Charlie Chang is a Youtube content creator who was able to build a $1 500 000 per year online business after getting rejected from more than 15 medical schools earlier on in his career.
In this article, we are bringing you the story of Charlie Chang as he shares it with the team at CNBC Make it. Charlie explains how he overcame the adversity of being rejected from 15 medical schools in 2014 to building a $1 500 000 per year online business by 2021.
Before working as an online content creator, Charlie’s life plan was already planned out by his parents, just like any other child with a dream to become a doctor. The plan was to go to medical school, get a six-figure job as a doctor, and make his parents proud.
Unfortunately, none of that worked out. Charlie realized that he grew to hate blood and needles and worst of all, he got rejected from more than 15 medical schools after finishing college in 2014.
From 2014 to 2019, Charlie took on tutoring side hustles, did some modeling gigs, started a drop shipping business, and even worked as a real estate agent. But nothing was earning him a steady and consistent income.
After several business attempts, Charlie finally found something that worked: Posting financial advice on YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok. In 2021, his content creation business brought in $1 500 000 million in revenue.
Getting Started
Charlie says he had been posting on YouTube since 2006, but the content was random and inconsistent. This time around, he decided to get serious about it and he choose his main theme to be "talking about money". From earning to saving to investing.
"Growing up in a painfully frugal family, I was always interested in finding ways to be smarter about earning, saving, and investing. In 2018, I created a new YouTube channel dedicated to financial advice. I posted almost every day, as well as on Instagram and TikTok.", Charlie says.
In 2018, Charlie created his new YouTube channel dedicated to providing financial advice, especially to Gen-Z and Millenials. This time round he chose to become more consistent with his work as he created a video and posted almost every day and shared them on Instagram and Tiktok as well.
Starting from the Bottom
Charlie says that his first few videos received around a dozen views each, of which half were from his mom. At this time, he was still earning most of his money through odd jobs and side hustles.
Things upscaled in April 2020, about a month after Covid-19 was declared a pandemic. Charlie noticed a spike in interest in stimulus-related content. That month, he posted 20 YouTube videos about the stimulus and relief efforts and one of his videos went viral and ended up earning him $10 078 in ad revenue and 30 300 new subscribers in just that single month.
In May 2020, he posted 19 videos and made $15 791 in ad revenue. And in June 2020, he landed his first sponsorship deal with Foundr, an online education company that paid him $250 to create one TikTok post.
Charlie continued to experiment with different types of video content to see what was most effective in growing his audience and attracting interest from brands.
By November 2020, he had reached around 200 000 subscribers and secured another partnership deal. At this point, Charlie decided to launch his first online course teaching people how to start their own successful YouTube channels.
In 2021, he added affiliate marketing to his income streams by promoting links from several financial service providers that reached out to him. This helped him earn $86 000 in January and then scaled to an average of $150 000 per month in 2021.
Today in 2022, Charlie has over 650 000 Youtube followers and he has been earning an average of $197 700 per month through five income streams that are all based on the Youtube channel.
Building 5 Income Streams from Youtube
Charlie has been able to build 5 solid income streams from his Youtube channel of which the majority bring in passive income and allow him to work wherever and whenever he wants. He says that he works for a maximum of 35 hours a week on his schedule.
"Some days I’ll work zero hours, and other days I’ll put in 12 hours. On average, I work 35 hours per week." — Charlie says.
Here’s How He Built Each of His Income Streams:
1. Affiliate marketing: 40% of monthly income
With affiliate marketing, Charlie earns a commission for promoting another brand’s product or services. He posts affiliate links in the descriptions of his YouTube videos and on his website, then he gets paid each time someone is directed to a brand’s product page or makes a purchase.
To make passive income through affiliate marketing, you need to include links to targeted content in a niche that people are searching for. This can lead to clicks for months, even long after you’ve posted helping you earn a steady passive income.
Charlie says that he gets most of his affiliate deals through partnership management platforms like Impact Radius, Partnerstack, and Share-A-Sale. Creators with any audience size can use these websites to find and join affiliate link programs.
2. Brand sponsorships: 25% of monthly income
With brand sponsorships, companies essentially pay Charlie to mention them in one of his videos or on his website.
He says that Brands typically reach out to him via the email address on his YouTube profile, but he also works with agencies like Spacestation to secure more sponsorships.
Charlie says that finding a niche helped him to grow a loyal and authentic audience, which has been crucial to his success. He answered Covid-related finance questions that no one else was addressing then he took the concepts with the highest audience engagement and ran with them.
"What I love about the business I’ve built is that the money I make isn’t directly tied to my time," says Chang. "I can choose when and where I want to work."
3. YouTube ads: 25% of monthly income
Charlie makes another quarter of his income from YouTube Adsense ads that appear before or during his YouTube videos.
To join this program, you must have at least 1 000 subscribers and 4 000 hours of watch time in the last 12 months. Once you’re part of the program, it’s important to post consistently and create videos based on what your audience responds well to.
4. Online course sales: <5% of monthly income
Charlie has created 2 courses so far which are on growing a Youtube channel "6-Figure YouTube Academy" and personal branding "Personal Brand Masterclass".
He filmed and edited the courses himself with the aid of the Final Cut Pro X software and he hosted them on Kajabi. Charlie uses his Tiktok, Instagram, and Youtube account to promote the courses and he admits that he doesn’t spend any money on advertisements.
5. Coaching: <5% of monthly income
Charlie also holds consultation and coaching sessions with clients who are interested to meet one-on-one to consult on how to make their businesses more successful. He holds his sessions on Zoom, which allows him to meet anyone from anywhere across the world. He charges $500 per 60-minute session.
Plans for the future
Charlie is now building a SaaS platform called StartupWise, which is a resource platform for new businesses and entrepreneurs. He is also working on a company called Side Hustle Mastery, and its complementary newsletter called Hustle Club, and all of these are still centered on his initial idea which was centered around the topic of money to help people learn how to earn, save and invest money in different ways.
Conclusion
Charlie Chang is a Youtube content creator and serial entrepreneur who overcame adversity and went on to build a $1 500 000 per year business that's centered on educating people on personal finance and entrepreneurship.
After failing to meet his career goal of becoming a doctor, he is now a 7 figure online entrepreneur and also the founder of StartupWise, a company that gives entrepreneurs insights on how to become successful with their ventures. You can catch him more frequently through his YouTube channel under his name, Charlie Chang.
