- Dr. Sandra Lee, aka Dr. Pimple Popper, briefly makes hundreds of thousands of dollars a month on YouTube.
- That’s over, she told Insider, because many advertisers don’t want to appear next to “graphic” content.
- Lee was upset that her “educational” videos were punished by YouTube’s “subjective” process.
The founder of an acne-prone YouTube channel says she loses nearly six-figures worth of monthly revenue streams when the site says her content is “too graphic” to make money.
Dr. Sandra Lee, also known as Dr. Pimple Popper, told Insider her YouTube channelWith 7.5 million subscribers and nearly 5 billion views, the company is struggling to generate significant revenue from advertising.
After earning nearly $100,000 a month from YouTube viewing between 2014 and 2016, the site told her she couldn’t make money from her content.
YouTube revenue
YouTubers like Lee make money From their video ads, memberships, and some revenue from premium subscribers.
When her “pop” viewers started watching her videos in the billions, it became Lee’s main source of income.according to Influencer Marketing Center Estimates If 1,000 views generated $3 to $5, Lee could have made $15 million to $25 million from those views.
However, YouTube Users are discouraged from posting “graphical or violent content” on its channel with a warning that it will be removed. This includes “shots or images showing bodily fluids, such as blood or vomit, with the intent to shock or disgust the audience.”
This is usually aimed at targeting harmful content and discouraging violence or trauma, but Lee’s blasting videos seem to fall into this category as well. A graph seen by Insider detailed the sharp drop in revenue in 2016, when her team said YouTube told her the videos couldn’t be monetized.
But Lee said her posts were attacked by YouTube for her posts, arguing that her videos were just for education.
“I’m really proud that kids now know what a lipoma is, or they know you can’t just squeeze a cyst — you have to completely remove the bag to remove it,” she said.
“We’re teaching people about psoriasis or hidradenitis, but if you’re not motivated to post that, how are people going to learn?”
Fighting medical disinformation
Lee felt she was helping fight medical disinformation by being a verified source in dermatology, and was frustrated with YouTube’s behavior.
“They suddenly changed the rules,” Lee said, noting that advertisers don’t want to be associated with a channel where blackheads pop up.
“them [social media platforms] It gets bigger and bigger because of all these new posters, but then they wait until they get big enough that they can suppress it and confine it. “
Lee has since set up a members-only area where viewers can get exclusive pop music, while she also earns revenue from her clinic, shows on cable channel TLC and her skincare brand.
But she noted that TikTok, where she has more than 15 million followers, is also starting to clamp down on content like Li’s. Some of her TikTok videos now come with content warnings.
“What’s dangerous, what’s shocking, what’s educational,” Li said.
YouTube did not respond to a request for comment.
