Making Money & a Name with YouTuber Evasive

Host Tara Jabbari sits down with influencer Nikole Eva, aka Evasive on YouTube, for this episode. After studying film, gaining experience as an editor, and working towards being a comedy writer, Eva started her YouTube channel to get her name out there… and it has been working! Tara and Eva talk about the start of her YouTube channel, how to make money through the videos, copyright issues, the importance of engaging with comments to build your audience, and much more!

Evasive YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUGZFAqUNtF_kJF80XOa5zQ
For business inquiries email: theevasiveone@gmail.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nikole_eva_/ 

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Transcript

00:01 - VO
Quiet on the set. All together, move, move and action. 

00:10 -VO
Welcome to Media Monuments presented by Women in Film Video in Washington DC. Media Monuments features conversations with industry professionals speaking on a range of topics of interest to screen-based media makers. 

00:26 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Welcome everyone to Media Monuments podcast. I am your host for this episode, Tara Jabbari, and today we have the comedian Nicole Eva, aka Evasive, on her YouTube. The YouTube is a video essay, mostly on films, and has over 39,500 subscribers and over 2 million views. Welcome, eva, thank you for having me so full disclosure. I was watching some of your videos. Our co-producer, brandon, found you and we're starting to work with more influencers because it's a new form of screen-based media. He's like this is a really fun YouTuber. You should check it out and all that stuff. So I did and I was like you know what, when I interview, I want to put on some makeup because you always have the cool winged eye on your necklace. So I hope you appreciate this is not what I do for everybody. 

01:28 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
I do appreciate it. Even if we're not on video, I still appreciate it. 

01:32 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Well, eventually we'll get there. 

01:35 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
Eventually. 

01:37 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
So first I wanted to ask you some of the basics that we usually ask for a lot of people who gains their career through the internet, through social media. When did you start using social media for work? 

01:52 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
That's a complicated question. So a little bit about my backstory. I went to NYU New York University for film school and before I went to university, and also during and then after, I made several attempts at YouTube, because YouTube was what I always gravitated toward. It was the social media that, since it first started, I watched videos on, so I always wanted to be a part of it, and it was a lot of trial and error over the course of about eight or nine years before I finally found something that stuck, and even that it's still not completely my career. Yet I still have a day job that pays most of the bills, but YouTube is slowly inching its way toward a full-time job the more I work at it. 

02:41 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
I mentioned just now and throughout your online presence that you did go to film school. Did you always want to be sort of like a video essayist, a reviewer or what was the original like? What would you hope to be doing? And then you turned into the YouTuber. 

02:58 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
My career goals I've set all along is that I would like to write for TV comedy shows. As we all know, you can't just go on LinkedIn and apply to write for a show. It's the kind of thing where you have to be invited and it's an inner circle and who knows who, and the only way you can really hope to get a job like that is to push your name out there. And since I want to do comedy, so many TV comedy writers also do stand-up and also do other things and that's how they're discovered. So it was all kind of feeding into those career goals and that was why I started doing YouTube. And then this last year it kind of took off for me and it's been slowly. The snowball has been building and building and I just am continuing to work at it and trying to continue to put my name out there through that and through stand-up. 

03:54 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
One of your videos on your YouTube is that you reached 10,000 subscribers in April early April and now it's about six months later at this time of recording, and you have just shy of 40,000. This big jump in such a short time what do you think really caused it? 

04:14 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
Well, to me part of it is that I'm fulfilling a niche that I haven't seen fulfill on YouTube before. You know, it took me a while of figuring out what kind of videos catch the algorithm and what kind of videos get the most views, and I found that the two types of videos that are guaranteed success are ones where I watch all of a certain category of movies, so every best picture winner, every worst picture winner and then the others is this second series I've started, where I have groups of LGBTQ people but I'm going to be expanding out in the future watch an offensive movie and react to it, and then I build that into a bigger video essay, and that came about because I have made all these friends through doing stand-up comedy in New York and I realized I had this idea and there was no one else on YouTube who was doing it, and so I saw an opportunity there to fulfill that niche, and it's paying off. 

05:14 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Yeah, I haven't finished the Razzie episode, but I watched the best picture yesterday and, for the right, I love the godfather. Barbie makes a comment about the Godfather and I'm like you know what? It's not just white guys who love it, it's like it's such a female show. Yeah. 

05:32 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
The Oscar video. That was I'm. I actually got a lot of Really angry comments from people who were I bet and just insulted that I would gladiator I, but a lot of those were throwaway jokes. 

05:45
It's good. No, it's a lot of these, a lot of my personality in YouTube. Which I think people don't a lot of people don't realize is that it is a character like in real life. I'm. I'm not like that, I'm a lot more. You know, I enjoy watching these old movies, regardless of whether or not you know, I find them entertaining. I still find them interesting. But on YouTube there are much less people who want to see a serious analysis of Oscar movies and there are people who want to see a funny analysis of Oscar movies. 

06:15 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
I mean the Rebecca one made me laugh, really laugh, yeah, and that was also that entire video was. 

06:21 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
I wasn't expecting it to get the views it did. That was my first video to really catch the algorithm and to really take off, so I wasn't expecting it to get so many views going in. And now, looking back on it, it's like I Kind of want to pardon, wants to do the video again and like go into more detail about these movies. But then I get other comments that are like this is I just love that you, you know, only talk about each one so briefly. Yeah, some people really hated that but some people really loved it. 

06:52 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
The Razzie one is like twice as long or more, yes, and it covers half the movies because the Razzie one. 

06:59 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
I actually took the time to explain each of these movies and why they won worst picture and what's so bad about them or what's not so bad about them, and and I have other ideas, like I would want to return and, do you know, watch every worst Actress winner, like cover, some of the other award categories. 

07:21 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Yeah, that would be good. There's a couple of podcasts that do like just I've been a guest on a couple that would just focus on an actor or just Even a music composer, were just the director. I. 

07:36 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
Have a friend one of my friends that I made on YouTube. Her name is Nikki Kerry and she has Over 200,000 subscribers. She's way further along than I am, but she was in my Razzie video and she just put it. She actually just put out a video where Part one she just split in two parts but she is watching every Ryan Gosling movie and she was like your channel kind of Inspired me to take on a video topic like that. 

08:02 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Yeah, and then the other kind of niche that you kind of touched on Is having people in the LGBTQ plus community watching a film. One of the top videos that you got views on is you. I made trans people watch Jack and Jill yeah, yes which I had never seen. So I appreciated you giving me a recap. I'm like, yeah, I don't need to see this. 

08:28 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
But it's so funny of. 

08:31 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
They're like you know what? It's a lot less offensive than I thought it would be. And and then the other one is she's the man Right. Yes, that's the one I just put out. Yeah, that one is the most recent one. And what it was interesting is to hear a couple of the trans people saying oh, I could totally relate to what this character said about being forced to prove themselves that they are, the gender that they are saying they are, or something, or like hiding or something like that. Where did you decide to kind of decide on those kinds of niches as well? 

09:05 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
A lot of it is just circumstance. I do stand-up comedy in Brooklyn and Manhattan. So just through stand-up comedy I met a lot of these people and I'm like these people are so funny and so many LGBT topics on YouTube or just in general, especially transgender topics, are so serious and so very analytical and so academic and I wanted to kind of show like hey, transgender people can be funny too. These comedians exist and they have existed for decades. And this is kind of my way of showing that and kind of bringing exposure to the community in a way that's not just very depressing and dour and actually show people having fun and doing, just hanging out and watching a movie and I present it. I say I made whatever, but that's just to catch the algorithm. These people are all my friends and they're all so happy to be in these videos. 

10:09 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Yeah, and that one is a great way. I mean, I was texting my friend who's trans and said, oh, I got to interview this person this week and I'm really enjoying this. I just I want to get your thoughts. 

10:22 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
I just really wanted to get my trans comedian friends, but even like my next video that I'm working on right now, we're going back to Adam Sandler. I made gay men watch. I now pronounce you Chuck and Larry. That's that recording has turned out great and I finished the script, so I'm editing that one next and I have this whole. You know I send my videos. Please tell me what other movies you want me to make people watch. And now I have this whole list. 

10:51 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
What have been some of the things that you were seeing with finding these niches, the film categories, the trans or the LGBTQ plus? It's just been. 

11:02 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
I mean, of course you make any videos on the topic like this, you're going to get really hateful people in the comments, but I've been lucky that those have been in the minority. You know, maybe 10 or 12 out of thousands of comments, and if I see hateful comments I just delete them right away. But I found just a lot of you know, especially LGBTQ people in the comments that are just saying you know, this is so good. I've never seen anyone do a video like this and you know I love this format. Please keep making more, please cover this movie, please talk about this. And it's just so interesting to be in this position now where I have people messaging me and asking me like, hey, can you talk about this, can you cover this? 

11:44 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
topic. I wanted to now get more in the technical aspects of it. So what are some of your favorite tools that you use to film and what kind of software or tools do you use for editing A lot? 

11:59 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
of my YouTube so far has been just an evolution. So when I started, I just was using my iPhone for the first few videos, and then I upgraded to this cheap DSLR that I got used off of eBay and now, more recently, I finally got, you know, a more modern camera, which is what my most recent video was recorded on. For editing, I use Final Cut Pro because you know, I know, adobe is better, adobe Premiere is the superior software, but I'll, cut pro is just what I'm so used to because I've been using it for so long and it's just easier that way, because I am so used to the shortcuts and everything, even if it is less efficient than using Adobe. And then for audio, I mean, I just have this Yeti blue microphone that I picked up in 2014 and still works great and I haven't had much of a reason to change from that. 

12:57
So equipment wise is very basic and I was actually surprised that, with how basic and kind of low quality some of the equipment was, that my videos still took off the way they did, because on YouTube you see people who are using the most, you know, advanced, expensive cameras and best microphones, but I found it didn't really matter what your equipment is as long as everything else in the video comes together. You know the audience kind of, because you have to remember that most of these people who watch YouTube videos are watching them on their phone. So super high quality only makes a difference if you're trying to project it on the TV. And looking at the YouTube analytics, I can see clearly that 75% of the people who watch my videos are watching it on their phone. 

13:42 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Yeah, and I think one thing that we are starting to notice with influencers is that it is more of the personality, the genuineness, as well as the content that people are more focusing on when they go on YouTube or when they go on other forms of social media not necessarily a plot or something. 

14:02 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
Yes, I mean it helps, but I try to do small little callbacks to previous videos, recurring jokes and such, but it is mostly just a personality thing more than anything else. 

14:17 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
And going back to some of the technical stuff, one question I have is that how do you deal with copyright issues when you do talk so much about these films? How do you get away with it with YouTube? 

14:28 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
So a lot of it is just learning from how other YouTubers have done it over the years. The big thing to know is that some copyright holders care a lot more than others and if you talk about technically, these things are copyrighted. But there is such a thing as fair use law which says that if it's a review or a commentary or something of that nature, then using those clips is allowed because it's fair use. But there are some companies that are a lot more litigious or just a lot more annoying in general, like my she's the man video was hit with a copyright claim about a week after I published it and then I appealed and they took the copyright claim off because it was clearly a review. But that's an issue of Viacom, the parent company that owns Paramount Pictures. They also own Nickelodeon. 

15:23
They have always been notorious on YouTube since YouTube's inception. I think they sued YouTube a few times in like the late 2000s and they've always been very much an enemy of people on YouTube because they always just go after anyone who does any reviews or anything of theirs. But other companies out so much and especially if you do old movies, which I do I'm covering older movies especially they don't really seem to care, and I think that in the earlier days of YouTube, things were a lot more kind of wild west, where these copyright holders could come in and just mass claim everything. And now YouTube has been around for so long that there's a very well established system that prevents reviews and other things like that from just being automatically taken down, which is part of the benefit, I guess, of me starting a YouTube this late into the game, because I've seen over the last decade how YouTube has evolved. 

16:20 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Is YouTube your favorite and the one that you really want to concentrate on, or are there any other platforms, online platforms that you are gearing towards? You're like you know what. This is kind of like the new YouTube that I wouldn't mind working on. Well, I also. 

16:34 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
I mean, I use Twitter I guess Axe now Twitter, instagram but YouTube is the platform that is most profitable by far. So I've kind of put a lot of my eggs in the YouTube basket for that reason, and to me it kind of also just shows staying power that Vine came and went and then TikTok replaced Vine. I'm on TikTok as well, but I have mostly just been using it to post. I'm going to start posting more short clips from my videos to feed in to the YouTube, because YouTube is where the money is and I don't really know of any other platforms that enable you to make money like that. I mean, tiktok has monetization systems, but it works very differently. Same thing with Twitch, for example, twitch streaming. The monetization system is very different and I've most people that I've seen on the internet kind of put all of their time and effort into one social media and then everything else is kind of just supporting the main driver of income. 

17:42 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
And what do you mean about the money through YouTube? Is it through YouTube that they go through your Patreon, or is it possible to make money directly from YouTube? 

17:52 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
So it's both. Youtube has their ad revenue system where they give you a certain amount of money per 100 views. A lot of it is up to the creator. You can decide do you want ads in the beginning, do you want ads in the middle, do you want ads in the end? And you make more money the more ads you put in the video. And then Patreon also is helpful with that, because through Patreon that's a more consistent. This is how much money I'm getting a month from Patreon. 

18:23
Youtube is it's monetization system. It's honestly a little bit annoying because they pay out once a month from the previous month's earnings. So on October 21st I will get all of the money I earned before September 21st. Like it's a month out. So even if you have a video that's a hit, you're not going to see the money from that video for over a month because of just the way YouTube's monetization process works. And I believe the way they do that is because they don't want to pay you out until they're sure that your video is not a copyright violation. So I think that's part of why they wait that long. But it makes it difficult for people who rely on YouTube for their income because you have to kind of plan things very far and advance. Even if your video is a success, you're not going to see the money for more than a month after you publish the video. 

19:21 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Yeah, that's a great point. Have you spoken to people who do make most of their living through YouTube and that's how you learned like playing way in advance and all that stuff? 

19:32 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
Yes, I still have a day job right now and I would like to do YouTube more full-time, but I'm not quite at the point yet where I can do that. And there's also other things to consider, like YouTube doesn't give you health care. Youtube doesn't even take out money for taxes. You have to do the math in your head of how much money you're going to owe and taxes for how much you make. So the only way to really go quote unquote full-time on YouTube is to be consistently making above what you need to live, because you have to also factor in all these other expenses and it's a long process to get there. 

20:11
Very few people can build it up overnight. And once you do make that your full-time job, then it becomes that much more stressful because you alone are responsible for your own income. You can't expect to be, you know, you can't expect to paycheck every week. You have to really push and work hard and you also can't be guaranteed that every video is going to be a success. So your income really fluctuates if you go to YouTube full-time, unless you're one of these really big YouTubers that has a team behind you and you put out a video every week or every other day that consistently gets tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands if you switch, is not what I'm doing. I am very much quality over quality at this point. I would like to in the future, expand and bring in other editors and bring in more help, but at the moment it's solely a one-person job. That's a lot of work. 

21:05 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
You have a lot of edits in those videos. As I was trying to pay, I was like how did you do the whole American beauty and then you put the guy that they're watching? 

21:15 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
Yeah, that effect in particular. That was Final Cut Pro. That was using a shape mask and then moving each quarter to be like right on the TV set and then animating it so that the square slowly gets bigger as the camera zooms in. It's just, I've been doing editing for so long that a lot of this stuff is now second nature to me and I don't even have to think about it. I just know exactly how to do it. But it's a skill that took years and years of practice. 

21:42 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Is there something that you're noticing, being a film student, that you would like to see change in within the film industry as it continues? 

21:53 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
It goes back to what I said earlier about how so many of these, especially with transgender people, they're very serious. It's either you're that or in the past, when it was offensive, it was played off as a joke, and I just think that there's so many opportunities in media to let LGBTQ people be funny and make comedy. Not everyone wants to see Brokeback Mountain depressing gay and queer stories. I've met so many people that are genuinely really funny great comedians here in Brooklyn and it's just like there's representation. But then there's representation. That's funny and I feel like comedy is such a way to connect people and bring people together and have them think about things in a way that they wouldn't otherwise think about. And I know me personally I enjoy comedy a lot more than I enjoy drama and I just think that there's a real untapped market for especially transgender and queer people creating comedy. 

23:01 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
There's so many facets of different people and it's not always just going to be a person with depression or in bullying, and the one that came to my mind is moonlight. But then I know lots of people who are gay and even in your videos where you're showing them trans people watching they say some of the funniest things. They're like I see you. I see you Kind of. I don't think that's what the character was supposed to be like. 

23:28 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
They're supposed like meaning that that's like a thing I have this whole long list now of movies that I can cover in this format Stuff that's more well known to stuff that's a little bit more obscure. But I think this format is really working for me and I'm going to continue doing it into the next year, and especially now that the writer strike has ended and the acting strike is starting to end, you know, kind of put out those feelers like hey, yeah, this is what I do on YouTube, the way I know how to write and try to find, start looking for comedy writing jobs that way. I don't expect anything to happen right away, or even in the near future, but at least I have my name and my face out there and I can show people. You know this is what I do, this is how I work and this is the kind of writing that I bring to the table. 

24:25 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
What is the best way for people to find your work and to reach out if they wanted to? Well, there's why you too. 

24:33 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
There's some people on YouTube who don't read their comments. I love to read my comments. 

24:36 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Oh, I noticed you were commenting and liking every single comment and all I was like, oh, this is a lot of work. 

24:43 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
I just have fun and it really helps to get that feedback and I just like to see the people who watch my videos and interact with them, because before I started doing YouTube, I would see people who got all these views and all these comments and I was like this looks like so much fun to have an audience. Besides that, I'm also on Instagram Nicole underscore, Ava. I'm very responsive on Instagram For business inquiries. I have my email, the evasive one at gmailcom. It's links on my YouTube. I say those three are really the best ways, but if anyone leaves a comment, I do read all of the comments because I just I love to know that I have supporters and I also just like to see what other ideas people have for videos. I've gotten so many good ideas for topics to cover in the future just for reading the comment. 

25:38 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Well, I'll definitely put the links, especially to YouTube, the Instagram and business email in the show notes. But this reminds me of one other thing when you are online and I've discussed this with a couple other influencers in the past episodes how do you take care of yourself when you see more negativity or even a couple of negative comments? Because that sometimes is the thing that gets people stuck. You get 10 positive and one bad. 

26:06 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
That's very true. The negative comments linger in your head more so than the positive ones. Even if you get hundreds of positive comments, it's that one negative comment that you really remember. For me, I mean, if it's just hate speech, if it's just straight up hate speech, I just delete it. But if it's sometimes the negative comments are more constructive and those I will leave up and sometimes respond to as a way to, because a lot of the time when people leave negative comments they don't expect you to respond. 

26:38
And I had this really funny interaction once earlier this year where someone left this paragraph and paragraphs on the Oscars video about how much they hated it and how terrible it was and how I'm terrible at analyzing movies. And I responded and just said, yeah, you're right. And the guy really threw him for a loop. He was like wait, didn't you make the video? I was like yeah, and I agree with you. He's like but you made the video. I'm like, yeah, so. And somehow this guy ended up responding like you know what this is the best response to criticism I've ever seen on YouTube. I still don't like your video, but I don't hate you as a person. I think you're funny. Like, sometimes you didn't get them to turn around, because a lot of the times people on YouTube are not expecting you to respond and so when you do respond, it's almost like oh, there is a real person on the other side of the camera and I almost feel like sometimes, if people see when the comments responding, they're less likely to leave a negative comment because they don't want to be put on the spot. It's not for everyone, but I enjoy kind of messing with people like that and I think that's part of why I'm able I've been able to build this audience is because I'm so interactive with the people in the comments and I've done two live streams so far and I had people give me feedback Like I just love how you interacted with the chat and talked back and forth to people who were there, really made it feel like you know this is a community and that you're a real person and not just you know this internet, whatever. That you're a down to earth person who's willing to talk to people. 

28:18
And I have people who on Instagram or on Patreon where you know one of my Patreon supporters who gives me $10 a month he visited New York and he messaged me on Patreon like hey, I've never been to New York before. I know you live here. Do you have any recommendations of places to go? And I actually gave him recommendations. It just I think it's important to have that human element and building an audience. And some people that's harder if your audience gets too big and it's like, well, I can't answer all these messages, I'm too busy. But at least starting out, if you interact with your audience it really builds kind of like audience loyalty and it really just helps to build your name and get yourself out there more because you know people feel like you're listening to them and you're listening to the comments they leave and the feedback. 

29:06
And I was just, you know, watching YouTube videos. 

29:08
I didn't leave comments because I didn't really see a point. 

29:10
I'm like the person who makes his videos probably never going to read it, you know. 

29:16
And even if they do or they're not going to respond and it's like what's? I never really saw a point to leave in comments. So part of why I respond to comments so much and like comments is because I want people to feel like they're being listened to and that there is a point in leaving comments, because the way the YouTube algorithm works is the more people like and comment on your video, the more YouTube will promote it. But more so than that. I just enjoy talking to people and enjoy knowing that there's people who are watching and enjoying these videos and it gives me more inspiration to keep creating because there's people who are expecting me to make another video and when you have that expectation it kind of pushes you to continue creating, versus an artist who makes something and then nobody watches it. Just to me, you know, if you enjoy creating something, that's great, but to me I want my things, the things I create, to be viewed, because otherwise it feels like why am I making this? 

30:13 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Well, thank you so much, Eva. I really appreciate your time. Um definitely will have all your links on the show notes and, yes, the next time I am in New York City I will check out your next standup. I will let you know, Thank you. 

30:28 - Nicole Eva (Guest)
I don't do standup as much as I used to because YouTube has been so much more profitable than the standup ever was, but I still. I try to do an open mic and practice at least once a week, and then people will invite me to perform at their shows, and the more that my YouTube career builds, the more invitations I'll get. 

30:47 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Yeah, exactly, and it's that muscle that needs to be continuously worked on to comedy especially. Yes, yes, it is so. Thank you so much. 

30:56 - VO
Thank you. Thank you for listening to media and monuments, a service of women in film and video. Please remember to review, rate and subscribe wherever you listen to this podcast. For more information about WIF, please visit our website at wwwwifasenfrancvasenfictororg. Media and monuments is produced by Sandra Abrams, candice Block, brandon Ferry and Tara Jabari and edited by Emma Klein, with audio production in mix by Steve Lack: Audio. For more information about our podcast, visit mediaandmonumentscom. That's a wrap.