How LESS Tech Made Me More Money

Hinzugefügt: 2026-05-31

[00:00:00]I needed less tech to make more money.

[00:00:02]And the story in this video is proof of that. But listen, in that video about moving out with only a MacBook, I really messed up because I thought people wouldn't like my stories. So, I made a short story at the beginning and then immediately started talking about the MacBook like it was a review. But today, I decided to fix that and tell the whole story of how I earned money with less tech than you might think. How I literally started with an old PC, then moved to the MacBook setup you already saw on the thumbnail. And there won't be any boring reviews of the tech stuff I own. I won't sell courses either, but obviously this will be fun and uh for some people inspiring story about an ordinary student who decided to follow his own passion. Now, let's get started.

[00:00:40]All right, so you wouldn't judge me in the comments, let me clarify something.

[00:00:44]To earn the money and build my own online business, I didn't need any expensive MacBook at the beginning. I needed much, much less things than you might think, which was my PC, a $60 pair of headphones, and a $40 microphone. And even those were earned through hard work, not handed to me by my parents. I switched to the MacBook and AirPod setup a little later once I started earning the things I do. But logically, you only need two or three things to start, just like I did. Now, you might be wondering where I earned that amount of money.

[00:01:13]Well, that was YouTube. I'm a tech YouTuber as you probably know and I make personal videos or stories related to tech along with reviews, guides, and other content. And I've been managing this channel for more than a year and a half. And I'm really glad you guys like that style because my most popular video right now is sitting at around 1.2 million views. And for that, I seriously thank you. Now, let me tell you why I started this channel in the first place.

[00:01:36]Honestly, the idea came in the summer of 2024. I was a person who was highly interested in PC tech and building PCs.

[00:01:43]To be honest, I think my interest in computers originally came from gaming.

[00:01:46]Logically, you start by wanting to play games and then you slowly gain knowledge about the system that run them and then naturally you'll have an interest in PCs. That process was really satisfying to me and became one of my passions. At that time, I had a PC with an RTX 3060 Ryzen 5 2600X and a 16 GB of RAM, which I save up for as a McDonald's worker along with my headphones and other devices I buy while trying to make YouTube content. And the problem with only PC setup is you can't work outside of your house. And I didn't have a MacBook at that time. So I always wanted to get one for this exact reason because trust me, I've been making YouTube videos for a very long time, way before 2024. And I didn't have just one channel. I had multiple channels over the last 8 years that were unfortunately unsuccessful. At the beginning, I had an even worse setup with a low-end laptop and a $20 microphone from AliExpress.

[00:02:37]But this specific channel started in August of 2024 and became my best channel. so far and I hope it'll continue to be so. So, until October 2024, the channel was mostly random topics I found interesting, but I deleted those videos and switched to making videos about things I generally cared about, which is gaming and tech.

[00:02:54]For example, my first video were about piracy and games. At the time, I was experiencing gaming fatigue. So, I made a lot of videos sharing my thoughts, talking about why games felt boring and why older games felt more fun, nostalgic stuff and all of that. Those videos kind of worked getting around thousand 2,000 views which was still good at the time but I was overloaded with university and work back then so I only managed around one video per month maybe even less but after new year of 2025 I decided to lock in I set a goal of making at least eight videos every month to enable a monetization to be clear it didn't go exactly as planned but I still uploaded regularly then March changed my life I suddenly came up with the idea of making personal videos about tech not normal reviews or news videos, but videos about why you actually feel after getting a product. And the first video in that style was called you built your dream PC, but now gaming feels boring.

[00:03:45]Surprisingly, people loved it. Most people related to the story, and because of that, it gained nearly 10,000 views in one week. After that, I tried repeating the same idea with the different angles. I changed PCs to consoles, Minecraft, and different topics, but nothing worked like that first video. Then I finally realized I needed another relatable PC topic and accidentally I created my most popular series so far. Things you realize as soon as you buy specific product and that blew up too long allowing me to enable monetization on the channel. You don't even realize how happy I was at that point. And then I realized something important. I found a format people genuinely liked. So I made a video about gaming laptops because I personally had a bad experience with them and thought why not make another relatable video about my experience. The best thing about that format was that it worked for everyone. Some people related to it while others learned something new. And that gaming laptop video gained 100,000 views in a week, becoming the biggest video not only in this channel, but in my entire YouTube career. Then in April 2025, when I first enabled a monetization, the first sponsor reached out and offered me $70 for a video integration. For me, that amount already felt insane and out of excitement, I accepted immediately. Fortunately, that wasn't scam sponsor. And when I got that $70 on my bank account, I was generally shocked because it felt unreal. And considering that I earned around $900 overall from monetization in the first month, I already started thinking about quitting my job and focusing fully on YouTube. But thankfully, I realized that would have been a stupid idea. It was only my first month of monetization. So, I told myself, "Wait 3 months and you can quit." But let me be clear, my behavior at work changed. I constantly thought about video ideas while working, YouTube analytics, and what I wanted to create next. My mind was already somewhere else. I mean, I was earning around $600 per month from my job while making around $1,000 from YouTube. And eventually, my boss noticed. He called me into his office and said, "Listen, Aman, I think you're clearly not productive at work. What's happening?"

[00:05:43]Obviously, I couldn't say YouTube is finally working. So, I used my studies as an excuse, but it was clear he wasn't happy. And eventually he told me, "Starting from today, focus on your studies. Once you finish, you can come back. Walking out of that office felt terrible. I was scared because I lost my job and still had university payments.

[00:06:00]But at the same time, I felt free because now I have more time for YouTube. Luckily, I was still living with my parents then. So if YouTube failed, I had some kind of safety net.

[00:06:08]But obviously, I hoped YouTube would work because I genuinely loved the idea of becoming a tech YouTuber. getting free tech products from brands, getting paid for reviews, showing off with a MacBook at Starbucks while actually working this time. It sounded like a dream job. And thankfully, starting from May 2025, the channel didn't slow down.

[00:06:25]It kept getting better every month until eventually I reached a point where I could fully live off YouTube at 20 years old and earn more than the average salary of most ordinary workers. And honestly, it felt weird. The idea that I was earning more than my parents or people who worked much harder than me felt almost embarrassing. I remember constantly thinking, "This can't be real. Maybe this won't last forever."

[00:06:46]And in some way, I think that mindset protected me. It stopped me from becoming arrogant. I wanted to stay the same person no matter how much money I make. And for me, the trust and loyalty of my audience matters more to me than some green papers. Because at the end of the day, if I can live comfortably, help my parents invest, and build my own life, I don't think earning more suddenly makes me happier. So, I focused on trust. I wanted people watching my videos to think, "All right, this guy isn't lying to me." But of course, that doesn't mean I'm perfect. I make mistakes all the time. Tech is complicated, but I genuinely try. Trust me. And if something is sponsored, I will tell you directly. Not just because I'm trying to look like a good person, but genuinely because honesty is the priority in this channel. So, with every month, more and more sponsorship emails started coming in, which sounds great, but it also meant I had to become more selective. There was shady crypto stuff, useless AI slop, random products, and all kinds of weird offers mixed in with generally useful tech products I'd actually buy myself. And finding the good ones took a lot of time. Of course, I could have accepted everything just to make more money and save time, but I never saw value in promoting random products just because they paid me.

[00:07:51]Because if I did that, people who genuinely trust me could end up getting scammed. So, I started rejecting more and more deals. But despite that, I've had some really good deals so far. I got so much tech at my house that I even had to sell some of it cheaper in secondhand just to get rid of it. And all of that lead to the fact that my income still slowly grew around five times and my subscriber count became more and more.

[00:08:13]So I even reached 80k subs. So thanks for that. I'm grateful. Without you none of that would have happened. But right now you might be thinking, "Wow, such a lucky guy. He got what he wanted. He make money from his passion and his freedom." And honestly partly I agree.

[00:08:28]Luck definitely played a role. But before you think this happened overnight, hear me out because I'm not new to YouTube like you might think and I had more than seven channels that didn't blow up and most of them weren't even about tech. But still, I didn't want to give up at all. I just continued it no matter what. I had multiple burnout moments and I had dozens of moments where I thought maybe this is not for me. I also had moments when even my parents told me why are you sitting at your computer all day and playing games? Even though I wasn't. I just couldn't explain what I was doing. So for me, these 80K subscribers, 10 million views, and money from YouTube are not just a side hustle. It's a big business for which I sacrificed a lot of time, as well as good opportunities I had and still have, such as becoming a pilot, a flight attendant, or working in a good company as an IT specialist just by studying it. I mean, I had a chance to do all of those things, but I didn't like them, not going to lie, because creating something for people and building my own YouTube brand, like a big business, is more interesting to me.

[00:09:25]So now when somebody asks me what I do for a living, I proudly say I'm a full-time content creator. I always wanted to say that. I just couldn't because I wasn't earning money until April 2025. There was no proof. The channels were too small for me to officially call it a work. But obviously to this day, it hurts when I hear back, "Are you a student or do you do something else for a living?" Because those questions are proof that most people don't really care about my passion. They don't really want to understand that. But of course, I'm not mad at it nowadays. I've just learned to ignore them and I tried to keep going every day, becoming bigger and bigger while creating honest and true tech reviews for you. Maybe one day represent my country Kazakhstan as a big tech creator in Kazakhstan or Central Asia or even collab with some of the big tech YouTubers. By the way, if you want to hear the backstory of my creator journey way before this channel even existed, just let me know in the comments because in my opinion that deserves separate video. If enough people are interested, I'll make a video about it. So, this was the story of how I needed less tech to make more money. By the way, I also started a Discord server recently. And for everyone joining before we hit 100K subscribers, I'm giving a special exclusive role just for early supporters. Basically, an OG bait to prove you were here before 100K. So, if you want to be part of the community early, the link is down below. Thanks for your support. I'm glad that you like the video. Thanks for watching and take