Y-Combinator’s FanHero helps Youtubers sell Merchandise to their Fans

There are a lot of new YouTube stars out there, dudes who have a bunch of subscribers to their channels, watching their videos and whatnot. But sometimes it’s tough to make a ton of money from YouTube. I mean, advertising isn’t everything it’s cracked up to be, and then you share some revenue with YouTube and the next thing you know there’s not that much left.

They’ve got a lot going for them. I mean, it’s cheaper than ever to buy a camera and get started and edit your stuff together and, man, there are a ton of people on YouTube. But they just wish they could make a little more money, you know. It’s hard out there being a YouTube creator.

FanHero is all about helping those YouTube guys make money in, like, non-advertising ways. Giving the community ways to support them through commerce — you know, selling stuff. It’s like the classic merch model, like how you go to your favorite band’s show and you buy a t-shirt or a CD.

But with this you don’t have to go anywhere. You’re just on the Internet and then — BOOM — you can buy their t-shirt right there. Oh yeah, and you can pay what you want. Like, it gives you a suggested amount to pay for a t-shirt or a poster, and it tells you how much your favorite YouTuber gets from that.

If you’re on YouTube and have a bunch of fans, it’s really easy to set up. Just make an account and upload an image and FanHero will put it on stuff. Posters, t-shirts, iPhone cases. You know the drill. And then you tell your millions of subscribers about it and they buy your stuff and you get a check, as long as you’ve made $100 or more that month.

It’s that easy. Maybe you don’t have time to make a new video this week, but hopefully this’ll give you a little spending money in the meantime, I mean, until you can upload something new and get those views up.

The guys behind FanHero are these Stanford CS undergrads Kevin Xu and Charlie Guo, who like, grew up on YouTube idolizing YouTubers. These guys don’t remember a time when the world’s biggest stars weren’t on it. They’re in Y Combinator now because that’s where all the cool kids go to learn about the Internet and monetizing and stuff.

Via: TechCrunch