Michou, whose real name is Miguel Mattioli, born in Amiens (Hauts-de-France), October 2, 2001, is a French videographer and YouTuber. He became known thanks to his content related to video games, published on the YouTube platform. With his eight million subscribers, he has become one of the highest paid YouTubers in France. We tell you everything about Michou’s career and salary and his journey, from YouTube to Twitch.
Michou’s journey
The emergence of video game broadcasting on video platforms like YouTube or Twitch allowed Michou to create a fan base passionate and loyal. Although he started filming himself in his bedroom in 2013, it was two years later that he decided to create his own channel. He participated in the emergence of video games such as Clash Royale and Fortnite and passed the million subscribers mark in the summer of 2018. A meteoric rise which can be explained by the personality of Michou, also quirky and endearing, a figure to whom the new generation has identified itself.
In 2020, he signed with Webedia and moved to Paris. The company ranks 6th among French online media groups with an average audience of twenty-eight million unique visitors per month in 2020, according to Médiamétrie. A collaboration that increases Michou’s popularity across France, since it has allowed him to double his number of subscribers on YouTube in two years, going from four to now eight million followers.
Although he is known as a creator of content related to video games, Michou has recently diversified by launching into musical creation. His clips are very successful, generating tens of millions of views and opening the doors to Dancing with the Stars in Michou, for the 11th season of one of TF1’s flagship shows. This new media exposure made him known to a new category of people, further strengthening his popularity on a national level. Thus, Michou’s salary also increases with his number of subscribers.
How is Michou’s salary composed?
Michou’s YouTube salary
To calculate the salary of a Youtuber, and therefore deduce the salary granted by YouTube to Michou, you must know that a thousand views bring in around €1. One million views can therefore generate around €1000. However, this figure is only an average and differs between YouTubers. When calculating the gain, for 1,000 views on YouTube, the CPM (cost per thousand views) must be taken into account. This is a metric for how much an advertiser would be willing to pay to show an ad a thousand times.
The CPM changes from one YouTuber to another. It seems difficult to define a precise amount, but the most popular Youtubers can have a CPM of $20 or more. That being said, it varies from $0.4 to $1.8 on average, and depending on four factors:
- the time of year;
- the content of the channel;
- viewing time on videos;
- the location of its audience.
If the scale seems a little more complex than it seems, let’s base it on a CPM of one euro per thousand views. Here is the monthly salary he could have earned from his views on YouTube since the start of the calendar year:
|
Month |
Salary (estimates) |
| January |
33,100€ |
|
FEBRUARY |
21,100€ |
|
March |
€7,000 |
|
April |
€18,200 |
|
May |
€32,200 |
|
June |
16,000€ |
|
July |
€14,400 |
|
August |
€14,400 |
| September |
€71,600 |
| October |
€7,300 |
In total, in 2022, Michou’s salary would therefore be around €235,300, just from January to October.
Product placements
Like a majority of well-known YouTubers, Michou also earns money through product placements and advertisements offered to him by companies seeking to gain visibility. With its community of eight million subscribers, the bill can quickly become steep for advertisers: it is not uncommon for them to exceed €10,000 and these amounts can sometimes hit the headlines. Michou has already earned nearly a million euros through this.
Diversified income
If his income linked to the production and distribution of videos takes up a preponderant part of his monthly salary, Michou has managed to diversify his activities. In addition to the salary he receives from his collaboration with Webedia, his appearance on television during the show Dancing with the Stars would have earned him nearly €60,000. A paltry sum in comparison with the new notoriety he acquired through his show, in particular thanks to the romance he lives with the one who was his dance partner during the show, Elsa Bois. The couple showcases themselves through social networks, notably via TikTok, to accumulate new additional income.
The ranking of French Youtubers with the most subscribers
As mentioned previously, it is difficult to quantify the income of a YouTuber as they are so diversified. The more popular a person is and attracts views, the more likely they are to generate high income, this is how the YouTube algorithm works. In addition, these are also the ones that will more easily attract advertisers.
Establishing a ranking of the best-paid YouTubers is therefore equivalent to identifying the content creators with the most followers, and therefore the most sought after by advertisers. Here is the ranking of the most popular French YouTubers:
- Squeezie – 17.5M subscribers
- Cyprien – 14.4M subscribers
- Norman – 11.9M subscribers
- Lama Faché – 9.24M subscribers
- TiboInShape – 8.8M subscribers
- Michou – 8M subscribers
- Amixem – 7.91M subscribers
- Rémi Gaillard – 7.21M subscribers
- McFly & Carlito – 7.19M subscribers
- Mister V – 6M subscribers
Youtuber, a full-time job
Earning a living thanks to YouTube requires putting in a significant amount of work and this in a plurality of areas that the general public does not necessarily understand. The image of the Youtuber is often summed up as that of a teenager who films himself from the microcosm of his bedroom. The reality is very different.
Producing videos is not enough. In addition to being creative and fashionable, they must be attractive. To achieve this, researching the subject, filming, editing, promoting, the biggest Youtubers are real entrepreneurs, sometimes at the head of a company employing several employees.
To find a place in this vast world of video content creation, it is essential to master the codes of the Internet. The skills of Michou and the other most popular content creators lie in this ability to have assimilated these mechanisms. Everyone has the talent, the method, to unite and generate a community, but also to keep it alive and make it prosper.
Michou leaves YouTube for Twitch
Youtuber Michou has announced that he is leaving the platform to devote himself solely to streaming on Twitch. This caused a real earthquake on the YouTube planet. As a reminder, Michou’s salary was around 230,000 euros on YouTube, just from January to October 2022.
During a three-hour live stream which took place on March 30, 2023, Michou made the switch between YouTube and Twitch and gained nearly a million subscribers in just a few days. It must be said that Michou had experienced many disappointments with YouTube. His channel was deleted and what followed was a nearly year-long battle to get his channel back and win back his subscribers.
Michou isn’t really leaving YouTube. Indeed, his lives will be broadcast on Twitch, a platform dedicated to live streaming, but he will continue to post the replays edited on the platform bought by Google in 2005. Twitch offers many advantages, notably on the live broadcasting that the YouTube algorithm greatly neglects. The platform also allows influencers to earn money through paid subscriptions, generally for 3 or 4 euros per month.
