6 Weird YouTube Formats That Turn Into 6-Figure Channels

Shane Hummus| 00:13:34|Apr 16, 2026
Chapters14
The video introduces six unusual YouTube formats that can earn six figures, explaining how these quirky niches work, why they succeed, and how viewers can discover their own unconventional format.

Weird, hyper-specific YouTube formats can pay six figures or more when you niche down and monetize beyond AdSense.

Summary

Shane Hummus breaks down six outrageously specific YouTube formats that actually pull in six-figure incomes. From miniature cooking channels to magnet-fishing and elevator tours, he shows that niche oddities can outperform broad topics when monetized effectively. He cites real channels and numbers: miniature cooking pulling six to eighteen thousand per month, Bondi Treasure Hunter around three to nine thousand, and Glamour D Dive in the upper five figures from AdSense. Shane emphasizes that the key isn’t popularity alone but how you monetize—through back-end deals, merchandise, affiliate links, and services. He also highlights that you don’t need huge views to win; some channels earn big through sponsorships, coaching, or selling products tied to their niche. The video doubles as a promo for his live workshop and his niche validator AI, promising practical steps to find a profitable, even quirky, niche. Expect concrete examples, skeptical realism, and a blueprint to test unusual concepts without sinking months into a bad niche. Shane ends with a call to action: attend the free training to learn niche selection, video ideation, and monetization strategies.

Key Takeaways

  • Miniature cooking channels earn roughly six to eighteen thousand dollars per month, with examples like miniature McDonald's and miniature ramen illustrating the format's appeal.
  • Vocal exercises and warm-ups channels can monetize far beyond AdSense, often earning most income from back-end methods despite seemingly modest view counts.
  • Magnet fishing channels (Bondi Treasure Hunter) can make three to nine thousand dollars monthly from YouTube and likely more via product sales and related channels.
  • Restoration channels (e.g., TysyTube Restoration) monetize through high-value restorations and related content, with examples like a lighter restoration video pulling substantial views and revenue.
  • Diesel Ducy elevator tours show a dedicated niche audience; even with moderate views, the format can produce six to nineteen thousand dollars monthly.
  • Glamour D Dive demonstrates profitable dumpster-diving content for a female creator, potentially reaching mid six figures with proper monetization beyond AdSense.
  • Key insight: a niche’s profitability often hinges on monetization strategy (ads are just a small piece); back-end sales, sponsorships, and services drive the real revenue.

Who Is This For?

Essential viewing for aspiring YouTubers who think only broad topics win; if you have a weird or niche obsession, this video explains how to monetize it and scale beyond AdSense. Also useful for creators looking to monetize unconventional content more effectively in 2026.

Notable Quotes

""six YouTube formats that are so weird that you're going to think that I'm making them up.""
Opening hook establishing the six bizarre formats.
""Miniature cooking and they make six to eighteen thousand dollars a month""
Concrete earnings example for the miniature cooking format.
""AdSense money... is only a tiny, tiny little percentage of the money you can make""
Explains why back-end monetization matters beyond AdSense.
""Diesel Ducy... elevator videos""
Describes the elevator-tour niche and its audience pull.
""Dumpster diving for girls... Glamour D Dive makes about $15 to $46,000 a month""
Shows profitability of a niche with female creator.

Questions This Video Answers

  • What unconventional YouTube niches actually make six figures?
  • How can I monetize a niche channel beyond AdSense?
  • Is it possible to make money on YouTube with a very small audience?
  • What are examples of weird formats that succeed on YouTube?
  • How do niche validation tools help you pick a profitable YouTube topic?
YouTube monetizationniche downweird formatsminiature cookingvocal exercises YouTubemagnet fishingrestoration channelselevator channelsdumpster divingShane Hummus live workshops
Full Transcript
I'm about to show you six YouTube formats that are so weird that you're going to think that I'm making them up. Filming elevator rides and making six-figures, cooking with toy utensils and earning six-figures, and throwing magnets in rivers and pulling in six-figures as well. These aren't normal formats, these are not normal YouTube niches, they're bizarre, they're completely random, and they're turning into six-figure channels. And today I'm going to be breaking down exactly how each format works, why weird wins, and how to find your own strange format that can actually pay you a full-time income. Or sometimes a lot more. And if you like this type of content, gently tap the like button and let's go right after I give you a small disclaimer. I'm known for being brutally honest and realistic on this channel. And most people who start on YouTube and try to make a full-time income, just like any other type of business out there, fail. There are no guarantees here and you should always do your own research. But that is why I make these videos which give you inspiration, give you motivation, but more importantly give you education and clarity on what does work and what doesn't work. And more than that, I do completely free and mega valuable live workshops like the one that I'm doing this week that clarify everything even further. And you can click the link in the description and the pin comment below to attend that. It's a live Zoom call where I will be covering the most important things like picking the right niche, picking the right video ideas, how to make videos efficiently, a step-by-step process for building out your YouTube channel, making sure that you have the right settings on your YouTube then afterwards, I have a Q&A where you can ask any question that you possibly have on how to grow and make money on YouTube. So this is a one-time free training. Make sure you attend it. Click that link in the description and the pin comment below. I'll also be giving away, just for this one time, some bonuses including an AI that actually helps you to pick your niche better. And this is an AI that we recently made better. So do not miss out on it. Click that link in the description and the pin comment below to attend, and I look forward to seeing you there. And with that being said, let's jump into number one on the list, which is miniature cooking. And this is both the format and the niche and the name of the channel all at once. Yes, the channel is called miniature cooking and they make six to eighteen thousand dollars a month doing miniature cooking. So if you look at their channel, you'll see miniature McDonald's, miniature pizza, miniature ramen, miniature Cheetos, Oreo cakes. And if you look at their most popular videos, you'll see best of miniature cooking compilation, 1000+ mini food recipes. Now according to VidIQ, they're making six to eighteen thousand dollars a month. According to ViewStats, they're making seven to twenty-one thousand dollars a month. And this channel has gotten over 650 million views. So yeah, I mean, based on the videos, I mean, this channel is hilarious, very interesting concept. I will say that the cooking niche is one of the most saturated niches. And when I say saturated, I it's not necessarily a bad thing. It just means that you have to niche down, right? You can't just do cooking videos these days and do well. You have to differentiate yourself from everyone else who's doing cooking videos. And here's one brilliant, genius way to do it, which is miniature cooking. And this just goes to show how important the niche is because if they were to do this same exact stuff, but they did it without it being miniature, I guarantee you they would not have had the same amount of success that they've had. All right, quick break. I'm hanging out with my brother Zach right now. He's not a tech guy at all and he made $214 in a single day on YouTube. And I just wanted to let you know that we are hosting a free, one-time live workshop. So one thing that people struggle with the most is finding their niche and that is why we actually created an AI called the niche validator that's going to help you find your niche or help you dial in your niche if you already have one. And we're going to be giving away this niche validator this week at a live workshop. And it's called the YouTube content advantage for making money in 2026. If you're struggling to find your niche or you don't want to commit months or even years to a niche that ends up not being profitable, then this is for you. So click the link in the description and the pin comment below. Once you register, hit add to calendar so it shows up on your Google, Apple, or Outlook calendar. And if for whatever reason you're watching this in the future, still check the link in the description and the pin comment below cuz we may be doing another live workshop in the future and it'll tell you when. Now you'll also be able to ask me questions live, so I look forward to meeting you. And you'll also get an update on how this guy is doing on YouTube as well. So see you this week and back to your regularly scheduled programming. And so yeah, that's why niching down is so important. Again, attend the live training, that's exactly what we're going to help you do. We even have an AI that helps you pick your niche. And this AI has been trained on thousands of hours in helping thousands of people pick their niche. Speaking of picking your niche, the second channel we have on this list was in the exact same position that you are right now. They were watching a video just like you were right now, watching one of the videos from my channel, and they listened to what I had to say, they clicked the link in the description, and they attended the live training, and they started taking action, and they were actually able to scale to over twenty thousand dollars a month before even joining our program. And this is Isaiah Harris, vocal exercises and warm-ups. And this is weirdly specific. The reason I included it in this video is because it's just a weirdly specific niche. Not singing, but vocal exercises and warm-ups. Now when you look at VidIQ, you'll see, "Oh, it says he's only making $62 to $186." When you look at ViewStats, it says he's only making $121 to $336, right? He's only getting about 45,000 views a month. So what gives, Shane? What do you mean he's making money? Well, the AdSense money that you get paid from views is only a tiny, tiny little percentage of the money you can make. AdSense, of course, are the ads that pop up on your channel and then you share the revenue with YouTube, right? Businesses pay YouTube to have ads pop up on your channel and then you share the revenue with them. And that is just a tiny percentage of the money that you can make. Isaiah, for instance, is probably making over a hundred times more from back-end monetization methods than he makes from AdSense. And that's another thing that I focus on is teaching people how to monetize properly on YouTube. Now Isaiah was basically a singing coach and he was spending a ton of money on Facebook ads to try to get new clients. As he put it, he was giving Mark Zuckerberg all of his money. And he did not want to give Mark Zuckerberg all of his money. And I even tried other ways of promoting myself like I tried Facebook ads like so many other courses and gurus will promote. And you know, I basically had like over $6,000 of that advertising on Facebook just go to the drain where, you know, I wrote Mark Zuckerberg a check and saw not a penny of that money back. And so he watched these videos and he decided to try to start getting singing clients from YouTube. And one of his very first videos popped off and got over 300,000 views and it just keeps going. And that was after his very first video popped off and got 21,000 views. And he has had a steady flood of clients coming in from YouTube ever since. So yeah, Isaiah's awesome, his channel's awesome as well. It's obviously weirdly specific. And the big lesson here is when you look at these numbers, don't just assume because a channel has low views that they don't make money. And also don't assume that a channel has high views and they do make money. That's just not the case. There's certain types of channels that don't need very many views to make a ton of money. And those are the types of channels I like to talk about as well on this channel and in my live training. So click that link in the description and the pin comment below to attend that. But you might be thinking, "Well, Shane, Isaiah's channel wasn't that weird. It's just weirdly specific. Get back to the weird stuff." Okay, I hear you. Bondi Treasure Hunter. This guy does what's known as magnet fishing. Now, magnet fishing has nothing to do with catching fish, believe it or not, and it has everything to do with getting metals out of water. And so he puts these super powerful magnets into the water and they basically find all kinds of different metals that would be lost to the world forever. And according to VidIQ, they're making about three to nine thousand dollars a month. And then they also have a website, Bondi Magnets, and they also have links in their description. So they're probably making a lot more than that because they sell their magnets on their website and they sell other stuff on there as well. And a lot of these tools are like thousand-dollar tools. And their most viewed video ever was Ultimate Criminal Canal Found Magnet Fishing Police on the hunt. And that got 21 million views and made from the AdSense alone. Who knows how many purchases they got from that video as well. And also the channel's gotten over 500 million views. So I'm sure they've made millions and millions of dollars from this channel. Rusty piece of metal been down the wall, it's pretty black and oily. But you might be thinking, "Shane, once they pull the stuff out of the water, what happens to it? It's probably just some really dilapidated metal." Well, actually, they probably sell it to a channel like this, TysyTube Restoration. This channel makes about 12 to 37,000 dollars a month and they restore all kinds of old stuff like lighters and swords and guillotines and knives and all kinds of stuff. And they record it on video and they put it on YouTube and they're making 12 to 37,000 dollars a month. Pretty wild. For instance, they restored this lighter right here, got 44 million views, and made $52,000. But even that is not as weird as the next one on the list, which is Diesel Ducy. This is a channel that basically gives elevator tours. And their description says, their words, not mine, "This is a channel where we elevate autism one lift at a time. Here you will find the largest variety of elevator videos on the internet. So grab a Diet Pepsi, light an incense, and enjoy the ride." So basically, this is somebody who is weirdly obsessed with elevators. And they attract other people that are also weirdly obsessed with elevators. And they make six to nineteen thousand dollars a month just doing tours of these elevators and talking about them. So if you have a weirdly specific obsession about something that you think nobody else cares about, well, there's 8 billion people in the world and chances are a lot of them actually do care about the thing you care about, too. And that's the case with this channel. Now, like I said, according to VidIQ, they make about $6 to $19,000 a month. According to view stats, they're making about $4 to $13,000 a month. And that's with around 3 million views, and this is a down month for them. Now, this is their most viewed video, "Ringing the Elevator Alarm, The Bell Breaks on Camera, Epic Fail." It got 6 million views and made over $30,000. Uh-oh. Oh, the bell fell off. And they've got a website, and they've got a Patreon, and they post stuff in the description, so they're probably making a bit of money on top of that. But you might be thinking, "Shane, all the channels you've shown me so far are probably channels ran by guys. What about the girls? Can Can girls do YouTube, too?" Of course they can. Check out this channel right here, Glamour D Dive. This channel is all about dumpster diving for girls, right? It's a girl that likes to do dumpster diving. She makes about $15 to $46,000 a month just from AdSense alone. And that is according to VidIQ. And her most viewed video, "Insane Find Hidden in the Dumpster, Dumpster Diving at Ulta," made $8,000 and got 1.6 million views. favorite things to find. Now, the coolest thing is, she's basically just doing something that she likes doing anyways, and she's just filming it and making a bunch of extra money doing it, which is actually quite common. This is something that a lot of people do. They just do stuff that they're already doing anyways, and they just film it, which doesn't take that much extra time, and throw it up on YouTube. And then, while she's doing all this stuff, she gets to sell this stuff that she dumpster dives for and make a ton of money. Now, additionally, she's got lots of links in her description. It looks like she does sponsorships, and she does affiliate marketing a little bit, so she's probably monetizing pretty well. If you go to her website, she actually sells some of the stuff that she finds in the dumpsters on her website, which is pretty cool. And it looks like it's constantly sold out, so people are buying it left and right. So, it looks like she's monetizing well, but she could probably monetize a heck of a lot better than this just from my expertise and from what I've seen. So, Glamour Dive, if you see this, you definitely need to click the link in the description and attend the live training that I'm doing this week, because we're going to go over how to monetize a lot better. She's probably making low six figures from this channel, and I think she could be easily making in the mid seven figures from this channel she monetize correctly. This reminds me a lot of a client that I worked with, Shawn, who was stuck making around $30,000 a month for a long time, and we helped him make it all the way up to over $500,000 a month. And by the way, the live training is completely free, but we do have a coaching program for people that are very serious about growing and making money on YouTube. And the types of people we work with are business owners who want to use YouTube as a way to get more views, build their brand, and get more leads, and make more money for their business. YouTubers who are already crushing it, but they want to crush it even more. YouTubers that are getting a lot of views, but they're having trouble monetizing, and they want to monetize better. Or people that are beginners, but they really want to take YouTube seriously and treat it like a real business. Right, so if you're one of those four types of people, and you want to start right now, then click the link in the description to book a one-on-one call to apply for the coaching program. We only accept about 18% of people who apply, so make sure you only do it if you're very serious about starting and starting now. And the call itself will be valuable whether or not you end up working with us or not. And also, click this video right here to see an example of Isaiah and how he was able to blow up his business on YouTube, and he only started 4 months ago using our system. Click right here to check that out.

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