Who is trending on Russian YouTube? Channel ratings and new authors with a high potential

In 2022 YouTube in Russia faced a number of restrictions, including a complete ban on monetization for Russian content creators, and also fears of the service to be blocked. However, despite this, advertising integrations continued and it confirms the potential perspective of influencer marketing on YouTube in Russia. 

If we talk in numbers, the profitability of the top Russian YouTube bloggers increased by 19% in 2022. We are talking about 483 million rubles (note - $5.5 million).  The most striking thing is that the amount of main content produced by Russian-speaking creators decreased by 20% (note - 430 videos) after monetization had been blocked. At the same time, the number of advertising integrations increased by 30% (approx. 305 integrations). 

This is due to the fact that most Russian companies began to cooperate with authors on YouTube or Telegram after Instagram* was blocked. And they continue to do it in the current year of 2024, increasing their advertising turnover. In 2023, bloggers' profitability increased, on average, by 31% - 1.2 billion rubles. In 2024 this figure will be higher. Which speaks to the ever-increasing interest in YouTube Influencers. 

Plus, YouTube itself is not losing its position in terms of the main characteristics of the audience in Russia. By the way, we wrote more about this in our article "A complete Russian YouTube Overview for Marketers. Key Market Insights". 

In the context of analytics, we can see that Russian YouTube can be safely called one of the main channels of influencer marketing at the moment. Probably, the most important question for brands always sounds about the same.

How to choose the channel(s) for advertising integration? We focus on general trends and ratings.
 

Top10 YouTube channels in Russia

According to the current information, in the top ten of Russian YouTube you can see:
 

But the general trend of the list is obvious: the supremacy belongs to the entertainment channels. 

The first place belongs to the family channel Get Movies. The channel's content is animated, but the variety is so great that everyone can find an interesting video for themselves. There is a huge number of informative programs about nature, sports, art and history, a selection of entertainment, comedy and parody shows, etc. The channel's content is animated, but the variety is so great that everyone can find interesting videos. But probably the most popular Get Movies video is related to the animated story of Masha and the Bear. Although there are other colorful characters on the channel for a long time.

The animated story of Masha and the Bear on the YouTube channel GetMovies

The second place of the rating is occupied by an entertainment channel for those who are not indifferent to pets. It is the channel about the life of twin dachshunds and their owners Chapitosiki. Like all the leaders of the Top10, the content of the blog is full of Challenges, contests, funny videos and has a colorful design. Unlike others, Chapitosiki videos are short, filmed mostly in the popular Shorts format. Due to this approach, the channel gains a large number of views and gathers a diverse audience.
 

Third place goes to Like Nastya Vlog, a children's channel. Little video blogger Nastya talks about various topics, including adult topics, through children's eyes. The content of the channel is bright, which cannot fail to attract the children's audience and parents. 
 

Children's story "How to Learn to Earn" on YouTube channel Like Nastya Vlog

Andrei Shirin's blog HiMan is in 4 place. It cannot be said that the channel is aimed at a particular audience. On the contrary, the blogger's goal is large coverage. Due to the entertaining content without foul language and hot topics, Andrei attracts both adult viewers and teenagers. Challenges, traveling, various shopping reviews. Thanks to this, the author constantly cooperates with large companies (note - in recent videos at least Vkusno i tochka and Alfa Bank were spotted advertising ) on a regular basis.

Advertising integration of Alfa-Bank with a special offer from Vkusno-i Tochka brand on HiMan channel

That's roughly the emphasis on diverse content from blogger TheBrianMaps. The author publishes funny sketches, music videos and actively cooperates with other bloggers. Brian was originally a gamer, but quickly realized that exploratory content would bring him to the wave of popularity much faster. 

The story of how the vloggers were 24 hours in a horror hotel on YouTube channel TheBrianMaps

The 7th place of the rating is occupied by the educational channel AdMe, which belongs to the media portal of the same name. The authors of the channel create their content for creative and curious people. Indeed, the videos, despite the variety of topics, are interesting and you want to watch them just after seeing the titles. 

Review 15+ life-changing gadgets on AdMe's YouTube channel

The other 4 channels in the rating belong to gamers - Marmok, KuplinovPlay, EdisonPts, Kompot. We have prepared a special material about them, because gamers on YouTube have an important place for advertisers and game developers. Importantly, the top players are always in demand among their audience. 

Promising young YouTube authors

YouTube is a platform where you constantly need to keep your finger on the pulse and monitor trends. In particular, the emergence of promising new authors. 

Here we have another rating, but this time from Forbes. Every year the list of successful young people under 30 years old is updated. The rating iincludes several YouTube bloggers.

So, for whom you should look out in the near future of commercial cooperation.  

Anastasia Burchuladze (note - channel Anastasiz), began her journey on YouTube, talking about her experience with anorexia. Her videos quickly became popular, which inspired the girl to continue vlogging. The author is also known for her life talk videos, clips and collaborations with other bloggers. After a short break in 2021, Anastasiz returned to YouTube and continues to actively create content. The blogger's audience has already exceeded 6 million subscribers.

Advertising integration of the Search Engine Yandex Alise on the Anastasiz channel (6.37M subscribers)

Milana Khametova (note - the same-named channel Milana Khametova) is only 13 years old, but she has already managed to win several beauty contests in Novosibirsk and start her way as a blogger. The girl's popularity began to grow thanks to Instagram*. Then, in 2020, Milana signed an exclusive production contract with Super House (note - the project of Russian bloggers in Tik-Tok). Next, there was YouTube success, where the debut song "Umka" gained over 90 million views. Now the author has more than 6 million viewers and deserved the status of a popular YouTube performer among children for her efforts.

Unpacking gifts on Milana Khametova's channel (7.07M subscribers)

Another promising musician is Ilya Yatskevich (note - ExileShow channel). The blogger started his activity on YouTube, creating music videos and successfully promoting his channel thanks to the help of another popular author Oleg Coffi (note - Coffi Channel). Later, Ilya started to develop an account on Twitch, where he creates music live and talks about his life. At the same time, the videos on YouTube are released constantly, gathering more than 3 million views.

Plus City mobile game advertising integration on ExileShow channel (4.8M subscribers)

It is impossible not to mention blogger Bogdan Lisevsky, co-author of the Plyushki channel, on the list. Bogdan started his career with performances in KVN (note - a popular humor game in Russia and CIS), having become the star of the team. Then, he performed in the equally popular show Comedy Club. Then he created an author's YouTube channel, attracting millions of viewers - humor, stars as invited guests, author's style. In short, Plushkin's audience is gradually growing, as are the prospects for commercial contracts with brands.

Advertising integration of online Cinema Wink! on Plyushkin channel (3.21M subscribers)

Closing the list is blogger Alexander Paradeev, who was noted in the rating of 2024.  The author gained popularity on the Twitch platform, where he registered under the nickname Paradeev1ch in 2020. On the platform, he hosted broadcasts of Mafia games with popular bloggers. In 2022, Paradeev, along with other bloggers, created a "squad," or association, called Khazyaev. The squad quickly became one of the most prominent on Twitch in Russia. In 2023, Paradeev also became known as a streamer of cybersport tournaments on Dota 2. He flew to the United States for the main match of the year in this discipline - The International 2023 - and broadcast from there. 

Paradeev's Twitch account has 1.8 million followers. More than 600,000 more users follow him on Telegram. In April 2023, the blogger also started an entertainment channel on YouTube. Within a year, he gained 1.4 million subscribers, and each video began to gain several million views. Yandex, MTS, Alfa Bank and other companies have already become advertisers of Paradeev's YouTube channel.

Advertising integration of the Search Engine Yandex Alise on the Paradejevich channel (1.43M subscribers)

Rating VS Reality

It would seem that ratings determine everything and the main criteria for choosing YouTube vloggers are obvious -bright content, kids, games, challenges, animation and everything in this format. However, not always the cooperation of advertisers with entertainment channels in the Top is what is needed to promote the brand.

Working with bloggers on various platforms, including YouTube, RMAA often encounters atypical situations. The history of cooperation with Genshin Impact is a clear example of this. Or, on the contrary, collaboration with a brand requires a narrower, segmented approach. This was the case with the promotion of the Celimax cosmetics brand, when there was an urgent need to collaborate with beauty bloggers. Plus, a brand may have a limited advertising budget that can't afford collaborations with top YouTube creators. That's okay. And there's a big list of other subtleties.

In general, nothing will work without a personalized approach to promotion tasks. Especially in Influencer marketing, because the competition even within this segment is very high. Let us remind you again that you cannot do without professional help. 

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