Picture the scene. A man in a white mask with painted-on red lips and black eyebrows speaks in a soft, high-pitched voice to the camera in front of him. In another, a woman sits next to a plastic, purple block, fashioned to resemble a pair of ears, but actually conceal a pair of microphones. She whispers into the “ears” while tapping and massaging them.
This is a glimpse into a growing corner of YouTube dedicated to ASMR – autonomous sensory meridian response.
These video-makers aim to induce ASMR – the experience is often described as a sense of euphoria that begins with a pleasurable, tingling sensation in the head that sometimes travels down the spine and limbs.
The condition can be induced through a number of triggers including listening to a certain voice, sounds or personal attention.
ASMR is sometimes dubbed a “head-orgasm”, due to its euphoric nature. But ASMR YouTubers avoid this description as it sexualises a non-sexual experience. People who experience ASMR, which is sometimes compared to auditory-tactile synesthesia, watch the videos to try and induce the experience. Others simply watch them for relaxation.
Can these video-makers follow in the footsteps of successful YouTube stars Zoella and PewDiePie? We hear from three ASMR YouTubers.
Heather Feather ASMR, 32, has 403,092 subscribers. She is based on the west coast of the US and made her first video in 2012
I’ve had ASMR my whole life but I didn’t know it was something other people experience until I stumbled across one of Maria Gentle Whispering’s videos on YouTube. I didn’t make my first video until a year and a half later. It was my birthday and I suddenly felt the urge to try it – I filmed myself putting on my makeup while there was a rainstorm outside.
Building my audience was an accident; I never thought anyone would like my videos. It was really surprising when people starting coming in the hundreds, and then thousands.
I spend more hours a week making videos than I do on my job [which she keeps secret to protect her anonymity], although I’d like this to be my full-time job. I usually get three or four hours of sleep a night because I’m working on my channel after work. I don’t feel silly filming but I’ve never got used to seeing or hearing myself when I’m editing.
My friends and family know I make videos; at the beginning they thought it was really weird. My grandma was worried that I was doing porn. I had to explain to them what ASMR was. When the channel started picking up momentum they became really proud. Now my grandma sews my ASMR costumes for me.
At the beginning, everything I bought for the channel including my camera and mics came out of my savings. I have Patreon [a crowdfunding website where YouTubers ask fans to pledge money in return for awards, such as personal videos], and a PayPal page where viewers can donate. But people think we make more money than we do.
I use YouTube ad revenue to support my channel, but it’s unpredictable. You could have five times the amount of subscribers that you did the year before and still be making same. We’re not actually allowed to say what we make from YouTube, but there is no flat fee. One YouTuber could be making $1 per click and another one could be making 2 cents. Now that ASMR has become a bigger deal, big brands have started taking notice. But you are constantly getting spammed by companies that want you to plug their stuff for free.
WhisperRed, also known as Emma, 37, has 218,881 subscribers. She is based in the north-east of the UK and made her first video in 2013
I had post-traumatic stress disorder after a car accident and was struggling to sleep. I was looking for relaxation videos on YouTube, then somehow I came across ASMR videos.
I started to use the videos to help me sleep at night. As I was listening to them, I started to get this familiar feeling that I’d always experienced, going through the top of my head down my spine. I’d experienced the feeling all my life, but I didn’t know there was a name for it. Every time I tried to explain it to someone else, which was really difficult, people would just look at me with a blank face. Then I got involved in the community and decided to start a channel.
I used to work full-time doing office work for my family’s business. But over time, my earnings from YouTube adverts increased and I’ve been able to decrease my hours at work. The ad revenue helps with some of the household bills and the rest goes on props such as doctors’ instruments for medical role plays and hairdressing kits for salon role plays.
When I reached about 20,000 subscribers I got an email asking me to appear on Loose Women. I hadn’t really told anybody what I was doing on YouTube, but I decided to go for it. The audience laughed at me. I don’t think they’d seen anything like it before, but it was good to explain my videos.
I can’t stop [making videos] now. I feel like I’ve found something that allows me to be completely who I am.
Robert Duff, also known as Duff the Psych, 27, has 85,771 subscribers. He is based in California, US and has been making videos since 2012
I stumbled upon ASMR on YouTube and it helped me out during a stressful time at graduate school. After a couple weeks of watching the videos, I decided to make my own channel. Providing relaxation and helping others manage stress was definitely in my wheelhouse as a psychology grad student, so I just went for it. The next week I had over 1,000 subscribers and was hooked.
Now I am a PhD-level psychologist and my day job entails both psychotherapy and neuropsychological assessment, which is essentially testing for problems in memory and other thinking skills.
Skills definitely transfer between my day job and my ASMR videos. For one, I often cover topics in my videos related to self-help, anxiety, depression or wellness. I never planned to make ASMR content full-time. But there have been months that YouTube [ads have] paid for my rent, which is amazing. If I pumped a great deal of time and effort into it, I’m sure that I could turn it into a full-time job – but I’m not interested in doing that.
I have used my YouTube audience to launch other products though – in 2014, I wrote my first book [a self-help book for people with anxiety] and they were the first to hear about it. Now my books are my primary source of income and I don’t think that would have been possible without leveraging my supportive and interested audience on YouTube.
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