The Q1 RPM cliff people mistake for a penalty

The Q1 RPM cliff people mistake for a penalty
Heard this every January: creators panic that they've been 'shadow-demonetized' when ad rates fall off a cliff after the holiday quarter. Word from people who track it: it's advertiser budgets resetting, not your channel — Q4 spend evaporates and CPMs follow.
What this means for you:
— don't change a working content strategy in January because RPM dropped; you'll be chasing a phantom
— front-load your big-swing, high-effort uploads into Q4 when the same view is worth more
— treat January-February as your experimental window — cheap views, low stakes
Confidence: high. This is a known seasonal pattern, just mislabeled as punishment every single year.