16 Hot Tips for YouTube Channel Growth

How to get more views? How to achieve sustainable YouTube channel growth? How to survive in times of fierce competition? If you ever asked yourself these questions, you definitely need to read this article! Today we will talk about each and every aspect of algorithm-friendly YouTube content creation. Let’s get started!

#1 Research Your Keywords In Advance

To begin with, it would be impossible to grow a YouTube channel and get more views by creating videos on topics that have long been forgotten (obviously). In order to avoid this problem, we advise creators to research keywords before writing scripts and shooting videos.

Where to start?

Well, firstly you need to figure out which search terms people are looking for. One easy way to do it is to use the YouTube autosuggest feature. Just type something into your YouTube search bar, and you will see suggestions popping up. These terms are the ones that people are currently searching for on YouTube.

Also, you can use tubics to look for relevant keywords. Sign up for the 14-day free trial and take advantage of our Tag Generator. It provides you with the combined data from different search engines about the most relevant search terms for your videos.

You can also use the following websites in order to find the most relevant keywords for your videos:

Google AdWords Keyword Planner
Google Search Suggestions
Google Related Search Suggestions

Once you’ve chosen your keyword, you can write a video script around that specific topic.

Be careful! Keyword search can help you to get some first ideas for the video, but it doesn’t tell you how many people are searching for those topics. Moreover, those suggestions provide your keywords in the sequence you typed your phrase in.

#2 Be Consistent With the Video Quality

The quality of your YouTube videos is something that can facilitate the channel growth process or simply kill it. In fact, things such as your video intent, its structure, and even the length of your videos all play an important part in whether or not those videos will succeed and perform up to and beyond your expectations.

The ideal structure of a YouTube video should be something like this:

Write an intro.
Develop your content by framing the problem(s), explain why such problems might be happening, how those problems could be hurting the viewer’s situation, then offering solutions to those problems along with examples of what you are saying.
Add a hook in the intro or while framing the problem. The hook is what entices a viewer to keep watching through to the end of your video.
Add a strong call to action (CTA).
Write an outro.

If you think that size matters on YouTube, good news, it doesn’t! According to the latest social media research, the most successful videos on YouTube are typically less than 5 minutes long, so don’t force yourself to make a Tarantino movie. Keep it short and sweet.

#3 Develop a Content Schedule

If you decided to stick to our advice and not shoot a Tarantino long movie, great! However, we are not done yet. The next step for you would be to develop a content schedule and consistently stick with it. We have a little tip to make your life easier: take one topic and come up with a bunch of related themes. This way you can talk about the topic, then each week talk about the various components of that topic. Doing so will make developing your content quicker, easier, and will require much less research time.

The most commonly recommended frequency is one piece of content per week. However, this will all depend on your audience. You might have to test this or ask your subscribers how often they would like to hear from you.

#4 Build Brand

Well, we talked about keywords, content, and schedule. What’s the next most important thing you should consider when doing video marketing? Don’t be surprised, but I am going to ask you to take the “red pill” and go to your YouTube channel. Have a look, be honest. Is your channel visually appealing? Does it look professional? No matter how hard you try to attract viewers, these little things can be deal-breakers.

If you have a blog or website, you probably already have some sort of look and feel you use to differentiate yourself from other companies. Therefore, it would make sense to carry over that branding to your YouTube channel as well.

#5 Create Appealing Thumbnails

A YouTube video thumbnail is one very important factor to make your content stand out! Your YouTube video thumbnail is the first thing a person will see when searching for content which would give him/her the best solution or answer to whatever it is he/she is looking for. Appealing thumbnail also increases the click-through-rate and has a positive impact on your views and ranking.

What works for a thumbnail?

The answer is a big, clear picture with a focus point. Usually, the faces of other people with various emotions make viewers click on a video. Moreover, color areas and high contrast can help your thumbnail stand out. You can also include the brand elements to make your thumbnail more recognizable.

Three main rules for a good thumbnail. It should:

Work on small screens,
Stand out,
Describe your video.

Don’t forget that for every new video you need to create a new thumbnail. If you don’t do so, viewers might think that the video is old and not click on it.

#6 Optimize Your Titles to Get More Views

Create searchable titles by including the target keyword you want to rank for or other relevant terms, along with a click stimulus that could peak a person’s curiosity enough to get them to click on your video. To find out the recipe for a perfect title, check out our blog post here or watch this video:

#7 Boost Views With Searchable Descriptions

Your description helps YouTube to understand the content (and context) of your video. Any word or keyword you include in the description can help you boost your video’s rankings in YouTube search (and Suggested Videos).YouTube strongly recommends that you optimize your video description for SEO:

“YouTube is one of the largest search engines in the world. And writing a description with keywords can help viewers find your videos more easily through search.”YouTube Creator Academy

There are some more tricks on how to make your description boxes even better. Check out our video to find out more:

8# Strategically Use Meta Tags

Decide on an SEO keyword and add this to your tags.

YouTube heavily accounts for your video’s first few tags when ranking content in their search results, especially the first tag. So make sure your first tag is the exact keyword you want to be found for.

Use some broad keywords that describe the overarching topic your video falls under as other tags.

For example, if you’re creating a video called “How to Hit a Baseball”, you’d want to add “Baseball” as a broad tag to indicate to YouTube that your video’s overarching topic is about baseball.

Use some specific keywords that describe the topics you covered in your video as other tags.

For instance, in the same “How to Hit a Baseball” video, adding “hitting off a tee” or “hitting batting practice” as specific tags would indicate to YouTube the exact topics your video covers.

#9 Use Cards and End Screens

We are here to get more views, right? If yes, please make sure to add cards and end screens.

Cards

Once you set up cards, a small rectangular box will appear in the top right corner of the video to give your fans a preview of the message. If viewers tap the teaser, the card associated with the video appears along the right side of your video.

Cards work well when they are used together with call to actions. For example, if you mention a specific video or a playlist and point to the top right corner, a notification will appear.

You can have up to five cards per video.

End Screens

End screens are used in the last few seconds of your videos to encourage viewers to engage with your video or channel. Additionally, end screens enable you to cross-promote your channel and your third-party videos.

End screens can be anywhere from five to 20 seconds. Just remember that a video has to be a minimum of 25 seconds to use the end screen feature.

End screens allow you to promote up to four elements.

#10 Closed Captions

Closed captions can be useful for those who are deaf or hard of hearing or for people who want to watch videos at work or in other places where having the volume on or wearing earbuds, etc. isn’t an option.Another huge benefit of using closed captions on your videos is for SEO purposes. Closed captions are searchable by the search engines!

Using captions will boost your SEO and eventually help to grow your channel.

However, for best results, consider making your own captions rather than using YouTube’s automatic captioning feature. Doing so will help make sure the information is accurate and properly portrayed.

#11 Recreate the Raw File Name

Once more surprising fact: changing the raw file name of your YouTube video will boost your SEO!Changing the raw file name of your content is something not many people do, but should. Rename your video using your SEO keyword if possible.

To do this you just go to your YouTube video’s Info and Settings page and rename it from there. This will help tell YouTube what your video is about. If you don’t, your raw file name will just look like a set of numbers and will have absolutely no SEO benefit at all.

#12 Interact With Your Subscribers

Most people want to feel as if they are a part of something. So when they subscribe to your YouTube channel or comment on your video, etc. you should always make sure they feel appreciated.

You can do this by engaging with your subscribers and interacting with them in as many ways as you can. Ask them questions about their viewpoint, give them advice, recommendations, how-to info, etc. and not just general information, but information directed specifically to them.

#13 Create Playlists

Creating playlists is a great way to encourage subscribers and boost the watch time of your videos. You can do this by grouping your related videos together in a playlist. This technique provides a higher perceived value because you are giving people more than what they were expecting which was one video.

You can make different playlists by grouping them into like scenarios such as new viewers (give them a group of numbered videos so they can watch them in order), educational (step-by-step how-to videos), or on-topic videos (a collection of topic-related videos).

#14 Cooperate With Bigger Channels

Bigger channels always look for good content. But what can you give them?For similar-sized YouTube channels, it’s a win-win: everyone gains subscribers and grows their channels. If the other channel is bigger than yours, think about what you can offer to the other channel.

This could be:

Money (often difficult for YouTube beginners)
Connections
Help them prepare a great video
Create something about them: e.g. an interview or an analysis

#15 Promote Your Channel to Get More Views

Spread your message through your website, social media, newsletter or some other channel that you have. This is exactly the right audience, so they are more likely to convert. For the blog, you could create a post right after you’ve uploaded the video (approximately in the first 24 hours) as it will boost organic views on YouTube. On the website, you can have a link to your YouTube channel.

Paid ways to boost views:

YouTube adsYouTube ads are the display ads that you can see in front of every video. Make sure to create a special video for these ads, don’t use one of your regular videos as they would get really short watch time (and potentially kill your organic growth on YouTube). Facebook or Instagram adsFacebook is usually better at targeting your audience than YouTube itself. It also counts as an external click, and YouTube likes external clicks. Therefore, if you boost your regular videos with an ad on Facebook or on Instagram within the first 24 hours after uploading, it could increase your organic views on YouTube.

#16 Don’t Give Up

YouTube channels always grow exponentially. When you start creating videos, you’re found on a specific search or being clicked on next to another video, therefore, you’re getting a couple of views. With every new video published, you get more and more attention to your channel. Everything grows exponentially, but the thing about exponential growth is that it’s always slow at first and then it goes up. So if your channel is not growing as you want it to, don’t stop-keep uploading!

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