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"[New] Hitting the Sweet Spot Top 5 Tips for Channel Growth"
Hitting the Sweet Spot: Top 5 Tips for Channel Growth
5 Tips to Get More Views with YouTube Optimization [Free Checklist]
Richard Bennett
Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions
We all want our videos to get a lot of views, and in turn, lead to more subscribers. In order to do so, we have to prepare it for success. If you are hoping to optimize a video after it has already been published to YouTube, then you aren’t going to get the best result, because much of optimization is done before the video is even shot.a
In this article, we will give youa checklist , which you should have with you at the very beginning of creating a YouTube video: the ideation stage. As you go through your process, check off each task. By doing so, you can ensure that you have given the video the best chance to rank high and be discovered.
How to Optimize Your Video to Rank Higher on YouTube?
- Keep Your Audience’s Attention
- Do Keyword Research
- Engage Your Audience
- Upload YouTube Video in Proper Length
1. Keep Your Audience’s Attention:
Even though your view count is going up, it doesn’t mean your audience is watching your video. And if they are not, then YouTube is going to consider your video less valuable and therefore, lowering its rank.
Audience Retention is an important metric to keep an eye on after every video you’ve published.
Before you start your next project, take a look back at the Audience Retention of your previous videos.
- Enter YouTube Studio in your channel
- Access to Analytics
- Select the video you want to review
- Click into engagement
- See where a dip in watch time
What is Good Audience Retention?
If you want to see how your Audience Retention is performing, the Average Percentage Viewed will give you a broad perspective. The higher the percentage, the more people are watching your entire video.
If you get above 60% Average Percentage Viewed, you should feel very proud. In our modern world with our short attention span, that is considered good retention.
In the example above, we see that on average, a viewer will only see 44% of the video. For the video below, we see that it only has 30% of the video viewed. Overall, the first video is performing better.
There is also a dip that happens at the beginning in the second example, which indicates that viewers are skipping forward and about 20% then deciding it’s not worth continuing. It’s good data to help you improve your introduction and the hook.
If there is important information that you are presenting at a given point and in the Audience Retention you see that only a small percentage of your viewers actually see it, then for the next video, you might want to position the details in a different point in the video.
How to Improve Audience Retention
Here are a few ways you can retain your audience’s attention if you noticed a drop in viewership:
- Film a hook (introduce your video to let the audience know what to expect)
- Add b-roll (having supplemental footage to cut to makes your video more interesting to watch)
- Have a co-host (Having someone on screen gives the video more dynamic interactions)
- Edit out the unimportant stuff
- Write a conclusion (having a conclusion prepared will allow you to transition from the content of the video to the call to action without the audience even knowing) See this example by PolyMatter below and notice how seamless their ending is.
If you have a video that is doing a good job retaining the audience, then replicate it. If there isn’t, keep experimenting with new structures. Improving audience retention is not simply important for your ranking, but it will affirm that you are building quality videos.
Knowing how to structure your video will allow you to be strategic as you build out your content.
2. Do Keyword Research:
Many viewers find YouTube videos via search, and if you aren’t using the appropriate keywords, then YouTube won’t be able to identify your content and display it for your viewers.
Where Do Keywords Appear on YouTube?
- Title: Have keywords at the beginning of the title and limit them up to approximately 60 characters so it appears in full in search.
- Tags: Include 10-15 tags from general keywords to more specific.
- Descriptions: Put important information and keywords at the beginning of the description so both searcher and the search engine understands what the video is about.
Why Keywords Matter
keyword arrangement is an integral part of YouTube optimization because the robots behind YouTube don’t associate the value of the actual video content with what the viewer is actually seeking. You should pay attention to the relevance of keywords.
Even when you add closed captions, it doesn’t mean the best keywords are present to the Youtube search engine when we speak.
That is why it is important to know your audience and what words and phrases they are going to use to search for your video.
Here is how you can see what keywords were used to find your video:
- Enter YouTube Studio in your channel
- Access Analytics
- Select Reach
- Click into Traffic Source
- Click Traffic Source: YouTube Search
If you want to find some new keywords for your upcoming video, you will need to do some research.
1. Enter Keywords You Want to Rank for In YouTube Search: This allows you to see what the most popular phrases are in the YouTube search engine.
2. Study the Competitors: See which videos are ranking high for your search term. Use a tool called VidIQ to see the keywords that the top videos are performing.
3. Search for Related Keywords and Evaluate Relevancy: A tool called Ubersuggest can help you find related keywords and allow you to identify the search volume, cost per click (aka CPC is used for determining the budget for paid search), and the competitiveness of the word or phrase.
Search volume: The number of searches with that particular keyword. The higher the number the more popular it is. You should aim to use keywords with a high search volume.
Keyword competition score: This score is usually indicated by a number and it represents how difficult it is for a keyword to rank due to other pages already ranking for that word or phrase. You want to find a keyword with a low competition score.
Pro tip: The best combination is high search volume and low competition score. But if you can’t get that perfect mix, go for the low competitive score, as it will give you a better chance to rank, even if it isn’t searched as often.
4. Come Up With Content Related to Those Keywords: To come up with topic ideas around a keyword, you can use a tool called Answer the Public , which gives you all the most popular questions searched online.
3. Engage Your Audience:
It’s been highly discussed on forums all over the Internet, and there appears to be a strong correlation between YouTube video ranking and the number of likes, dislikes, and comments the video received.
While YouTube itself might not be using the number of likes and comments to determine where your video rank, having high engagement allows your video to be discovered through other means.
Here is an example of how it would work:
- A YouTuber with 100,000 subscribers views your video and likes it
- Then your video might be visible to a fraction of those 100,000 subscribers.
- Boom! Domino effect!
- More people will see your video and like it, increasing your network of viewers and your watch time, which is one of the main factors that YouTube takes into consideration.
Get engagements with a call to action:
- Don’t be afraid to ask for an engagement at the beginning of the video to avoid fall off on retention.
- Encourage them to leave a comment or start a discussion by asking a question at the end of your video.
- Monitor comments and responds to them so you can build a relationship with your audience over time.
It’s all about creating a community and that is what YouTube encourages.
4. Upload YouTube Video in Proper Length:
YouTube puts a lot of weight on watch time, and in addition to that, it puts more weight on session watch time.
Session watch time is counted when people watch your video and then continue to watch others, it doesn’t have to be your own. The more time people spend watching YouTube videos, as a result of your content, the more likely YouTube will increase your ranking.
Since YouTube puts importance on time spent watching videos, the length of your video will play a key role.
If you have 5 videos and all of them are a minute long, a 100% watch through will only get you 5 minutes total.
However, if you have 1 video that is 20 minutes, and an average viewer only watches half of it, then you have an average watch time of over 10 minutes. That’s more than double what your five short videos can do. This longer video is worth more. However, if that 20-minute video is really boring and people drop off in the first minute, then it’s not any better than 1 of the 5 short videos.
If your format allows, go for a longer video instead of a shorter one. But the most important thing is that you can keep people watching your videos: so use end screen and playlist links to keep them engaged.
End screen: Pick related videos for your audience, so they know exactly what they should watch next. You can even create a background template for your end screens .
Playlist: If you have multiple videos that fit a specific topic, add them to a playlist so the viewer can enjoy them all in one viewing.
Key Takeaways:
- Use Audience Retention to better understand how to structure your video for the best results.
- Perform Keyword Research to find the keywords that your competitors are using and your audience is searching for.
- Increasing Subscribers gets your video in front of more people the moment it is published.
- Encourage Comments and respond to establish a relationship with your viewers.
- Ensure that Viewers Continue Watching videos on YouTube after they finish watching yours.
Other Things That Affects Your YouTube Ranking
Except for the above-mentioned factors, there are also other issues that affect the ranking of your YouTube video. YouTube has stated that the number of subscribers doesn’t play a key role in your video ranking.
For example, if a YouTuber has a million subscribers and then overnight they lose 100 thousand, a video they had ranking number 1 will still be ranked number 1.
However, the number of subscribers has a lot of indirect effects on your channel.
- Subscribers know the moment your video is published
- Subscribers will watch your video in the first week (YouTube will rank your video higher if they see a lift in the first week of publishing)
- YouTube put a higher value on subscribers than views and social shares, because it’s harder to fake subscribers
Growing subscribers take time and effort, and even though it shouldn’t be your main focus, there are tactics you can do to gain more subscribers .
Don’t miss a chance to optimize your YouTube video, download, and print out this checklist for your next video project. For more information on SEO(Search Engine Optimization) on YouTube, you can also read the following article.
How to Fast Rank Video Higher with Video SEO >>
10 Best YouTube Keyword Tools to Use with Bonus Tips>>
If you want to find a video editing solution that empowers your imagination and creativity yet takes less effort, please try this robust and user-friendly video editing software Wondershare Filmora. It provides special effects, stock photo & video, sound library, etc., which will definitely enhance your productivity and helps to make money by making videos much accessible.
Richard Bennett
Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.
Follow @Richard Bennett
Richard Bennett
Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions
We all want our videos to get a lot of views, and in turn, lead to more subscribers. In order to do so, we have to prepare it for success. If you are hoping to optimize a video after it has already been published to YouTube, then you aren’t going to get the best result, because much of optimization is done before the video is even shot.a
In this article, we will give youa checklist , which you should have with you at the very beginning of creating a YouTube video: the ideation stage. As you go through your process, check off each task. By doing so, you can ensure that you have given the video the best chance to rank high and be discovered.
How to Optimize Your Video to Rank Higher on YouTube?
- Keep Your Audience’s Attention
- Do Keyword Research
- Engage Your Audience
- Upload YouTube Video in Proper Length
1. Keep Your Audience’s Attention:
Even though your view count is going up, it doesn’t mean your audience is watching your video. And if they are not, then YouTube is going to consider your video less valuable and therefore, lowering its rank.
Audience Retention is an important metric to keep an eye on after every video you’ve published.
Before you start your next project, take a look back at the Audience Retention of your previous videos.
- Enter YouTube Studio in your channel
- Access to Analytics
- Select the video you want to review
- Click into engagement
- See where a dip in watch time
What is Good Audience Retention?
If you want to see how your Audience Retention is performing, the Average Percentage Viewed will give you a broad perspective. The higher the percentage, the more people are watching your entire video.
If you get above 60% Average Percentage Viewed, you should feel very proud. In our modern world with our short attention span, that is considered good retention.
In the example above, we see that on average, a viewer will only see 44% of the video. For the video below, we see that it only has 30% of the video viewed. Overall, the first video is performing better.
There is also a dip that happens at the beginning in the second example, which indicates that viewers are skipping forward and about 20% then deciding it’s not worth continuing. It’s good data to help you improve your introduction and the hook.
If there is important information that you are presenting at a given point and in the Audience Retention you see that only a small percentage of your viewers actually see it, then for the next video, you might want to position the details in a different point in the video.
How to Improve Audience Retention
Here are a few ways you can retain your audience’s attention if you noticed a drop in viewership:
- Film a hook (introduce your video to let the audience know what to expect)
- Add b-roll (having supplemental footage to cut to makes your video more interesting to watch)
- Have a co-host (Having someone on screen gives the video more dynamic interactions)
- Edit out the unimportant stuff
- Write a conclusion (having a conclusion prepared will allow you to transition from the content of the video to the call to action without the audience even knowing) See this example by PolyMatter below and notice how seamless their ending is.
If you have a video that is doing a good job retaining the audience, then replicate it. If there isn’t, keep experimenting with new structures. Improving audience retention is not simply important for your ranking, but it will affirm that you are building quality videos.
Knowing how to structure your video will allow you to be strategic as you build out your content.
2. Do Keyword Research:
Many viewers find YouTube videos via search, and if you aren’t using the appropriate keywords, then YouTube won’t be able to identify your content and display it for your viewers.
Where Do Keywords Appear on YouTube?
- Title: Have keywords at the beginning of the title and limit them up to approximately 60 characters so it appears in full in search.
- Tags: Include 10-15 tags from general keywords to more specific.
- Descriptions: Put important information and keywords at the beginning of the description so both searcher and the search engine understands what the video is about.
Why Keywords Matter
keyword arrangement is an integral part of YouTube optimization because the robots behind YouTube don’t associate the value of the actual video content with what the viewer is actually seeking. You should pay attention to the relevance of keywords.
Even when you add closed captions, it doesn’t mean the best keywords are present to the Youtube search engine when we speak.
That is why it is important to know your audience and what words and phrases they are going to use to search for your video.
Here is how you can see what keywords were used to find your video:
- Enter YouTube Studio in your channel
- Access Analytics
- Select Reach
- Click into Traffic Source
- Click Traffic Source: YouTube Search
If you want to find some new keywords for your upcoming video, you will need to do some research.
1. Enter Keywords You Want to Rank for In YouTube Search: This allows you to see what the most popular phrases are in the YouTube search engine.
2. Study the Competitors: See which videos are ranking high for your search term. Use a tool called VidIQ to see the keywords that the top videos are performing.
3. Search for Related Keywords and Evaluate Relevancy: A tool called Ubersuggest can help you find related keywords and allow you to identify the search volume, cost per click (aka CPC is used for determining the budget for paid search), and the competitiveness of the word or phrase.
Search volume: The number of searches with that particular keyword. The higher the number the more popular it is. You should aim to use keywords with a high search volume.
Keyword competition score: This score is usually indicated by a number and it represents how difficult it is for a keyword to rank due to other pages already ranking for that word or phrase. You want to find a keyword with a low competition score.
Pro tip: The best combination is high search volume and low competition score. But if you can’t get that perfect mix, go for the low competitive score, as it will give you a better chance to rank, even if it isn’t searched as often.
4. Come Up With Content Related to Those Keywords: To come up with topic ideas around a keyword, you can use a tool called Answer the Public , which gives you all the most popular questions searched online.
3. Engage Your Audience:
It’s been highly discussed on forums all over the Internet, and there appears to be a strong correlation between YouTube video ranking and the number of likes, dislikes, and comments the video received.
While YouTube itself might not be using the number of likes and comments to determine where your video rank, having high engagement allows your video to be discovered through other means.
Here is an example of how it would work:
- A YouTuber with 100,000 subscribers views your video and likes it
- Then your video might be visible to a fraction of those 100,000 subscribers.
- Boom! Domino effect!
- More people will see your video and like it, increasing your network of viewers and your watch time, which is one of the main factors that YouTube takes into consideration.
Get engagements with a call to action:
- Don’t be afraid to ask for an engagement at the beginning of the video to avoid fall off on retention.
- Encourage them to leave a comment or start a discussion by asking a question at the end of your video.
- Monitor comments and responds to them so you can build a relationship with your audience over time.
It’s all about creating a community and that is what YouTube encourages.
4. Upload YouTube Video in Proper Length:
YouTube puts a lot of weight on watch time, and in addition to that, it puts more weight on session watch time.
Session watch time is counted when people watch your video and then continue to watch others, it doesn’t have to be your own. The more time people spend watching YouTube videos, as a result of your content, the more likely YouTube will increase your ranking.
Since YouTube puts importance on time spent watching videos, the length of your video will play a key role.
If you have 5 videos and all of them are a minute long, a 100% watch through will only get you 5 minutes total.
However, if you have 1 video that is 20 minutes, and an average viewer only watches half of it, then you have an average watch time of over 10 minutes. That’s more than double what your five short videos can do. This longer video is worth more. However, if that 20-minute video is really boring and people drop off in the first minute, then it’s not any better than 1 of the 5 short videos.
If your format allows, go for a longer video instead of a shorter one. But the most important thing is that you can keep people watching your videos: so use end screen and playlist links to keep them engaged.
End screen: Pick related videos for your audience, so they know exactly what they should watch next. You can even create a background template for your end screens .
Playlist: If you have multiple videos that fit a specific topic, add them to a playlist so the viewer can enjoy them all in one viewing.
Key Takeaways:
- Use Audience Retention to better understand how to structure your video for the best results.
- Perform Keyword Research to find the keywords that your competitors are using and your audience is searching for.
- Increasing Subscribers gets your video in front of more people the moment it is published.
- Encourage Comments and respond to establish a relationship with your viewers.
- Ensure that Viewers Continue Watching videos on YouTube after they finish watching yours.
Other Things That Affects Your YouTube Ranking
Except for the above-mentioned factors, there are also other issues that affect the ranking of your YouTube video. YouTube has stated that the number of subscribers doesn’t play a key role in your video ranking.
For example, if a YouTuber has a million subscribers and then overnight they lose 100 thousand, a video they had ranking number 1 will still be ranked number 1.
However, the number of subscribers has a lot of indirect effects on your channel.
- Subscribers know the moment your video is published
- Subscribers will watch your video in the first week (YouTube will rank your video higher if they see a lift in the first week of publishing)
- YouTube put a higher value on subscribers than views and social shares, because it’s harder to fake subscribers
Growing subscribers take time and effort, and even though it shouldn’t be your main focus, there are tactics you can do to gain more subscribers .
Don’t miss a chance to optimize your YouTube video, download, and print out this checklist for your next video project. For more information on SEO(Search Engine Optimization) on YouTube, you can also read the following article.
How to Fast Rank Video Higher with Video SEO >>
10 Best YouTube Keyword Tools to Use with Bonus Tips>>
If you want to find a video editing solution that empowers your imagination and creativity yet takes less effort, please try this robust and user-friendly video editing software Wondershare Filmora. It provides special effects, stock photo & video, sound library, etc., which will definitely enhance your productivity and helps to make money by making videos much accessible.
Richard Bennett
Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.
Follow @Richard Bennett
Richard Bennett
Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions
We all want our videos to get a lot of views, and in turn, lead to more subscribers. In order to do so, we have to prepare it for success. If you are hoping to optimize a video after it has already been published to YouTube, then you aren’t going to get the best result, because much of optimization is done before the video is even shot.a
In this article, we will give youa checklist , which you should have with you at the very beginning of creating a YouTube video: the ideation stage. As you go through your process, check off each task. By doing so, you can ensure that you have given the video the best chance to rank high and be discovered.
How to Optimize Your Video to Rank Higher on YouTube?
- Keep Your Audience’s Attention
- Do Keyword Research
- Engage Your Audience
- Upload YouTube Video in Proper Length
1. Keep Your Audience’s Attention:
Even though your view count is going up, it doesn’t mean your audience is watching your video. And if they are not, then YouTube is going to consider your video less valuable and therefore, lowering its rank.
Audience Retention is an important metric to keep an eye on after every video you’ve published.
Before you start your next project, take a look back at the Audience Retention of your previous videos.
- Enter YouTube Studio in your channel
- Access to Analytics
- Select the video you want to review
- Click into engagement
- See where a dip in watch time
What is Good Audience Retention?
If you want to see how your Audience Retention is performing, the Average Percentage Viewed will give you a broad perspective. The higher the percentage, the more people are watching your entire video.
If you get above 60% Average Percentage Viewed, you should feel very proud. In our modern world with our short attention span, that is considered good retention.
In the example above, we see that on average, a viewer will only see 44% of the video. For the video below, we see that it only has 30% of the video viewed. Overall, the first video is performing better.
There is also a dip that happens at the beginning in the second example, which indicates that viewers are skipping forward and about 20% then deciding it’s not worth continuing. It’s good data to help you improve your introduction and the hook.
If there is important information that you are presenting at a given point and in the Audience Retention you see that only a small percentage of your viewers actually see it, then for the next video, you might want to position the details in a different point in the video.
How to Improve Audience Retention
Here are a few ways you can retain your audience’s attention if you noticed a drop in viewership:
- Film a hook (introduce your video to let the audience know what to expect)
- Add b-roll (having supplemental footage to cut to makes your video more interesting to watch)
- Have a co-host (Having someone on screen gives the video more dynamic interactions)
- Edit out the unimportant stuff
- Write a conclusion (having a conclusion prepared will allow you to transition from the content of the video to the call to action without the audience even knowing) See this example by PolyMatter below and notice how seamless their ending is.
If you have a video that is doing a good job retaining the audience, then replicate it. If there isn’t, keep experimenting with new structures. Improving audience retention is not simply important for your ranking, but it will affirm that you are building quality videos.
Knowing how to structure your video will allow you to be strategic as you build out your content.
2. Do Keyword Research:
Many viewers find YouTube videos via search, and if you aren’t using the appropriate keywords, then YouTube won’t be able to identify your content and display it for your viewers.
Where Do Keywords Appear on YouTube?
- Title: Have keywords at the beginning of the title and limit them up to approximately 60 characters so it appears in full in search.
- Tags: Include 10-15 tags from general keywords to more specific.
- Descriptions: Put important information and keywords at the beginning of the description so both searcher and the search engine understands what the video is about.
Why Keywords Matter
keyword arrangement is an integral part of YouTube optimization because the robots behind YouTube don’t associate the value of the actual video content with what the viewer is actually seeking. You should pay attention to the relevance of keywords.
Even when you add closed captions, it doesn’t mean the best keywords are present to the Youtube search engine when we speak.
That is why it is important to know your audience and what words and phrases they are going to use to search for your video.
Here is how you can see what keywords were used to find your video:
- Enter YouTube Studio in your channel
- Access Analytics
- Select Reach
- Click into Traffic Source
- Click Traffic Source: YouTube Search
If you want to find some new keywords for your upcoming video, you will need to do some research.
1. Enter Keywords You Want to Rank for In YouTube Search: This allows you to see what the most popular phrases are in the YouTube search engine.
2. Study the Competitors: See which videos are ranking high for your search term. Use a tool called VidIQ to see the keywords that the top videos are performing.
3. Search for Related Keywords and Evaluate Relevancy: A tool called Ubersuggest can help you find related keywords and allow you to identify the search volume, cost per click (aka CPC is used for determining the budget for paid search), and the competitiveness of the word or phrase.
Search volume: The number of searches with that particular keyword. The higher the number the more popular it is. You should aim to use keywords with a high search volume.
Keyword competition score: This score is usually indicated by a number and it represents how difficult it is for a keyword to rank due to other pages already ranking for that word or phrase. You want to find a keyword with a low competition score.
Pro tip: The best combination is high search volume and low competition score. But if you can’t get that perfect mix, go for the low competitive score, as it will give you a better chance to rank, even if it isn’t searched as often.
4. Come Up With Content Related to Those Keywords: To come up with topic ideas around a keyword, you can use a tool called Answer the Public , which gives you all the most popular questions searched online.
3. Engage Your Audience:
It’s been highly discussed on forums all over the Internet, and there appears to be a strong correlation between YouTube video ranking and the number of likes, dislikes, and comments the video received.
While YouTube itself might not be using the number of likes and comments to determine where your video rank, having high engagement allows your video to be discovered through other means.
Here is an example of how it would work:
- A YouTuber with 100,000 subscribers views your video and likes it
- Then your video might be visible to a fraction of those 100,000 subscribers.
- Boom! Domino effect!
- More people will see your video and like it, increasing your network of viewers and your watch time, which is one of the main factors that YouTube takes into consideration.
Get engagements with a call to action:
- Don’t be afraid to ask for an engagement at the beginning of the video to avoid fall off on retention.
- Encourage them to leave a comment or start a discussion by asking a question at the end of your video.
- Monitor comments and responds to them so you can build a relationship with your audience over time.
It’s all about creating a community and that is what YouTube encourages.
4. Upload YouTube Video in Proper Length:
YouTube puts a lot of weight on watch time, and in addition to that, it puts more weight on session watch time.
Session watch time is counted when people watch your video and then continue to watch others, it doesn’t have to be your own. The more time people spend watching YouTube videos, as a result of your content, the more likely YouTube will increase your ranking.
Since YouTube puts importance on time spent watching videos, the length of your video will play a key role.
If you have 5 videos and all of them are a minute long, a 100% watch through will only get you 5 minutes total.
However, if you have 1 video that is 20 minutes, and an average viewer only watches half of it, then you have an average watch time of over 10 minutes. That’s more than double what your five short videos can do. This longer video is worth more. However, if that 20-minute video is really boring and people drop off in the first minute, then it’s not any better than 1 of the 5 short videos.
If your format allows, go for a longer video instead of a shorter one. But the most important thing is that you can keep people watching your videos: so use end screen and playlist links to keep them engaged.
End screen: Pick related videos for your audience, so they know exactly what they should watch next. You can even create a background template for your end screens .
Playlist: If you have multiple videos that fit a specific topic, add them to a playlist so the viewer can enjoy them all in one viewing.
Key Takeaways:
- Use Audience Retention to better understand how to structure your video for the best results.
- Perform Keyword Research to find the keywords that your competitors are using and your audience is searching for.
- Increasing Subscribers gets your video in front of more people the moment it is published.
- Encourage Comments and respond to establish a relationship with your viewers.
- Ensure that Viewers Continue Watching videos on YouTube after they finish watching yours.
Other Things That Affects Your YouTube Ranking
Except for the above-mentioned factors, there are also other issues that affect the ranking of your YouTube video. YouTube has stated that the number of subscribers doesn’t play a key role in your video ranking.
For example, if a YouTuber has a million subscribers and then overnight they lose 100 thousand, a video they had ranking number 1 will still be ranked number 1.
However, the number of subscribers has a lot of indirect effects on your channel.
- Subscribers know the moment your video is published
- Subscribers will watch your video in the first week (YouTube will rank your video higher if they see a lift in the first week of publishing)
- YouTube put a higher value on subscribers than views and social shares, because it’s harder to fake subscribers
Growing subscribers take time and effort, and even though it shouldn’t be your main focus, there are tactics you can do to gain more subscribers .
Don’t miss a chance to optimize your YouTube video, download, and print out this checklist for your next video project. For more information on SEO(Search Engine Optimization) on YouTube, you can also read the following article.
How to Fast Rank Video Higher with Video SEO >>
10 Best YouTube Keyword Tools to Use with Bonus Tips>>
If you want to find a video editing solution that empowers your imagination and creativity yet takes less effort, please try this robust and user-friendly video editing software Wondershare Filmora. It provides special effects, stock photo & video, sound library, etc., which will definitely enhance your productivity and helps to make money by making videos much accessible.
Richard Bennett
Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.
Follow @Richard Bennett
Richard Bennett
Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions
We all want our videos to get a lot of views, and in turn, lead to more subscribers. In order to do so, we have to prepare it for success. If you are hoping to optimize a video after it has already been published to YouTube, then you aren’t going to get the best result, because much of optimization is done before the video is even shot.a
In this article, we will give youa checklist , which you should have with you at the very beginning of creating a YouTube video: the ideation stage. As you go through your process, check off each task. By doing so, you can ensure that you have given the video the best chance to rank high and be discovered.
How to Optimize Your Video to Rank Higher on YouTube?
- Keep Your Audience’s Attention
- Do Keyword Research
- Engage Your Audience
- Upload YouTube Video in Proper Length
1. Keep Your Audience’s Attention:
Even though your view count is going up, it doesn’t mean your audience is watching your video. And if they are not, then YouTube is going to consider your video less valuable and therefore, lowering its rank.
Audience Retention is an important metric to keep an eye on after every video you’ve published.
Before you start your next project, take a look back at the Audience Retention of your previous videos.
- Enter YouTube Studio in your channel
- Access to Analytics
- Select the video you want to review
- Click into engagement
- See where a dip in watch time
What is Good Audience Retention?
If you want to see how your Audience Retention is performing, the Average Percentage Viewed will give you a broad perspective. The higher the percentage, the more people are watching your entire video.
If you get above 60% Average Percentage Viewed, you should feel very proud. In our modern world with our short attention span, that is considered good retention.
In the example above, we see that on average, a viewer will only see 44% of the video. For the video below, we see that it only has 30% of the video viewed. Overall, the first video is performing better.
There is also a dip that happens at the beginning in the second example, which indicates that viewers are skipping forward and about 20% then deciding it’s not worth continuing. It’s good data to help you improve your introduction and the hook.
If there is important information that you are presenting at a given point and in the Audience Retention you see that only a small percentage of your viewers actually see it, then for the next video, you might want to position the details in a different point in the video.
How to Improve Audience Retention
Here are a few ways you can retain your audience’s attention if you noticed a drop in viewership:
- Film a hook (introduce your video to let the audience know what to expect)
- Add b-roll (having supplemental footage to cut to makes your video more interesting to watch)
- Have a co-host (Having someone on screen gives the video more dynamic interactions)
- Edit out the unimportant stuff
- Write a conclusion (having a conclusion prepared will allow you to transition from the content of the video to the call to action without the audience even knowing) See this example by PolyMatter below and notice how seamless their ending is.
If you have a video that is doing a good job retaining the audience, then replicate it. If there isn’t, keep experimenting with new structures. Improving audience retention is not simply important for your ranking, but it will affirm that you are building quality videos.
Knowing how to structure your video will allow you to be strategic as you build out your content.
2. Do Keyword Research:
Many viewers find YouTube videos via search, and if you aren’t using the appropriate keywords, then YouTube won’t be able to identify your content and display it for your viewers.
Where Do Keywords Appear on YouTube?
- Title: Have keywords at the beginning of the title and limit them up to approximately 60 characters so it appears in full in search.
- Tags: Include 10-15 tags from general keywords to more specific.
- Descriptions: Put important information and keywords at the beginning of the description so both searcher and the search engine understands what the video is about.
Why Keywords Matter
keyword arrangement is an integral part of YouTube optimization because the robots behind YouTube don’t associate the value of the actual video content with what the viewer is actually seeking. You should pay attention to the relevance of keywords.
Even when you add closed captions, it doesn’t mean the best keywords are present to the Youtube search engine when we speak.
That is why it is important to know your audience and what words and phrases they are going to use to search for your video.
Here is how you can see what keywords were used to find your video:
- Enter YouTube Studio in your channel
- Access Analytics
- Select Reach
- Click into Traffic Source
- Click Traffic Source: YouTube Search
If you want to find some new keywords for your upcoming video, you will need to do some research.
1. Enter Keywords You Want to Rank for In YouTube Search: This allows you to see what the most popular phrases are in the YouTube search engine.
2. Study the Competitors: See which videos are ranking high for your search term. Use a tool called VidIQ to see the keywords that the top videos are performing.
3. Search for Related Keywords and Evaluate Relevancy: A tool called Ubersuggest can help you find related keywords and allow you to identify the search volume, cost per click (aka CPC is used for determining the budget for paid search), and the competitiveness of the word or phrase.
Search volume: The number of searches with that particular keyword. The higher the number the more popular it is. You should aim to use keywords with a high search volume.
Keyword competition score: This score is usually indicated by a number and it represents how difficult it is for a keyword to rank due to other pages already ranking for that word or phrase. You want to find a keyword with a low competition score.
Pro tip: The best combination is high search volume and low competition score. But if you can’t get that perfect mix, go for the low competitive score, as it will give you a better chance to rank, even if it isn’t searched as often.
4. Come Up With Content Related to Those Keywords: To come up with topic ideas around a keyword, you can use a tool called Answer the Public , which gives you all the most popular questions searched online.
3. Engage Your Audience:
It’s been highly discussed on forums all over the Internet, and there appears to be a strong correlation between YouTube video ranking and the number of likes, dislikes, and comments the video received.
While YouTube itself might not be using the number of likes and comments to determine where your video rank, having high engagement allows your video to be discovered through other means.
Here is an example of how it would work:
- A YouTuber with 100,000 subscribers views your video and likes it
- Then your video might be visible to a fraction of those 100,000 subscribers.
- Boom! Domino effect!
- More people will see your video and like it, increasing your network of viewers and your watch time, which is one of the main factors that YouTube takes into consideration.
Get engagements with a call to action:
- Don’t be afraid to ask for an engagement at the beginning of the video to avoid fall off on retention.
- Encourage them to leave a comment or start a discussion by asking a question at the end of your video.
- Monitor comments and responds to them so you can build a relationship with your audience over time.
It’s all about creating a community and that is what YouTube encourages.
4. Upload YouTube Video in Proper Length:
YouTube puts a lot of weight on watch time, and in addition to that, it puts more weight on session watch time.
Session watch time is counted when people watch your video and then continue to watch others, it doesn’t have to be your own. The more time people spend watching YouTube videos, as a result of your content, the more likely YouTube will increase your ranking.
Since YouTube puts importance on time spent watching videos, the length of your video will play a key role.
If you have 5 videos and all of them are a minute long, a 100% watch through will only get you 5 minutes total.
However, if you have 1 video that is 20 minutes, and an average viewer only watches half of it, then you have an average watch time of over 10 minutes. That’s more than double what your five short videos can do. This longer video is worth more. However, if that 20-minute video is really boring and people drop off in the first minute, then it’s not any better than 1 of the 5 short videos.
If your format allows, go for a longer video instead of a shorter one. But the most important thing is that you can keep people watching your videos: so use end screen and playlist links to keep them engaged.
End screen: Pick related videos for your audience, so they know exactly what they should watch next. You can even create a background template for your end screens .
Playlist: If you have multiple videos that fit a specific topic, add them to a playlist so the viewer can enjoy them all in one viewing.
Key Takeaways:
- Use Audience Retention to better understand how to structure your video for the best results.
- Perform Keyword Research to find the keywords that your competitors are using and your audience is searching for.
- Increasing Subscribers gets your video in front of more people the moment it is published.
- Encourage Comments and respond to establish a relationship with your viewers.
- Ensure that Viewers Continue Watching videos on YouTube after they finish watching yours.
Other Things That Affects Your YouTube Ranking
Except for the above-mentioned factors, there are also other issues that affect the ranking of your YouTube video. YouTube has stated that the number of subscribers doesn’t play a key role in your video ranking.
For example, if a YouTuber has a million subscribers and then overnight they lose 100 thousand, a video they had ranking number 1 will still be ranked number 1.
However, the number of subscribers has a lot of indirect effects on your channel.
- Subscribers know the moment your video is published
- Subscribers will watch your video in the first week (YouTube will rank your video higher if they see a lift in the first week of publishing)
- YouTube put a higher value on subscribers than views and social shares, because it’s harder to fake subscribers
Growing subscribers take time and effort, and even though it shouldn’t be your main focus, there are tactics you can do to gain more subscribers .
Don’t miss a chance to optimize your YouTube video, download, and print out this checklist for your next video project. For more information on SEO(Search Engine Optimization) on YouTube, you can also read the following article.
How to Fast Rank Video Higher with Video SEO >>
10 Best YouTube Keyword Tools to Use with Bonus Tips>>
If you want to find a video editing solution that empowers your imagination and creativity yet takes less effort, please try this robust and user-friendly video editing software Wondershare Filmora. It provides special effects, stock photo & video, sound library, etc., which will definitely enhance your productivity and helps to make money by making videos much accessible.
Richard Bennett
Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.
Follow @Richard Bennett
Figures Unveiled! Exploring YouTube’s Curious Numbers (2017)
Infographic - Mind Numbing YouTube Facts,Figures and Statistics
Richard Bennett
Mar 27, 2024• Proven solutions
Since YouTube.com domain was first registered more than a decade ago, it has become one of the most used video sharing platforms on the planet. Former PayPal employees Chad Hurley, Steven Chen and Jawed Karim founded YouTube in 2005 and only a year later their platform was one of the world’s fastest growing websites, surpassing MySpace with more than 100 million video views in the July of the same year. It wasn’t long before YouTube was purchased by Google on November 13. 2006 and since then the world’s most popular video sharing platform has grown continuously.
In 2017, more than 500 hours of video content are being uploaded to YouTube each minute, and over 1.5 billion active users utilize it to share their memories, music they love, business ideas or anything else they feel strongly about. The following infographic will present some of the most interesting YouTube facts and statistics that will enable you to understand better one of the most popular websites ever created.
It’s hard to pick highlights from such an interesting and comprehensive read, but a couple of key stats shine out.
- YouTube has just 0,5 billion users less than Facebook
Mark Zuckerberg is perhaps one of the best-known business geniuses who made his fortune by creating the social network everyone wanted to be a part of. With more than 2 billion active users Facebook is the largest online community on the Internet today. YouTube has 1.5 billion active monthly users which makes it the second largest platform of its kind, well ahead of Instagram, LinkedIn or Twitter.
- People aged 24 to 44 watch the most videos on YouTube
This information isn’t particularly surprising since younger generations use the Internet more frequently than the older ones. 49% of all YouTube users are aged between 24 and 44, but this statistic will likely change in the future since YouTube’s popularity can only increase. What comes in as a surprise is the fact that men spend 24% more time on YouTube than women. Could it be that men are more interested in music, short videos or promotional business videos than women or perhaps, women are simply more practical and thus tend to spend less time aimlessly going through endless video content.
- 9% of the videos are taken down because of the copyright infringements
At one point in the early 2000’s, it seemed as if the copyright laws will be changed forever by the Internet. Since then countless initiatives have prevented YouTube users to view, upload or share content that they don’t have the permission to use. In 2017, 9% of all videos uploaded on YouTube are taken down by the copyright holders. This means that YouTubers must make sure that all content they upload is unique or that they at least have a permission to use it.
- An average person spends 40 minutes on YouTube each day
YouTube is probably one of the best pastimes the Internet can offer, and for that reason, a common person spends 40 minutes on YouTube per day. When you add an average life expectancy into the equation the math shows that during their lifetimes, people spend nearly 2 years on YouTube, or 1 year and 10 months to be exact.
- Pop music singers are the most popular celebrities on YouTube
Naturally, music is the most searched term on YouTube, and celebrities like Justin Bieber, Katy Perry or Rihana have millions of subscribers with billions of total video views. Unlike Facebook where the most popular celebrities are Christiano Ronaldo or Vin Diesel, an actor and a football player, YouTube stars are mostly musicians and Pop Culture icons whose music is available to fans across the globe because of this platform. Some of the historically most viewed videos on YouTube are Luis Fonsi’s Despacito, Psy’s Gangnam Style or Tayler Swift’s Shake it Off that all have a staggering amount of views.
Let us know what you think about these interesting facts about YouTube in the comments below and feel free to share this article with your friends and colleagues.
Richard Bennett
Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.
Follow @Richard Bennett
Richard Bennett
Mar 27, 2024• Proven solutions
Since YouTube.com domain was first registered more than a decade ago, it has become one of the most used video sharing platforms on the planet. Former PayPal employees Chad Hurley, Steven Chen and Jawed Karim founded YouTube in 2005 and only a year later their platform was one of the world’s fastest growing websites, surpassing MySpace with more than 100 million video views in the July of the same year. It wasn’t long before YouTube was purchased by Google on November 13. 2006 and since then the world’s most popular video sharing platform has grown continuously.
In 2017, more than 500 hours of video content are being uploaded to YouTube each minute, and over 1.5 billion active users utilize it to share their memories, music they love, business ideas or anything else they feel strongly about. The following infographic will present some of the most interesting YouTube facts and statistics that will enable you to understand better one of the most popular websites ever created.
It’s hard to pick highlights from such an interesting and comprehensive read, but a couple of key stats shine out.
- YouTube has just 0,5 billion users less than Facebook
Mark Zuckerberg is perhaps one of the best-known business geniuses who made his fortune by creating the social network everyone wanted to be a part of. With more than 2 billion active users Facebook is the largest online community on the Internet today. YouTube has 1.5 billion active monthly users which makes it the second largest platform of its kind, well ahead of Instagram, LinkedIn or Twitter.
- People aged 24 to 44 watch the most videos on YouTube
This information isn’t particularly surprising since younger generations use the Internet more frequently than the older ones. 49% of all YouTube users are aged between 24 and 44, but this statistic will likely change in the future since YouTube’s popularity can only increase. What comes in as a surprise is the fact that men spend 24% more time on YouTube than women. Could it be that men are more interested in music, short videos or promotional business videos than women or perhaps, women are simply more practical and thus tend to spend less time aimlessly going through endless video content.
- 9% of the videos are taken down because of the copyright infringements
At one point in the early 2000’s, it seemed as if the copyright laws will be changed forever by the Internet. Since then countless initiatives have prevented YouTube users to view, upload or share content that they don’t have the permission to use. In 2017, 9% of all videos uploaded on YouTube are taken down by the copyright holders. This means that YouTubers must make sure that all content they upload is unique or that they at least have a permission to use it.
- An average person spends 40 minutes on YouTube each day
YouTube is probably one of the best pastimes the Internet can offer, and for that reason, a common person spends 40 minutes on YouTube per day. When you add an average life expectancy into the equation the math shows that during their lifetimes, people spend nearly 2 years on YouTube, or 1 year and 10 months to be exact.
- Pop music singers are the most popular celebrities on YouTube
Naturally, music is the most searched term on YouTube, and celebrities like Justin Bieber, Katy Perry or Rihana have millions of subscribers with billions of total video views. Unlike Facebook where the most popular celebrities are Christiano Ronaldo or Vin Diesel, an actor and a football player, YouTube stars are mostly musicians and Pop Culture icons whose music is available to fans across the globe because of this platform. Some of the historically most viewed videos on YouTube are Luis Fonsi’s Despacito, Psy’s Gangnam Style or Tayler Swift’s Shake it Off that all have a staggering amount of views.
Let us know what you think about these interesting facts about YouTube in the comments below and feel free to share this article with your friends and colleagues.
Richard Bennett
Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.
Follow @Richard Bennett
Richard Bennett
Mar 27, 2024• Proven solutions
Since YouTube.com domain was first registered more than a decade ago, it has become one of the most used video sharing platforms on the planet. Former PayPal employees Chad Hurley, Steven Chen and Jawed Karim founded YouTube in 2005 and only a year later their platform was one of the world’s fastest growing websites, surpassing MySpace with more than 100 million video views in the July of the same year. It wasn’t long before YouTube was purchased by Google on November 13. 2006 and since then the world’s most popular video sharing platform has grown continuously.
In 2017, more than 500 hours of video content are being uploaded to YouTube each minute, and over 1.5 billion active users utilize it to share their memories, music they love, business ideas or anything else they feel strongly about. The following infographic will present some of the most interesting YouTube facts and statistics that will enable you to understand better one of the most popular websites ever created.
It’s hard to pick highlights from such an interesting and comprehensive read, but a couple of key stats shine out.
- YouTube has just 0,5 billion users less than Facebook
Mark Zuckerberg is perhaps one of the best-known business geniuses who made his fortune by creating the social network everyone wanted to be a part of. With more than 2 billion active users Facebook is the largest online community on the Internet today. YouTube has 1.5 billion active monthly users which makes it the second largest platform of its kind, well ahead of Instagram, LinkedIn or Twitter.
- People aged 24 to 44 watch the most videos on YouTube
This information isn’t particularly surprising since younger generations use the Internet more frequently than the older ones. 49% of all YouTube users are aged between 24 and 44, but this statistic will likely change in the future since YouTube’s popularity can only increase. What comes in as a surprise is the fact that men spend 24% more time on YouTube than women. Could it be that men are more interested in music, short videos or promotional business videos than women or perhaps, women are simply more practical and thus tend to spend less time aimlessly going through endless video content.
- 9% of the videos are taken down because of the copyright infringements
At one point in the early 2000’s, it seemed as if the copyright laws will be changed forever by the Internet. Since then countless initiatives have prevented YouTube users to view, upload or share content that they don’t have the permission to use. In 2017, 9% of all videos uploaded on YouTube are taken down by the copyright holders. This means that YouTubers must make sure that all content they upload is unique or that they at least have a permission to use it.
- An average person spends 40 minutes on YouTube each day
YouTube is probably one of the best pastimes the Internet can offer, and for that reason, a common person spends 40 minutes on YouTube per day. When you add an average life expectancy into the equation the math shows that during their lifetimes, people spend nearly 2 years on YouTube, or 1 year and 10 months to be exact.
- Pop music singers are the most popular celebrities on YouTube
Naturally, music is the most searched term on YouTube, and celebrities like Justin Bieber, Katy Perry or Rihana have millions of subscribers with billions of total video views. Unlike Facebook where the most popular celebrities are Christiano Ronaldo or Vin Diesel, an actor and a football player, YouTube stars are mostly musicians and Pop Culture icons whose music is available to fans across the globe because of this platform. Some of the historically most viewed videos on YouTube are Luis Fonsi’s Despacito, Psy’s Gangnam Style or Tayler Swift’s Shake it Off that all have a staggering amount of views.
Let us know what you think about these interesting facts about YouTube in the comments below and feel free to share this article with your friends and colleagues.
Richard Bennett
Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.
Follow @Richard Bennett
Richard Bennett
Mar 27, 2024• Proven solutions
Since YouTube.com domain was first registered more than a decade ago, it has become one of the most used video sharing platforms on the planet. Former PayPal employees Chad Hurley, Steven Chen and Jawed Karim founded YouTube in 2005 and only a year later their platform was one of the world’s fastest growing websites, surpassing MySpace with more than 100 million video views in the July of the same year. It wasn’t long before YouTube was purchased by Google on November 13. 2006 and since then the world’s most popular video sharing platform has grown continuously.
In 2017, more than 500 hours of video content are being uploaded to YouTube each minute, and over 1.5 billion active users utilize it to share their memories, music they love, business ideas or anything else they feel strongly about. The following infographic will present some of the most interesting YouTube facts and statistics that will enable you to understand better one of the most popular websites ever created.
It’s hard to pick highlights from such an interesting and comprehensive read, but a couple of key stats shine out.
- YouTube has just 0,5 billion users less than Facebook
Mark Zuckerberg is perhaps one of the best-known business geniuses who made his fortune by creating the social network everyone wanted to be a part of. With more than 2 billion active users Facebook is the largest online community on the Internet today. YouTube has 1.5 billion active monthly users which makes it the second largest platform of its kind, well ahead of Instagram, LinkedIn or Twitter.
- People aged 24 to 44 watch the most videos on YouTube
This information isn’t particularly surprising since younger generations use the Internet more frequently than the older ones. 49% of all YouTube users are aged between 24 and 44, but this statistic will likely change in the future since YouTube’s popularity can only increase. What comes in as a surprise is the fact that men spend 24% more time on YouTube than women. Could it be that men are more interested in music, short videos or promotional business videos than women or perhaps, women are simply more practical and thus tend to spend less time aimlessly going through endless video content.
- 9% of the videos are taken down because of the copyright infringements
At one point in the early 2000’s, it seemed as if the copyright laws will be changed forever by the Internet. Since then countless initiatives have prevented YouTube users to view, upload or share content that they don’t have the permission to use. In 2017, 9% of all videos uploaded on YouTube are taken down by the copyright holders. This means that YouTubers must make sure that all content they upload is unique or that they at least have a permission to use it.
- An average person spends 40 minutes on YouTube each day
YouTube is probably one of the best pastimes the Internet can offer, and for that reason, a common person spends 40 minutes on YouTube per day. When you add an average life expectancy into the equation the math shows that during their lifetimes, people spend nearly 2 years on YouTube, or 1 year and 10 months to be exact.
- Pop music singers are the most popular celebrities on YouTube
Naturally, music is the most searched term on YouTube, and celebrities like Justin Bieber, Katy Perry or Rihana have millions of subscribers with billions of total video views. Unlike Facebook where the most popular celebrities are Christiano Ronaldo or Vin Diesel, an actor and a football player, YouTube stars are mostly musicians and Pop Culture icons whose music is available to fans across the globe because of this platform. Some of the historically most viewed videos on YouTube are Luis Fonsi’s Despacito, Psy’s Gangnam Style or Tayler Swift’s Shake it Off that all have a staggering amount of views.
Let us know what you think about these interesting facts about YouTube in the comments below and feel free to share this article with your friends and colleagues.
Richard Bennett
Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.
Follow @Richard Bennett
- Title: "[New] Hitting the Sweet Spot Top 5 Tips for Channel Growth"
- Author: Joseph
- Created at : 2024-05-31 13:44:36
- Updated at : 2024-06-01 13:44:36
- Link: https://youtube-stream.techidaily.com/new-hitting-the-sweet-spot-top-5-tips-for-channel-growth/
- License: This work is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0.
