Promote YouTube videos
If you're just getting started with youtube or you're thinking about starting a new channel soon then you've probably had the thought cross your mind. How am I gonna get any views if I don't have any subscribers while it is true that every big YouTuber and successful youtube channel you see today. Started from the same place with no views and no subscribers well it's a frustrating stage to go through.
I remember those days well spending all this time writing and scripting and recording and editing and planning out these videos only to launch them to crickets up still no views. So this right here is the article that I wish I had. When I was first getting started with my youtube channel and in the early days of youtube that would have saved me a ton of time and energy and money and heartache.
So let me tell you how it's done and it all starts by taking a look at one of my favorite business expressions which is that "Nobody can buy from you if they don't know you exist". You see one of the biggest myths and misconceptions in business and it applies equally to youtube is that all you need to succeed is to have a great,
- Product
- Service
- Business
- Offer
And people will just come flocking to you rushing in cash in hand ready to buy whatever you have to sell. It doesn't work this way you see fair or not it's not the best businesses that win. Rather it's The Businesses With The Best Marketing and this same concept applies over to youtube. So yes of course you do need to create good videos.
You do need to make sure that they're engaging and well thought out and well planned and all of that but you also need to make sure to wrap them in the right packaging by doing all of the marketing that also has to be a very big part of the overall equation. You see competition is simply too high for you to just go out there trying to make good videos and hope that everything falls into place.
Take Control
You want to take a little bit more control of this. You want to have a little more agency in yourself and your videos by making sure that you're following all of the steps that I'm going to be telling you here. Now if you're just getting started with your channel and you don't yet have very many subscribers or none at all then by far.
The best way to get those initial views on your videos is going to be to leverage other audiences and other networks and relationships that you have on other channels or across other mediums.
- Other Audiences
- Search
- Engage
- Consistency
- Thumbnails
1. Other Audiences
If you already have a business that says has an email list well then. You're going to want to email them. When you release a new video but if you don't have an email list and maybe you just have another social media following well the same thing applies. You want to make sure that you're letting them know about your video to drive them in that direction.
Even if you don't have different business accounts or business social media accounts. You probably still have personal social media accounts or at the very least,
- Personal contacts
- Relationships
- Networks with friends and family
- Colleagues
Well, a big thing here is just letting them know that you've got a video on a topic that they may find interesting full disclosure in the early days. Even if you've got a topic that they may not find interesting. Well if they can just help you out a little bit by checking it out and hitting the like button it goes a long way.
One of the best ways though to drive traffic to your youtube channel from other audiences is by giving them a bit of a taste of what they can experience. Once they get there which means taking your original youtube video and then slicing and dicing and carving it up and then sharing it across other social media platforms.
Piktostory
Piktostory is an amazing video marketing tool that allows you to take a single video and then quickly and easily turn it into multiple content pieces for use across all your social media platforms. It's the perfect tool for,
- Content marketers
- Social media managers
- Brand strategists
And anyone who creates video content to increase audience engagement automatically adds subtitles. Allows you to change the color type and size of the font and you can customize the video background color to match your brand or whatever look you're going for. So you can check out pikto's story and sign up for a completely free account.
2. Search
If you want to access any additional features alright next let me show you my absolute favorite strategy for brand new youtube channels to get found and get more views. Even if you don't have any subscribers and that is search now before I dive into the specifics on search. First a very important warning and something you want to pay attention to.
Where a lot of people get into trouble in their early days of starting youtube and trying to get found is that the model and copy bigger creators more established brands who's been doing this for a long time see the reality is. Is that what larger creators are doing. Now is very unlikely what they did to get them. There in the first place as they grow their strategy needs to change.
This means typically moving and evolving from more of a search-based strategy to more of a suggested and browser-based strategy. Now there are many reasons why this is important. However one of the biggest ones is that when you're using a search-based strategy.
Search-Based Strategy
Search based strategy is ideal when you're first getting started well you can't make people search for something. So you need to tap into already existing demand by doing proper keyword research and finding out what people are actively searching for online but as your channel and your audience and your subscribers grow it only makes sense to pivot away from more of a search based strategy to more of a suggested based strategy.
Suggested Based Strategy
Suggested-based strategy is where you start to try to create content that engages and appeals to people and the algorithm gets youtube to essentially suggest your content to more people. So again it's very important, to be honest with where you're at right now. If you're just getting started with no views and no subscribers start with the search but keep in the back of your mind that.
When we can talk about this another day you'll want to pivot to more of a suggested and browse-based strategy. Let's talk search now when it comes to search engine optimizing your youtube videos, simply, all you need to do is some decent keyword research to find out what people are examining for and then make videos about that.
Now if you're just getting started you're going to want to look at something called Long Tail Keywords. Which are essentially just more in-depth sentences more detailed questions rather than short terms and short topics on the topic of marketing rather than making a video called marketing. You'd want to make a video on,
- Marketing strategies for service-based business
- Marketing strategies for online service-based business
- The top marketing strategies for online service-based businesses that sell clothing
I guess clothing isn't a service but you get the picture. Now there are several different ways to do keyword research including great free tools like simply going to google and seeing what pops up. When you search for your term as well as different youtube plugins some free some paid such as Tubebuddy and vidIQ so with that out of the way.
3. Engage
The next question then is what can you do once you've got your search engine optimized video it's out there it's getting some views. Well, how do you increase things even further and that leads me to my next point which is all about you wanting to engage with your community and with the comments that you get.
Here's the deal when you're first getting started you've got a couple of different advantages that some of the larger creators don't have names. The fact that simply because you're getting fewer views and fewer subscribers and therefore fewer comments. Well, it gives you even more opportunity to dive deep into the comments section to engage with your community.
To start building and creating as much value and as much of a deep relationship as is humanly possible. So far I think I should be able to maintain that pace it sounds like a simple strategy but you would be amazed. At how many youtube channels that I take a look at from new creators and I see all kinds of different comments people engaging or complimenting or making suggestions or asking questions.
They get completely ignored that my friend is not a good way to build a community or a youtube channel not only is this bad from a branding and business point of view trying to essentially destroy customer relationships by completely ignoring them but it's also bad from a youtube algorithm standpoint. You see youtube is a social media platform and social media platforms love engagement.
4. Consistency
We have probably the single most important factor of all of them and I appreciate pretty much every single person who has ever created any kind of video. Whatsoever on youtube marketing has spoken about this but I would be doing you a disservice. If I didn't cover it as well because seriously it's that important.
So stick with me and I'll give you something good right after the word. I'm talking about today as consistency that's right good old-fashioned boring consistency. Just putting in the time putting in the wraps doing the work and cranking out those videos. You see for every youtube hack and youtube trick and youtube algorithm secret and everything that's out there.
The reality is that it often comes down to very simple math. If right now you're producing say one video a month and you're growing at. I don't know say 10 subscribers a month. Well, you could essentially double that by making two videos a month and if you're doing one video a week. Well, again you could probably double your growth by doing two videos a week.
If you're doing two videos a week you could do four videos a week. The point is up until around the point of a minimum of one video a week and probably around two to three videos a week. Depending on what market business or industry you're in you're going to experience. Some pretty exponential gains before you start ever approaching the realm of diminishing returns.
Where additional effort isn't going to necessarily equate to more subscribers and more views. That threshold is different for every market and every kind of niche here on youtube but the reality is there seems to be a pretty agreed-upon standard of one video a week at a minimum and three videos a week is kind of an ideal range.
This is a perfect example to look at what I do and not just what I say and while we're talking about consistency I'd like to include you in a concept that I call 30 bad videos. The reality is if you're just getting started with youtube and you're frustrated that you're not getting enough views and enough subscribers or anything like that.
Well unless you've produced and created and uploaded published 30 bad videos. Well kinda just haven't done the work yet see it takes time to develop any new skill and to get good at something not only that it takes time for the youtube algorithm to try to figure out. What you're talking about and where to put your videos and what kind of people to show your content to.
Now I say 30 bad videos not because they're necessarily bad but because they're going to get better and if you set the bar way too high for the level of production or quality or professionalism that you want to try to deliver. You'll more often than not get stuck in this procrastination perfectionism death loop judging yourself feeling terrible or posting anything and that's not good for anyone. So make sure to make that video and then get it published.
5. Thumbnails
My next tip is all about making sure that the videos you create. Well, they do get seen and there's no better way to do this than. Through the use of well-designed thumbnails. They not only have been designed with thought and intention and strategy behind them but are also optimized for maximum impact and click-through rate.
So here's what's interesting about youtube thumbnail design is that often when we look at things like graphic design and design of pretty much. Any kind's very subjective what one person thinks to look good be completely ugly to someone else but when it comes to youtube the data doesn't lie.
This is why most of the top creators spend an insane amount of time on their thumbnail design. They're not always trying to create the prettiest or the most well-designed thumbnail. Rather they're trying to create the thumbnail with the most impact that says what the viewer is going to get and gets that click because again you could have the best video in the entire world but if no one clicks it no one's ever gonna know.
So take a look at what others in your industry and also outside of your industry are doing when it comes to thumbnail design and think about both the title and the topic of your video. As well as what that thumbnail is going to look like how can you design it to intrigue. Someone to click it so they'll watch your video.
My best tip though if you want to get more subscribers to get more views and grow your youtube channel is to spend some time understanding marketing. The principles and the fundamentals behind it because this is really what's going to enable you to take your channel to the next level.