Today we are going to do our very first YouTube channel
review.
We're going to take a channel with 1,000 subscribers or less
and talk about, in this case, the branding elements
and how you can optimize those to convert
as many first-time viewers and subscribers as possible.
Let's talk about that coming up right after this.
Hey, guys.
My name is Tim Schmoyer.
And welcome to Video Creators, the channel
that's all about helping you guys grow your YouTube channels
and spreading a message that changes lives.
Let me know what you guys feel about this channel review
we're going to do right here.
I'm thinking about doing a lot of them
for channels that have 1,000 subscribers or less.
And today we're going to talk about how
to convert those new viewers into subscribers by looking
at a YouTube channel from Sarah Moran Nutrition.
So a link to her channel's down in the description below,
and we're going to dig through a lot of this stuff together.
But first of all, let's go to [INAUDIBLE].
I want to show you guys something here.
Look.
She is growing 56.3% in views over the past 30 days,
and 63% of subscriber growth over the past 30
days, which is awesome.
Great job, Sarah.
But this is what I want to point out to you guys right here, OK?
So see this?
This is what most creators think.
They're like, all right, I'll be flat for when I first
get started.
But it better start growing pretty quickly,
and they like to see this arc.
But this is what often happens, is
then you come down a little bit sometimes too.
And that's when creators, when they
start going through this dip, that's when they get
frustrated.
What am I doing wrong?
Why am I not growing anymore?
And so then she's flat for several months,
but now she's on the way up again.
And what we can learn from Sarah is
even when things start heading south a little bit,
you should still continue to persevere,
and push forward, and keep moving in the right direction.
And that is what Sarah's doing here.
So super encouraging.
Good job, Sarah.
Glad to see that you're growing here.
So let's talk about her YouTube channel.
We're going to talk about some things that she can do,
and you guys can learn from her, about how
to optimize this page, because this page is so important.
If you look at your YouTube Analytics,
you'll see that the majority of your new subscribers
are coming straight from your channel page.
Right here, they're clicking this little red Subscribe
button.
And you're going to get some subscribers from your videos,
but this is where most of them are.
And the reason is a lot of the times,
because they see one of your videos,
and they're like, oh, I love Sarah's videos.
They're awesome.
What else does she have that's like this?
And so they come to her channel or your channel.
And then they look here and decide, should I subscribe?
Is this something that's offering ongoing value
to me, that is for me, that I would want to have?
Those are the questions your channel
needs to be designed to answer.
So let's talk about how Sarah does it.
Right here, very first thing, header image
is the first thing they're going to skim.
Really important.
And she does some things here that are really smart.
Helping you live a real foods lifestyle.
So right here in the very beginning, right at the header
image, she's pitched a little bit of value
that her channel has, which is really, really smart.
And I encourage all of you guys to do that.
And then she has new videos every week.
Now, that's really good also, to have your posting schedule.
But to keep it generic as new videos every week doesn't
really help you viewers know when to come back
to look for new videos.
You guys want your viewers to make your channel
a part of their weekly rhythm.
And that means that you're going to need
to commit to Tuesday and Thursday, or Wednesday,
Friday, Saturday, or whatever the case might be so
that your viewers know when to come back.
So I would probably not just say every week.
I would commit to one and just stick to that.
So header image is really important.
Pitching the value and who that value is for,
which this doesn't really do.
But it does at least have the value.
And if you can call out who it's for,
that would be even more powerful here.
Next thing-- we're going to scroll down a little bit--
is that you need to have a channel trailer.
Now, knowing Sarah, I know she's very familiar with what
a channel trailer is, and she's probably
working on one right now to fill into this spot.
But the rest of you guys should have a channel trailer, a 15
or-- I'm sorry, 30 to 45-second video
that just pitches the value of your channel.
That's your opportunity to not just show somebody
through the header image what your value's about,
but also pitching, OK, some, you know, half minute or so
to pitch it in.
We have other videos on this channel that
will take you through how to craft a really
effective channel trailer.
So those are linked up below, so go check those out.
So then the next thing that a new person on your channel
would see are these playlists.
Now, she's doing some one thing really well that
is already better than the average YouTube creator,
and that is she isn't just categorizing her videos based--
and these playlists based on what they are,
but the title of these playlists actually pitch value also.
So Healthy Recipes and Cooking Tips.
And then she has the description for each of them,
which is really good metadata.
Gives more information to Google about what
the playlist is about.
And then also right here, Nutrition Questions Answered.
Get your nutrition questions answered by a registered
dietitian nutritionist.
Those are big words for me.
Say What?
Breaking Down-- Breaking Down Food and Nutrition News.
And again, so these are pitching some value.
And she's doing a good job with that.
So I would highly recommend that you title your playlists here
in a way that make it easy for someone
to want to get into watching these videos.
The only thing I would recommend is maybe
having a playlist that's, like, New to Sarah Moran Nutrition?
Start Here.
And the only reason I would recommend that
is because some of these videos might not convert well.
You just don't know.
Like, this is only two days ago, so she
doesn't have enough data to know how this video would perform
for her, and yet it's the very first video
featured on her channel.
So instead, I would make a playlist,
curate it with some videos that you
know do convert non-subscribed viewers into subscribers,
as well as maybe just some videos that you love or you
feel like represent your channel the best, or something
like that, and add those to a playlist that
would make it easy for a first-time viewer
to know how do they start consuming your content,
how they get introduced to who you are, what you're all about,
that type of stuff.
So that element, branding element, is really important.
Now let's talk about thumbnails for a little bit
here, because those are also really important.
Now, there's just two styles.
You can see this style here is her old style from 10 months, 4
months, 8 months ago, and then these,
you know, for the past few weeks.
So let's talk about her old ones look at what she changed.
So she used to have just a picture of herself,
same background, and the sidebar was a different color
with different text.
And one thing to point out, and she
looks like she made this change more recently,
she was using this font, which is hard to read on mobile.
It's even harder to read at my desktop.
"Becoming a Registered Dietitian [INAUDIBLE]."
So use fonts, when the thumbnail is
small like this, that it's still easily readable, which it looks
like she did here with "Emotional Eating" and "11
Reasons You're Always Hungry."
The second thing I would suggest is that some of these titles
lend themselves to pretty good visuals,
like "Is Organic Food Better?"
So behind her, she should probably
have the big picture of a big pile of something people
think of when they think of organic food.
Or "How to Find Local Food," and there should probably be, like,
a farm picture behind her.
"Dealing With Emotional Eating."
She should probably make an emotional thing
herself, you know, with some food or some sort of imagery
that works with the title that she's using for the video--
rather than what she's doing in these,
is just repeating the same text in the thumbnail
that she has as the title, which remember,
the text in the thumbnail is not indexed.
Google can't see it.
They're not reading it.
So if you do use text in your thumbnails,
use it to complement the title, not just
to repeat the exact same thing, because there's
no benefit to that.
But when possible, use visuals.
I do think she should continue to keep her face in that,
a picture of herself, especially like this one, where
you see the whites of the eyes, or this one, or this one.
When people can see the whites of your eyes, that
helps-- that helps them generate-- feel trust
for you, which is really important, right?
So keep your face in it, but do some visuals.
Now, she's updated some of these, right?
So here's a good visual of "The Kale Recipe You Need to Know."
I would suggest she still has her face, picture of her,
maybe on the bottom-left corner or something,
because people do connect with people more
than they connect with objects.
So I would maybe consider that.
The cast iron here probably doesn't need that text
right there because we can see that's cast iron.
But her having her picture right there with it,
that's really good.
One thing to remember, though, guys?
Oh, like this one.
Like, this one has chili.
If you have something like this, don't make it that small.
Like, this is all about chili recipe for the Super Bowl.
So make sure we can see this chili really, really clear.
You can't see it that clearly this small.
So that should probably be, like,
the whole background behind her with this picture of her cut
out on top, that type of thing.
Also remember, this bottom-right corner,
there's going to be that timestamp on it.
So see the guacamole is covered up a little bit,
and so is yummy over here.
That's covered up.
So try to avoid that bottom-right corner
of your thumbnails with anything when possible.
And I think that's where were going to stop for this one.
There's a lot of really good stuff
here that she's doing really well.
And I highly recommend you guys go check out her channel.
And I'd love to hear from you guys in the comments below what
other suggestions and ideas you have for her
that you would suggest that she could make.
And also, go check out her channel,
subscribe, give her some support as well.
And let me know you think about these types of reviews.
Are they helpful for you?
Would you like to see more of them?
I've got a whole bunch of channels
that are under 1,000 subscribers that I would like
to review that I think have some really
valuable lessons jam-packed in them
that I want to bring up for you guys.
But let me know in the comments below.
And if this is your first time here at Video Creators,
I was like to have you subscribe because this channel's
just all about helping you guys grow your YouTube channels
and your audiences, kind of like we've done here, hopefully,
for Sarah a little bit.
And hopefully this helps you do the same so that the message
that you're spreading can continue to spread, reach
people, and change their lives.
So thanks for hanging out with me, guys,
a little bit here today.
Subscribe, and I'll see you guys again soon.
Bye.