- YouTube recommendations
drive 70% of what we watch on the platform.
So, even though YouTube
is the world's second largest search engine,
most of the views you're getting
are not coming from the YouTube search bar.
So, if you want to hit massive growth on your channel,
then it's in your best interest to understand
how to get into the YouTube recommendation system.
There's a few things that will help you understand
about YouTube's recommendation system in the first place.
And the first thing on that list
is that YouTube is trying to get people
to overall increase the amount of time
they spend watching YouTube.
The longer they spend on the platform watching your videos,
the more ads YouTube can serve the viewer
and, in turn, the more money you and YouTube make.
Because of the emphasis on viewing session time,
YouTube is trying to serve up
as many relevant results as possible every single day.
While you're watching YouTube,
the videos alongside in the suggestion feed
are all very relevant
and aligned to the content you're currently watching.
The YouTube algorithm here is just trying to determine
if these are the videos that are going to keep you watching.
Now, YouTube recommendations appear in two different places:
they are on the home feed
and, of course, they are in the "Up Next" section
as you're watching a video actively on YouTube.
And understanding the factors
that help build these lists in the first place
will help you capitalize on them.
Before we dive into that, though,
let me explain what I mean when I say session
because that's gonna be important.
Say you open YouTube on your phone.
As soon as you start watching a video,
what you've just done is begun a watch session.
Now, that session can last anywhere
between one video or one and a dozen videos.
It's however long you spend on YouTube
from the time you open the app and started watching videos.
If you leave the app and then come back an hour later,
you've just started another session.
The reason this is so important to understand is because
YouTube is going to surface videos to you
similar to the ones that you watched in a given session.
And another way they build out suggestions
is showing you videos that are similar
to ones you generally watch.
And then, of course, suggestions can also be dictated
by videos you've watched way in the past.
So, as a creator, capitalizing on the suggestion feeds
are going to help you in a number of ways.
And they're all obvious.
They're going to get you more views;
they're going to get you more subscribers;
they're going to get you more exposure in general.
By now, you might be asking, "How could a smaller channel
"get into the YouTube recommendation system?"
I want in, I want a piece.
Well, it just so happens
that depending on where you're at in your YouTube journey,
you could end up having your video
show up in the home feed immediately after you publish
or it could honestly take months.
The reason being, though,
is YouTube just simply doesn't have enough data yet
to understand who this video
should go to in the first place.
That's why sometimes you'll jump on YouTube
and see older videos surfacing on the home feed
alongside newer videos that have been created
by more established channels.
These larger channels
are having their videos surfaced a lot quicker
because they've just given YouTube a lot of data over time.
But let's talk about
how you can stack the deck in your favor.
The steps I'm about to cover are in no particular order
and you can tackle these as you grow on YouTube,
and continue creating content and gaining experience.
But the first one we're going to talk about
is having the best intro you possibly can
in every single video.
Start with a really strong hook
and include eye-catching visuals or something surprising.
You'll also want to clarify
what your video is about straight away
and give the audience confidence
that they clicked on the proper video
and then reveal a little bit about
what you're gonna be talking about later on in the video.
Now, I would caution you not to get too wordy here.
It really depends on what you're covering
but my advice has always been
to reveal as much as you can in your intro,
get people as hooked as possible,
but also keep it as short as possible too.
Another thing that can help you out a lot
is increasing engagement on all of your videos.
You, as a viewer, when you watch something on YouTube,
your brain releases a whole ton of chemicals, right?
Not a scientist, just saying.
When you get what you want on YouTube,
whether it's to be informed or entertained,
your brain is firing off all kinds of fun chemicals.
So, you click like and maybe you even leave a comment,
talking about how fantastic the video was.
The punch of these chemicals
is going to recede over time, though,
and you as the viewer are going to want more.
So, what happens?
You click on another video.
Your session time is going to increase
and then even when you take a break,
YouTube's hope is that you're gonna come back
an hour later for more.
And that naturally leads into a discussion about watch time.
Of course, the more you can get people to watch on YouTube,
the more ads YouTube can serve,
which benefits YouTube, of course, and it benefits you.
So, YouTube is going to reward videos and reward creators
who are able to capitalize on that
and create as much watch time as possible.
And if you're trying to do that already
and you've heard all these tips before,
this next one might be something you haven't heard before.
And that is if you can interlink your videos together
using playlists, end screens, and pinned comments,
you're going to have a much easier time growing on YouTube.
As an example, if you make a video about topic X
and a viewer gets all the way through it,
it's in your best interest to pitch them another video
that is also about topic X.
Stick around to the end of this video for an example
but one of the things you can do
is use an end screen to specifically point at one video
and tell people a little bit about why they should watch it.
And you can also go into older videos,
go into the comment section,
and pin a comment at the very top,
which moves people to another video about video X.
And then, of course, topic X
needs to all go into one cohesive playlist.
Doing all of these steps will help you
not only increase your watch time across your channel
but when a person decides to start a YouTube watch session,
hopefully they spend that entire session on your channel.
That's the goal with plugging videos
in different end screens, pinned comments, playlists, etc.
To tip that first domino though, you need a good title.
Focusing on optimizing your titles
is going to help YouTube understand what your video's about
and who it's for.
This is your opportunity to try and rank really high
for a particular keyword or keyword phrase.
And if you're struggling with titles,
I want to point you to our AI title generator.
Try plugging in a phrase that describes your video
and then click "Get title ideas".
Our AI title generator is going to give you
a whole bunch of ideas for highly engaging titles
and even free users have some limited access to this tool.
The links are down below
but there's one more thing we need to talk about
and that's thumbnails.
You can have a great title
but if your thumbnail isn't clickable,
that's also going to hold you back.
When you're getting started optimizing your thumbnail,
one of the things you can try doing
is basically making a visualized version of your title.
You do want to create a dynamic well-designed image
but from my own experience,
you don't have to be a graphic designer
to make great thumbnails.
What you need to be able to do
is communicate something using just a picture, an idea,
what is your video about?
Don't let your viewers think for a second
when they see your title and they see your thumbnail,
they should understand
what they're gonna get when they click.
As your channel grows,
you can kind of create a brand for your thumbnails
by making them all look similar in some kind of way.
It is important to have your thumbnail design
stay consistent across your channel
for your returning viewers.
The best advice I can give you
is to go to the top channels in your niche
and try and understand and study
what it is they're doing in their thumbnails,
especially for their most successful videos.
You would be really surprised at what you can learn
by just taking a step back
and seeing what's working for other creators.
All of that stuff is super important.
I would say those are the most important steps
but we can also talk a little bit about
how you can get ranked in search as well.
So, let's talk about optimizing your metadata,
starting with the description.
One of the best things you can do
is have one to three sentences
that are at the very top of the description
that describe your video.
Below all of that,
you can include additional information, links,
affiliate links, whatever you want.
As you're creating your description, though,
be thinking about the keyword and keyword phrases
that you're trying to rank for in search.
Not only do you want to include this in your description
in as many ways as possible, that makes sense anyway,
you also want to be thinking about this
for your tags as well.
A lot of creators will use about four to six tags
in every single video
and those are just the generic tags
that describe all of their videos and their channel.
From there, one thing you can do with your tags
is include common misspellings
for the keyword you're trying to rank for
and then just the main phrases you would like to appear for
when someone's typing in the search bar.
But the number one way
to get into the YouTube recommendation system
is jumping on an existing trend.
People ask us all the time, "How do you even find trends?"
I'm gonna try and break this down for you
as simply as possible.
Finding trends on YouTube doesn't have to be hard.
All you need to do is pay attention
to what's going on in the world.
"Squid Game" on Netflix is the best example
I could possibly give you for this.
By the time we got around to making a video,
telling you that, "Hey, Squid Game is a trend
"and you should totally jump on it",
people had already jumped on it.
We saw this trending and we took time to figure out
what this meant for people on YouTube
and how we can best capitalize on it.
But in the time it takes us to jump on a trend
and make a video about it, alerting you to it,
you could have found out yourself
just by hanging out on Twitter or Reddit or YouTube itself.
When a huge amount of people
is suddenly all excited at once about a massive topic,
don't wait for people like me
to tell you to make a video on it.
Just find a way to make a video on that topic
that fits in with your style
and the type of content that you make.
"Squid Game" is an old example now.
So, I'm not telling you to make a video on "Squid Game"
but what I want you to do
is research all the different videos
that are on YouTube about "Squid Game".
Try and figure out just how many niches
made videos around "Squid Game"
and look at the ways that they capitalized on the trend.
You can find "Squid Game" videos
that range from MrBeast recreating all the games himself;
to gaming videos that incorporate it in different ways;
to cooking channels.
All types of channels capitalized on "Squid Game"
in their own way.
The biggest mistake you can make
is waiting on a trend to come by
that happens to fit with the type of channel
that you already have.
If you are a channel
that gives tips on how to mow lawns faster
and you really want to capitalize on "Squid Game"
but you don't know what to do,
just take out your lawn mower
and draw the logo in your grass.
Find new trends;
find fun ways to incorporate them into your content.
Once you have that trending idea
and you're looking to turn it into a video,
it's important to take the right steps,
so that video has the best chance
of turning into a viral success for your channel.
And this video is going to help you
through that process step by step.
So go ahead, click this,
and help with my session watch time.