- One of the hardest parts about being
a YouTube creator i think is knowing
which thumbnail to use for your video.
I've learned that if I publish the wrong thumbnail
for the video,
that video will tank and I go back
and switch it to another thumbnail later
and boom it takes off.
It would be great wouldn't it
To have some sort of way to A/B test your thumbnails
but today I want to walk
you through three different ways to do that,
so that you can set up your videos
for the best success possible.
(whooshing)
Hey guys, my name is Tim Schmoyer welcome to Video Creators.
We are all about helping you grow your YouTube audience,
you can spread a message that reaches people
and changes their lives.
And first thing you're going to do to start learning about
which thumbnails perform the best for you,
is to use to create different groups
and YouTube Analytics based on the thumbnails
that you're creating.
You go in your analytics,
click on the Group's tab there,
click Create New Group
and then you're gonna create a new group
for each different style of thumbnail you have.
And then you're going to add the different videos
that apply to that group to that group.
What these groups allow you to do is now look at the data
just for the videos that are in that group,
and then click that Compare to button
and compare to other videos in a different group.
So for example, you can start to compare videos
with thumbnails and the faces
versus thumbnails with no faces,
then you can start comparing like wow, overall,
whenever I have a face in the thumbnail,
it works 3.6 times better
or if there's a natural background
tends to perform much better.
Or if there is a text on the thumbnail like
that performs better,
you can start to see based on the group's overall
which things that you're trying your thumbnails
that generate the best results in terms
of click through rates and watch time.
Those are the two metrics you go look at them together,
don't look at just one high click through rate
doesn't mean nothing.
If people are banding your content really quickly.
You need to use thumbnails
that set the right expectation for the viewer
so that when they get into that content,
they actually stick around and watch.
The group to help you figure out channel wide
are I kinda like a high level.
These are the best practices for my thumbnails.
But what about an individual video level?
The best way to analyze
that currently in your YouTube Analytics,
is to use the Realtime data.
So after that video is published,
watch it for the next few hours
and then switch it to the other thumbnail
and then see how that real time analytics.
How does the new thumbnail impact click through rates
and watch time
and views on on that video.
It's not a perfect analysis
because when notifications go out,
those notifications go out
with whatever thumbnails on at that time.
And most people could click on it later
and watch your video
when you're testing a different thumbnail.
So it's not great
but it's kinda like the best option we have right now.
The third option
is to use TubeBuddy's A/B thumbnail testing tools.
You upload both of your thumbnail variations to TubeBuddy
and then they will swap it back
and forth every 24 hours
until one of the thumbnails appears
to be the likely winner based on click throughs
and impressions and watch time
and all the metrics
that you should be looking at.
If you're looking for the most automated way
to test your thumbnails,
to your video creators,
we do all three of these,
we have our group set up that we're evaluating
every month or two
and kind of seeing, okay, is this trend still working.
And then we do look at real-time analytics.
And we'll switch the thumbnail back
and forth every few hours
after that video has been published.
And then after we've settled on a thumbnail
based on that data,
then we start using TubeBuddy's A/B testing tool
and let that go for like two weeks
or so until we can kind of like dial in that thumbnail.
Now one other thing I would recommend
that you consider
is that you might have videos on your channel
that have been sitting there for a while
that are really valuable
and they're just not getting the traction
that you want them (laughing) to get.
So updating some of those thumbnails on older content,
this could be a great idea,
a great way to spark new life into your videos.
We've done that multiple times.
here at Video Creators I had a video talking
with a YouTube employee
about the best time to upload content.
The original thumbnail like I only got like 10,000 views
or something like that
and then petered out
and I was like,
"I know this is the video people want to see more".
So we updated the thumbnail
to have YouTube employee in the thumbnail
because that text in the title was truncated originally
and then it just shot up, I don't know like another
50,000 views in the next few days. (laughing)
There's two considerations to keep in mind
when you're figuring out which videos should I mess with
and experiment with a new thumbnail,
see if I can breathe new life into it.
Number one is this on a gut level,
this is a good video,
it should be getting more attention,
that video is flat, update it.
The second thing is look at your data
and kind of get an idea of
where is that like the median
for a video performance on my channel
and videos that are kinda like just below
or just above that line
that you think should be doing better.
Those are the videos I would start with first
not the videos that aren't getting any views,
but don't mess with the ones
that are already performing really well for you,
look for those that middle-group
and start playing with those.
Now thumbnails are so important(laughing)
for the growth of your channel
and the success of your videos.
That we've put together a whole playlist
for you right here that you can click on.
I do multiple interviews,
with multiple successful creators sharing
with you all their behind the scenes,
secret tips and hacks for their thumbnails over
what makes their videos perform very well.
So if you want to learn from the best,
click right here,
and I'll see you guys over in that next video.