- Not once in this discovery algorithm
did YouTube mention the word, subscribers.
I'm not gonna add anything to that.
I'm just putting it out there.
(gentle upbeat music)
Now then, hey, folks, I'm Rob. welcome back to vidIQ,
educating you on your YouTube journey.
And today's lesson is all about YouTube impressions
and how to get more of 'em.
Basically, whenever a viewer sees one of your thumbnails
on a YouTube page,
that is classed as an impression.
(bell ringing) It's essentially
free advertising from YouTube
and you want as much of it as possible.
Now, once again, YouTube,
in a recent video from the awesome Creator Insider team
have essentially exposed how this works.
So for full disclosure,
I don't wanna take complete credit for everything
I'm about to say, I am going to reference a lot of it
from the Creator Insider video.
But at the same time, when I did this previously,
our video got more views than the Creator Insider video.
So I feel as if I'm helping spread the gospel
about how the YouTube algorithms really work.
YouTube, Creator Insider, you're welcome.
You can review how many impressions your videos are getting
through the YouTube Studio.
(bell ringing) And there is a little bit
of insight here into how discovery works as YouTube states.
You can increase the chance of YouTube suggesting
your content by increasing your click-through rates
and your video watch time.
But this isn't a perfect formula
because looking at these graphs, impressions are down
but click-through rate, the percentage of time
that someone clicks on an impression is up.
So obviously, there's more at play
than just click-through rate and watch time.
And YouTube lists these other factors in three categories,
viewer personalization,
video performance, and content seasonality.
Let's take a look at personalization first.
This is all about the individual viewer
and what they have watched in the past.
Once YouTube knows this, it can surface
what it thinks the viewer is most likely to enjoy.
This is where you need to start thinking
about YouTube less as an algorithm
and more as an individual recommendation system.
If it was only about click-through rates and watch time,
then everybody would be recommended
exactly the same videos based on that data alone.
As entertaining and watchable as MrBeast is,
he's only going to appeal to a small fraction
of the global YouTube audience.
But YouTube is very good at finding that audience
and MrBeast is very good
at creating content for that audience
or indeed, the individual viewer.
But at the same time, YouTube will try and figure out
who else you may like to watch,
if you are a fan of MrBeast.
Here is one of MrBeast's crazy idea videos
in which he fills his brother's house with slime.
Now on the suggested video column,
YouTube thinks we may enjoy something from Mark Rober,
who while not exactly the same type of creator
does have some crossover in the zany challenge-style videos.
Once we go down the Mark Rober, rabbit hole a little bit
and end up on a video about scam artists,
YouTube is now recommending me videos
from a channel I've never heard of who exposes scam artists.
Jumping to that video,
and now YouTube reckons I want more
scam artist stories, (bell ringing)
plus videos from Marques Brownlee.
I always watch his videos.
He made a video recently about reviewing a purple iPhone.
Yeah, I even watched that as well.
What YouTube is trying to work out here
is what content is watched together,
be it through a relationship
between the video creators or the video topic.
You've enjoyed video A,
but we know that video A and B work well together.
And if you watch video B,
then you may wanna try out video C,
and so the YouTube rabbit hole commences.
And when YouTube learns more about a viewer
and the channels and the topics that they watch,
then it can balance out what to recommend to them.
And just as an important sidebar
to all of this recommendation stuff
that YouTube's talking about,
not once do they ever mention subscribers.
I'm not gonna say anything else.
I'm just putting it out there.
And to throw a another curve ball into the mix,
viewers interests change over time.
(soft music)
This Google trends graph shows interest over time
for three of the most popular video games
in the last decade, Minecraft, Roblox and Fortnite.
It is inevitable that trends that rise and fall over time,
even more so at an individual level.
It is therefore important for you as a creator
to be sensitive to those changes in interest.
This is where returning viewer data is invaluable.
You may develop an audience for a topic
and that audience may stay because they are as passionate
about the topic as you or love you as a creator.
But that doesn't mean the rest of the world
still shares that same interest.
And YouTube has a hard time finding a new audience.
And so again, that might be a reason why, yes
you do get high click-through rates
and you do get high watch time,
but no increase in impressions
because YouTube cart connect your content
to over content that viewers may like to watch.
Let me give you another quick gaming example.
Among us was certainly the YouTube game of 2020
but it's interest is waning fast.
And 3d animator, Jake Fellman recognize this,
even though among us had a catapult to this channel
to millions of subscribers and billions of views.
So he pivoted
from among us 3d animation to Minecraft animation.
It took a while for his existing audience to adjust
and for YouTube to find
that eternally massive Minecraft audience
but the numbers prove it was the right decision.
(soft music)
So this is the area of discovery
you're probably most familiar with
because it all directly relates
to the performance of your videos.
YouTube is looking at what viewers do
when they are offered a video.
And along with click-through rate,
they observe viewer feedback.
Here's my question though.
Does anybody actually click on these?
I would assume relatively few do.
In which case did they carry a lot of weight
in the YouTube recommendation system?
I'm just thinking aloud here, by the way,
no data to prove it.
It's no surprise.
Of course the average view duration
and audience retention are factored in
but the question still remains, which is more important?
I think the best answer we will ever get
from YouTube is both.
And then we viewer satisfaction.
And this is the second time I've seen YouTube
in recent memory, placing likes and dislikes
prominently in their education on discovery.
So yeah, if you do wanna help us out,
make sure you click that thumbs up button.
But I would have for comments would be
a far more valuable indicator
in terms of viewer satisfaction.
I mean, tapping a button takes less than a second
but thinking about what you're going to write
and then writing, it takes 10 times as long.
Maybe YouTube just can't accurately gauge for satisfaction
from a viewer comment.
Having said all that, the focus of YouTube
that first video on discovery was view at satisfaction,
which we cover in detail here.
Now, while YouTube mostly recommends
what you should watch on the platform,
it doesn't yet anyway, control
what you actually decide to watch,
and does a global audience at large,
but being 2 billion monthly users.
What you end up watching influences what YouTube chooses.
(upbeat music)
These external factors, YouTube can't really control.
And while we've already discussed
changing topic interests over time,
one thing creators sometimes fail to recognize
is competition within their video topic.
This is where we can start to explore the exciting idea
of untapped topic niches.
If you drill down into a niche enough
and create content on a very consistent basis, yes
you may find a smaller audience
but the competition within that topic could be minuscule
which allows you to dominate.
Does anyone remember 'Age of Empires 2,'
well, think 'Clash of Clans' over 20 years ago
and 20 times better.
Apparently people still play it
and are still passionate about it.
And there are that many channels covering it.
So this channel Albeit Small,
is creating loads of content around the game
on a very consistent basis.
Does this limit the potential audience size?
Well, it just so happens.
There's a modern remake of the game coming soon,
'Age of Empires 4'
and the creator is intelligently slotting content
around that game, into his video content.
On the other side of this equation,
there may be occasions where
you publish a video that's related to a recent news story
and the video is performing excellently.
You've got high click-through rate
great watch time, audience retention.
But even that doesn't stop the video from tanking.
And that could be due to competition.
Let's say the new release of an iPhone, for example,
you may have some exclusive information.
That's relevant to an audience for a couple of hours
before everybody else jumps on board.
And then they'll just swamped by
all of these competitors
who can create better quality content
or the viewer gets more satisfaction out of that.
Unfortunately, when you are in a very competitive space
that is just the nature of the beast,
which is why we always suggest
you find your own little corner on YouTube
and branch out your topic and your audience from there.
And then there are just common sense,
seasonality changes.
Don't start making Christmas buying guides in April.
Nobody cares, save them till November.
Think about when seasonal events reach their peak
and aim to launch your content,
just a fraction before that.
Also think about your audience.
If it is a younger audience, then during the summer
it might not be a good idea to publish content in the week
because they're out doing activities
and they may watch more videos on a Saturday and a Sunday.
But of course, with viewing habits,
you'll need to experiment to understand
when your audience is ready to watch your YouTube videos.
So in returning to the through line of this video,
how's it get more impressions and be discovered on YouTube.
It is not strictly to do with
click-through rates and watch time,
it is about you.
I'm not talking to you the creator right now,
I'm talking to you the viewer.
If you can understand what your viewer wants to watch,
how it relates to over content on YouTube
and when they want to watch it
and how to satisfy that viewer,
then you're on the right track.
And with that, I'll see you in the next one.
I have no idea what this has got to do
with baseball in any way, shape or form.