Of the thousands of creators that I've worked with, one of the biggest mistakes a lot of them
make is not spending enough time really crafting a strong title to go with their videos. I think
many of us spend a lot of time working on our thumbnails but we don't realize that a thumbnail
is useless without a really strong title to go along with it learning how those two work
together to really compel the viewer and win that click that's everything let me show you what I
mean I think a lot of you know what a really great thumbnail looks like at least in your head tell me
what you think about this one this is a video from a channel named Vsauce and they put this out over
a decade ago but it's driven over 21 million views in that time but if you look at the thumbnail it's
just a single blob of yellow color nothing else what really won the viewers over was the title
this is not yellow anyone reading that title and looking at that thumbnail would probably think
what do you mean this isn't yellow I'm looking right at it that's yellow how can that not be
yellow the video is really about how things like televisions and computer monitors display yellow
it's actually a combination of red and green put together in a specific way that tricks our
eye into thinking we're seeing yellow but the Curiosity or information Gap that this title
and thumbnail together create is what really makes this a winner let's talk about that for
one second a lot of creators think of YouTube as a search engine because it is the second
largest search engine in the world owned by the largest search engine in the world but the vast
majority of views every single day on the platform don't come from search as a matter of fact over
70 percent of the views every day on YouTube come from recommendation that means people clicking on
videos that they weren't searching for so when we're building that packaging and crafting the
perfect title for a viewer who's going to see a video that they probably weren't searching
for it has to be something really special it's going to grab them and pull them in leaving those
information gaps can do a great job of forcing the viewer to have have to click and watch the
video to answer the questions that they might have been formulating in their head as they were
reading that title another great example of this is some of the cooking channels we've been seeing
really pop off lately we're all probably used to seeing videos like this one here the quick and
easy garlic butter chicken breast recipe delicious easy dinner it's got a great image of the finished
recipe in the thumbnail but the title is pretty straightforward it tells you what the recipe is
but they do add some compelling elements in there quick easy delicious things that might
trigger that viewer into clicking these words connected emotionally with the target audience to
the tune of 2.3 million views but there's another completely different approach that works really
well check out this video it's so delicious that I cook it almost every day incredible chicken and
potato recipe this thumbnail doesn't even show the finished recipe it just shows the raw chicken cut
up in an interesting way that might catch her eye and then the title works with that image to
make the viewer think what's Happening Here what exactly is this recipe how are they cooking it and
why is it so much more delicious than the other chicken recipes they've made they're leveraging
a few factors here not just the Curiosity which is really strong in this one but gain gain is the
element that's presented in that title that allows the viewer to think if they watch a video they'll
walk away with some bit of knowledge that they didn't have before they watched the video so that
combination of gain and curiosity work together in this compelling title to the tune of 27 million
views now another thing to think about when you're crafting a title is introducing the element of
fear now I don't mean fear as in scaring someone like on Halloween I mean fear in the sense of
triggering a viewer to make them think that they might be missing out on something but they might
be doing something wrong five biggest mistakes all noobs make in Clash of Clans 2.2 million
views you you can see here that he's leveraging the idea of fear of making mistakes five of them
to be precise but he doesn't tell you what those mistakes are you have to click on the video to
find that out what are these mistakes am I making these mistakes if I'm making these mistakes is it
making me look like a noob these are all things that might run through the potential viewer's
head as they're reading this title this is a much better title than something that makes it harder
for the viewer to get excited about here's an example quote Electro Dragon unquote level 6
featuring quote black zero unquote quote Town Hall 15 attacks unquote linear bar Clash of Clans
this is an example of a title that looks like it was built entirely for search something that was
trying to be built for the machine not for the human now I'm not trying to insult this Creator
whatsoever this might be a fantastic video but the title itself looks like he put a lot of keywords
in there specifically thinking that it might show up in search so he wanted to get them all
in instead of thinking about about the viewer who might find this video somewhere other than search
like in browse it lacks that bit of compelling element that really triggers the viewer into
action now when it comes to keywords I think they can be important if you're making a video about
the new iPhone it's probably important for the viewer and YouTube If you put that word iPhone
somewhere in the title but when it comes to those types of videos I see a lot of tech channels make
this mistake they'll make a video that's basically the new iPhone 14 unboxing and review the problem
is there's lots of really big Tech Channels with huge communities and audiences that are
going to make that exact same video and those are the ones that YouTube is going to surface
more often the Mark has brownlies of the world the official Apple YouTube channel but when it comes
to Tech even leveraging existing Tech that's been around for a while in a new and unique way can be
hugely impactful for your channel even if you're talking about something as simple as a USB flash
drive instead of just talking about that everyday piece of tech trigger the viewer leave information
gaps and create some curiosity that might trigger them into thinking what is it that it can do that
I don't know about there's actually a tool that can actually help you craft a more compelling
title now I'm not always a huge fan of tools especially one that shows scores because what
happens is some creators get wrapped up in the high score game just remember with these tools
we're always trying to build for real humans who are going to be reading these titles let me show
you how this one works let's say I'm trying to craft a title for the video you're watching right
now now I could go with something like how to make better YouTube video titles that certainly would
describe what we're doing here and what we're talking about but that's a topic that's been
covered by a lot of other creators in this space and they've done a really good job with it instead
I'll try thinking more like you the viewer who may have had some troubles trying to craft titles and
I'll try to do this from a perspective of what you might be thinking there are certainly a lot
of great YouTube content creators out there who struggle every year day trying to build the right
title for their videos I do it too knowing how many people wrestle with that let's start there
9 out of 10 YouTubers can't write great titles but I want to add a little more to that I want
to Peak the Curiosity and gauge the potential viewer are you one of them so there's a little
bit of negativity and fear at the beginning of it but then we leverage that Curiosity at the end am
I one of those creators I think my titles are okay am I doing something wrong what's a great
title am I one of those 9 out of 10 now I might change this title over time if I feel like this
video isn't connecting in the way I wanted to but I think that's a much better start than how to
write better YouTube titles I'll put links to this tool that I'm using in the description below but
if you have any questions feel free to ask me in the comments section this YouTube thing sure can
be hard sometimes but I think the video on screen might actually help make it a little easier take a
peek if you have a little time I'd appreciate it. Peace!