- If you really wanna grow your YouTube channel
in the next 365 days, make sure you watch this entire video,
because it's gonna tell you some very clear information
about exactly what it is that you need to do.
And we're starting right now with my friend, Matt,
from Little Monster Media Company,
Matt, take it away.
- Thanks, Nick.
When we think about growing a YouTube channel
here at Little Monster,
the very first thing that we think about
is programming strategy,
basically, what you're choosing to put up on your channel.
And there's a few different ways that we think about it.
First and foremost, we think about format.
And what we think about here is how is the video structured?
Is it a listicle?
Is it an explainer?
Do you do commentary videos?
And oftentimes we find channels
that upload content in an array of different formats,
and in hybrid formats,
but if you really wanna grow in 2021,
you gotta narrow that down.
The way you make this decision is by understanding
what's resonating most with your audience.
And the simplest way to look at this
is to look at how your videos across each different format
do on average.
In 2019 and 2020, Little Monster did a few reaction videos,
we did some deep dives with different creators,
we even did some commentary videos.
Next big thing from a programming standpoint,
you wanna look at is the style of video.
At Little Monster, we made a few different styles of video,
the kind of higher produced where I'm bouncing around a room
and this type of style where it's a bit more conversational
and I'm just hanging out, talking to you.
But the majority of our content was the explainer videos
and those videos, on average,
outperform everything else we do.
We're about six or seven videos into this new style,
I certainly like it, I hope you guys do.
We wanna do at least about another dozen or two more
before we're ready to sit down
and do the analysis and say, okay,
which style is the one that we really want to go with?
Other things you want to look at here
are stylistic elements.
Like, do you use motion graphics?
Is there something that you can punch up there
or do you cut away to handheld stuff?
Is there a particular segment that people really like
based on your retention graphs
or just seeing it in the comments?
Now, a lot of creators have an established format or style
and it's what they're comfortable doing.
So they just stick with that
which really leads to kind of
the third big programming choice
that every creator has to make
every time they want to make a video,
which is what to make a video about.
There are a lot of ways
to make really intelligent decisions here
as well as some tools that'll help you do that.
First and foremost is Tubebuddy's Click Magnet to
I made a whole video on how to use Click Magnet
which we'll link in the description or what have you.
But what this tool allows you to do is really see
which videos are driving the most viewership for you.
It's also going to give you a lot of insight
into which thumbnail design and even best words to use
in your titles to help you drive more viewership.
Because what this tool was trying to do is
say your audience is most interested in this set of things.
Another thing that can be really helpful
in making the decision as to what video
you should make is your own search traffic.
If you go into YouTube Studio,
click, See More, go to Traffic Sources,
and then click YouTube Search
is going to give you a list of terms
that drive viewership to you from YouTube search.
And yeah, you might see some that you feel like
you've done to death
and there's no reason to make another video on
but be creative here.
Is there another way to think about it?
Is there another way to phrase the video
that you made and something you want to add to it?
Or maybe you want to make a follow up video to that
which is a great way to drive traffic
kind of across your channel and extend that session.
The third way is probably the coolest new thing
in YouTube Studio this year,
which is other videos your audience is watching.
This unit will show you what other videos your audience
has most watched over the last seven days.
This can act as inspiration
or maybe you want to make your own version
of one of those videos, regardless,
it's phenomenal insight into what your audience
is interested in watching.
This is also a great place to see what channels
your audience is watching.
Try going to some of those channels
and see which programming recently has worked best for them.
Is there a version of one of their videos
that you think you have a unique
or interesting take on or can add to?
Because with all of this,
what we're essentially trying to do is find out
what the largest amount of our audience
is most interested in watching overall,
what kind of thumbnails are they most likely to click on?
What kind of titles are they most
interested in watching videos about?
Because when we know this,
we can lean into the largest segment of our audience.
And when you make content that the largest section
of your audience is interested in watching
that means that video is going to get more views
upon initial upload.
Because from the moment a video goes out,
YouTube is taking that data in and analyzing it
and trying to find other audiences
that would be interested in watching this video.
And with that large data set that you got
because you were able to program to your largest segment
of audience, they're going to have a very large number
of watch histories from individual viewers
to go out find more individual viewers like them.
It works like this.
Let's say a thousand people watched a Little Monster video
in its first day of release
which would be pretty good for us.
This means that there's a thousand different
watch histories that YouTube can look at and say
let's find other people with similar watch histories
and share it with them and so on and so forth
as it expands your audience.
Conversely,
if we only had a couple hundred people watch that video
when it first went up on its first day,
YouTube only has a couple hundred watch histories
to match with other viewers on the platform
and put our video in front of.
This means the potential growth for that video
is much slower.
What could also happen in this instance is
that YouTube sees that lower click through rate.
That see that lower audience engagement
which essentially equates to lower satisfaction
and serves your video to less people.
Because look at it through YouTube's eyes,
if you can't even satisfy the people
that have already indicated an interest in your content
with that new video
why should they expand the audience for that video?
Another way to think about it would be
imagine you're binge watching "The Office"
and Netflix just decides to play an episode of "30 Rock."
Sure,
there's going to be a fair number of people
that are interested in watching "30 Rock."
However, there's also going to be a large percentage
that wouldn't and they click away from "30 Rock."
This is essentially what happens
when someone releases a video to their core audience
and a large swath of them don't click on it.
It was a poor programming choice
for the audience they have access to.
But that doesn't mean every video should be the same.
You want to focus on being dependable,
providing the audience with a general format, style,
personality, and topics of interest to them
but not being predictable.
If you basically do the same video each time,
the audience is going to get bored
and they're just not going to click on your next one.
So we need to stay fresh by programming to that audience
content that they want to watch
that is relevant to them right now.
Which, hey, that's why we made this video.
What you do now will impact your channel
in the coming weeks, months, and potentially even years.
So spend this time now figuring out exactly
what it is your audience wants to watch
so that you can grow in 2021.
- To learn even more about growing your YouTube channel,
click into this playlist right here right now.
Thank you so much for watching.
I'll see you next time.