The Ultimate Guide To Getting More Views On Your Youtube Videos
Everybody wants more views for their videos on Youtube right? I talked a couple of days ago about the fact that videos rarely go viral and it’s best not to set out with that goal but having said that there are some ways that you can get more views for Your Youtube video. The way that I always look at it is that if your video can get a thousand views through using the techniques below then you are giving the video every chance to be shared even further. These simple tips should help get you more views on Youtube….
Network Within Youtube
So many people forget that Youtube is actually a social network and think of it only as a video site. The truth is that Youtube is actually one of the better social tools that Google owns and there are a whole host of features available to you. If you just upload your videos to Youtube and sit back and wait for the views to come the chance is that they won’t. What you need to do is make sure you network your ass off. People need to know about you and you’ll need to shout a little about your videos.
Embed On Facebook
One easy way of increasing views instantly is to put videos in to your own personal Facebook page or on Yout Facebook business page. The beauty here is that videos will play within the stream and although the views will take longer to register back on Youtube than normal they will increase quickly as a result as the click through rates are excellent.
Get Subscribers
If there is one single piece of advice that I could give anybody it is to get subscribers on Youtube. A subscriber is somebody who every time you publish a new email will get an email to alert them. That is invaluable. Get a few hundred and they are an easy way for your videos to get a couple of hundred views the second they go live. I would do everything in your power to build Youtube subscribers as part of a long term Youtube strategy.
Add Annotations
One of the least known features on Youtube and more often than not used in a spammy way but if done correctly they really can be amazing! The whole point with them is that you can get incredibly creative both in the editing process as well as after the video has been uploaded. If they are done correctly you can do anything from increasing subscribers to linking to other videos and increasing the user experience.
Add Your Link To Email Signatures
Simple little tip this and we have already spoken about it in the past here on the blog is to use Wisestamp to automatically update your email signature. This can pull in your videos automatically or you can add a static link to your email. The key here is that most people send about 50 odd emails a day so that is 50 emails where people could see your link and click thereby increasing your video views.
Embed The Video On Your Blog Or Website
This really is a bit of a no brainer really and will be a sure way of increasing the views you get on a video. It does take a little longer for the views to filter back to your own site but once they do they will make a big difference. Make sure to only add the video in places that are relevant to your own audience and from there they will pass it on even further. Youtube measures the amount of embeds a video gets as a key metric so it will help you in the rankings as well.
Add Friends On Youtube
This is no different to networking to build your blog or to networking in the real world. You need to start adding people from within your niche on Youtube and talking to them either through comments or personal messages to start building a relationship. Champion the work of others, engage with them and the views will start flowing back to your own site.
Put Some Ad Spend Behind Your Video
All the best brand videos with millions of views more than likely have tons of ad spend behind them to get them started. The further up the rankings you get the better chance you have of the video spreading organically and hitting the mainstream. The good news is that getting videos featured on Youtube is incredibly cheap and can be for as little as $0.01 per view.
Sign Post Your Video Through Social Media
Before social media and services like Twitter it was a lot harder to increase views on videos. The one thing that I would say now is that there are so many different services that can be used and I would very much think of it as creating digital sign posts all pointing at your videos. The more signs you have the more video views you will ultimately get.
Give The Video A Strong Title
This really is one of the pillars of Youtube and the one thing that is most likely to get you more views. In the same way that you are reading this blog post because you saw the title somewhere and thought it would help with your Youtube videos your own title on Youtube needs to do this. It needs to do exactly what it says on the tin and entice people in to watch the video. Play around with different video titles to see what delivers you the best results.
Choose The Right Thumbnail
We all search for videos nearly every single day on Youtube and when we do we are presented with a search results page with lots of different videos. One of the things that we base the choice of which video we click on is what we see visually and that is the thumbnail. Youtube offers you a selection of just 3 thumbnails (these are auto generated to avoid spam) so make sure you pick the most appealing one that is most likely to get clicked.
Don’t Make Your Video An Advert
Too many people set out with the ambition of getting lots of views for their videos but at the same time want to get their branding in there as well. What you usually end up with is a glorified advert and nobody wants to see that. Think of all the big videos on Youtube that get tons of views, do they have a load of ads in them? Usually not. The key is to be subtle and keep things very subtle.
Tag Tag Tag
One of the ways in which Youtube finds videos and serves up the right results to users is by searching through the tags that you add manually. You want to make sure that you spend a lot of time making sure the tags are relevant, there are plenty of them and that they tie in with your video. I can’t stress enough how important tags are on Youtube so make sure you take your time on this one.
Partner With Youtube
This is obviously a lot trickier than you would think and there are a couple of ways of doing it. The first is if your videos get a lot of views then Youtube will turn on a branded channel for you. The other way which is probably not as relevant to you all is to get a branded channel with Youtube which is targeted at large brands and can cost anywhere between 20 and 40k. Apart from the benefits of being able to skin the channel you can also expect to get a ton more views as you appear far better in the search results.
Be A Big Fish In A Small Pond
The Youtube rankings and when you appear in their “top” lists are influenced by the country that you select for your account. By virtue of the fact that I live in Ireland and have selected IRL as the country for my videos I find that I can appear higher up the rankings with a lot of people seeing my videos in the Irish most popular pages. The flip side of this of course is that there are less people watching but unless you are insanely popular and would get ranked well in a country like USA I would tend to focus on the small countries.
Add Video Responses
For those not familiar with video responses they are when a video appears below another video. They are a great way of getting attention for your own videos. They should only be added where relevant so as it enhances the user experience and the one thing I would say is to make sure you accept them yourself to encourage the practice.
Add Youtube Buttons To Your Website Or Blog
Youtube offer a great variety of buttons for your websites which you can embed and point people towards your own channel. IF you own a blog or website and want your customers or friends to see your videos I would suggest you get the buttons in as prominent a position as possible.
Get Action Going In Your Comments
The comments section on Youtube can often get heated and you do need to have fairly thick skin as you’ll often get called all sorts of names but they are also a great place to increase interaction around your content and you should engage and stoke them wherever possible. They are a reason for people to keep checking back and bookmarking your videos.
Content Is King
All of the tips in this list are incredibly useful but they won’t work if your content is rubbish. The idea is to do everything on this list and have the video views increase from there organically but if the content you produce is not up to much in the first place you don’t have a chance. The old saying that content is king really does run true and the more time you spend creating great content the better.
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