Hi there! So you want to be a YouTube superstar? Everyone does! But with millions of hours of content uploaded daily, how do you stand out from the crowd? The answer lies in understanding and leveraging the YouTube algorithm.
Secret #1: The New Channel Boost: How to Explode Onto the Scene
YouTube, in an unofficial attempt to compete with the likes of TikTok, has implemented something called the “new channel boost”. This boost gives new creators an initial advantage, providing extra impressions and views to their first videos.
- TikTok gives new accounts a lot of Impressions and Views to inspire new creators.
- YouTube has been doing something similar.
Many YouTubers have noticed YouTube doing something similar to what Tik Tok does. For example, the channel, Nate wealth, had 200,000 views on the first video and 89,000 views on the second video. But then the fourth video had 150,000 views, the fifth video had 360,000 views, and the sixth video had 140,000. The topics Nate covered, especially in the first two videos, were how to record voiceovers for YouTube videos, which typically aren’t super hot topics in the YouTube education space.
Nate Wealth’s channel started at the peak of the YouTube new channel boost. Some of the newer videos on the channel have very few views compared to the original videos. Only two videos out of the last 14 videos have gotten over 100,000 views. The videos are just as good, if not better, quality than some of the earlier ones, it’s just that the channel boost has worn off.
How to use this to your advantage: If you’ve been struggling on your current channel, consider creating a new one and posting your best content there to try and trigger this boost.
Secret #2: Collaborative Filtering: Understanding Your Audience
Collaborative filtering is a concept that helps illustrate how the YouTube algorithm works.
- When you post a video, YouTube promotes it to different audiences to see who might be interested.
- If viewers aren’t interested, they won’t click, and the algorithm will try a different audience.
- When the algorithm finds an audience that resonates with your video, it will promote it to a larger segment of that audience.
Why this matters: Many small creators fail because they post videos that appeal to multiple different audiences. The algorithm is never able to build a profile of who their viewers are, and their videos get a small amount of views.
The solution: Create videos for a specific niche. Ask yourself, would the type of audience who clicks on this video also want to click on all of the rest of the videos on my channel? If the answer is no, then your channel fails the niche test and will probably grow slower or not at all.
Secret #3: The Peak-End Rule: Leave a Lasting Impression
YouTube says that YouTubers should focus on appeal, engagement, and satisfaction. Appeal is whether viewers find the video appealing enough to click on it. Engagement is how long they watch it. Satisfaction is whether people keep coming back to the YouTube platform.
YouTube wants people to keep coming back to the YouTube platform. Even if viewers watch a video all the way to the end, that doesn’t necessarily mean that those viewers were satisfied with that piece of content. If a viewer was tricked and was expecting a big payoff at the end of the video that never came, that’s really bad in YouTube’s eyes because it makes the viewer less likely to click on another video to spend more time on YouTube.
The YouTube recommendation system analyzes a bunch of signals to figure out whether or not people are actually satisfied with the video they just watched. YouTube periodically shows viewers surveys after watching a certain video that asks them how they feel about the video they just watched. YouTube uses the data from those surveys to train predictive models to identify which videos are the most satisfying.
Due to collaborative filtering, YouTube might only show these surveys to one out of every 100 or one out of every 10,000 or 100,000. Based on that one viewer’s response, it’s going to find all the other people who’ve watched this video who have similar viewing habits and tastes to that one viewer who filled out the survey. That one survey response from that one viewer is basically going to be used to represent the sentiment for all of these other viewers, almost as if they filled out the exact same survey.
The key to satisfaction: The peak-end rule states that how people feel about your video will be defined by the peak of the video (the single most engaging, emotion-inducing moment) and the end of that video.
The mistake to avoid: A lot of YouTubers screw up the ending. For example, ending the video by saying “that’s the end of my video, thanks so much for watching, if you enjoyed, please leave a like down below and leave a comment letting me know what videos you want to see next”. This kills the end, meaning people are going to remember your video less favorably, giving you less positive survey ratings, meaning the algorithm sends you less views.
The solution: Have some sort of ramp of energy or emotion right at the end of your video. Mr. Beast abruptly ends his videos after just casually giving away like a million dollars. When that audience satisfaction survey shows up, those viewers are still sort of riding the high of the last few seconds of the video they just watched. They’re more likely to give it a favorable rating or click on another Mr. Beast video.
Secret #4: The Average View Duration Lie: Dig Deeper Into Your Analytics
Average view duration is how long your viewers watch your video for. It’s important to analyze your average view duration to draw good meaningful conclusions from it.
Let’s say you have a small channel and you post a video like “my story how I started my YouTube channel”. After you post that video, you see the retention is really good. What’s more likely to be the case is that particular video is only going to be clicked on by people who are interested enough in you to care about your story. That type of viewer is going to be more likely to watch your video all the way to the end than say a more casual viewer who’s not even going to click on your video in the first place because your story doesn’t interest them.
You’re getting a very small group of people who really care about you to click on your video. They watch it all the way to the end and inflate your analytics to make it look like this is the best video you’ve ever created. But the video doesn’t get very many views because as soon as YouTube tests promoting it with a small section of other broader audiences, they show absolutely no interest.
The ultimate metric: The ultimate metric you should keep coming back to is your views. Even if you got a bad click through rate, if that video is getting a lot of views it means you’re doing something right. Analyze that video, figure out what it is about that video that people are liking, and apply it to all of your future videos.
Watch time hours: A metric YouTube puts a lot of focus on is your watchtime hours. Watch hours are almost a combination of the three big elements: appeal, engagement, and satisfaction.
- You can have a video that retains a lot of people, but the video has only been watched by nine people because it’s not very appealing to anyone.
- You could have a really appealing video (great title, great thumbnail, great idea), but when people click onto it they don’t engage and don’t watch it for very long.
In order to get watchtime hours, people have to actually click on the video, and they also need to watch it for a certain length of time.
Secret #5: The Click vs. Retention Myth: Packaging Matters More Than You Think
There seems to be this click versus retention myth going around that says if you just create great videos, viewers are going to come. Your packaging (title and thumbnail) actually plays a bigger role in your video getting views initially than the quality of your video. If you have a great video that keeps people watching all the way to the end, but you have a pretty average title and thumbnail, that video is not going to perform as well as another video that has a great title and thumbnail but kind of more average video content.
Actionable insight: If you’re spending 90% of your efforts on actually creating your video and then 10% of your efforts on the title and thumbnail, you should probably be spending somewhere more like 30 or 40% of your efforts just on coming up with a really cracking idea and great packaging (super enticing title and thumbnail) and then the remaining percentage of your efforts actually on your video.
Clickthrough rate is the percentage of people who click on your video after they see it listed on YouTube. If your video is pushed out to 10 viewers and one of them clicks on your video, you will have a 10% clickthrough rate because the number one is 10% of 10. Sometimes you can actually get more views with a lower clickthrough rate than you would with a higher clickthrough rate.
Conclusion
Mastering the YouTube algorithm isn’t about tricking the system; it’s about understanding how it works and aligning your content strategy accordingly. By focusing on niche content, creating satisfying viewing experiences, and paying attention to your packaging, you can increase your chances of success on YouTube.
FAQs
How important is video length? Longer videos can lead to more watch hours, but only if they remain engaging. Don’t add filler content just to increase the length.
Should I focus on Shorts or long-form content? Both have their advantages. Longer Shorts tend to get more views. Long-form content allows for deeper engagement and watch time.
How often should I post videos? The sources do not specify how often to post videos.