Growing Strategies After the "First Steps Period"

[KiddieToysReview]

So I've been doing YouTube for 3 and a half years yet I am still at 118 subscribers. I read pretty much every piece of advice available online, but most guides, etc. focus on the first steps, while like I said I've been already doing it for 3 and a half years. So does anyone have strategies or ideas on what to do at this point?

Make a list/spreadsheet of the top 20-50 channels in your vertical. Have columns for tags/titles/topics/views/% retention (if available via VidIQ)/etc. Study carefully and find what topics they cover and trends they start/follow, and analyse their growth. There's a bunch of websites that run stats that can help you here too (like socialblade). Determine current popular trends in your vertical and follow suit. Make playlists and fill them with snappy/on trend content that enthrals your viewers and feeds high demand keywords into the algo.

I would not say you are out of the initial startup stage yet. 118 subs is nothing in the world of Yt. Time on platform is irrelevant, all that matters is traffic and rates of growth. In mid-2017, I would say 5k subs is the minimum where you can consider yourself out of startup and into the initial growth stage. It used to be 1k sub about 2-3 years ago, but with the hyper-competition and numbr of new channels, 5k, perhaps pushing to 10k by year end, is the new minimum.

 

[avrona]

Determine current popular trends in your vertical and follow suit.

Which I already do.

Make playlists and fill them with snappy/on trend content that enthrals your viewers and feeds high demand keywords into the algo.

Which I also already do.

118 subs is nothing in the world of Yt.

Exactly, so I want to know why.

In mid-2017, I would say 5k subs is the minimum where you can consider yourself out of startup and into the initial growth stage.

5k is still ages away for me, even though I've been doing this for almost 4 years. On Socialblade, it doesn't even display a 5k prediction, and it shows 5 years of predictions.

 

[KatyAdelson]

Channel growth and exposure questions are some of the most frequently asked questions on this forum. Because they have been answered numerous times, the staff lock these threads.

Please check out the YouTube Tutorials, and Articles forum for some help:
http://yttalk.com/forums/youtube-tutorials-articles-resources.10/

We also have the Channel Reviews / Feedback forum that can be helpful:
http://yttalk.com/forums/reviews-channel-feedback.64/

There is also an abundance of information in the Strategies and Technique forum:
http://yttalk.com/forums/strategies-technique-advice.14/

Additionally, quoting advice from other members and saying that you have already done it and that it didn't work is a very defeatist perspective that is not helpful for anyone. What would be more helpful would be to give specific examples of things you have done and try to logically think through why they did not work. This will help bring to light some of the weaknesses in your current strategy, and/or highlight nuances in previous advice that perhaps were not initially emphasized.

If you had truly done all of the advice available on this forum, I honestly believe you wouldn't need to make these kinds of threads.

I wish you the best. ^_^