Willabee
Let's be weird together!
@LaLaLolly recently asked me in another thread, "What do you find to be effective ways of self-promoting?"
I wrote up a response there, but I feel like it deserves its own post so it's more available to you all.
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That's a really good question
When you figure it out, let me know ;P
In all seriousness... I'm pretty lax with self-promotion, which is probably why my turn-out is so low, but it's pretty easy. The first thing is to master keywords. Are you using relevant keywords in your tags? Do you incorporate those into the description without blatantly listing them. That's always a good start because it helps make you more searchable. Not all content is highly searchable, though. For example... there are a million "Cinnamon Challenges". It's hard to stand out from that in SEO.
However, your title can play a huge part as well. Let's say you did the challenge as a vlog and just used "VLOG #332" as your title (which is done far too often). NO ONE WILL WATCH IT... except maybe your grandma. You might have bumped it up to "VLOG #332 : CINNAMON CHALLENGE"... which can be enticing if that's what someone's looking for. But we want a gripping title that draws people in. Maybe something like "I ALMOST DIED!!!" (Just make sure the title isn't entirely misleading. If you were't choking yourself to death on the cinnamon (and do NOT do that on purpose), YouTube might have problems with the video for using misleading SEO to attract an audience. Be fun, but stay within the rules.
(In recap, though: Which title would you have clicked on?)
The next thing is the thumbnail. Thumbnails are valuable advertising space for your video! Now, I am not a thumbnail master. I wish I was. However, the general rule is: Design a thumbnail that is both enticing and relevant to the video, and NEVER use YouTube's auto thumbnails. That golden rule of not using auto thumbnails thumbnails can be ignored from time to time depending on the content you make. I, for one, sometimes let YouTube take the wheel for life-casting style vlogs.
If you're intent on making your own thumbnails, which you should be, there are some simple guidelines to follow.
- Use colors that pop. Bright colors like Yellow, Red, Pink, Light blue and Green tend to draw the eye. I like to make borders of bright color since they separate the thumbnail from others around it and force the viewer to take a second look. You should also consider how color can play as a background or font color.
- Lead the eye with color. Another thing you can do is use colored shapes to create lines that lead the eye to an object in the thumbnail. For example, if you have your head on a colored background, use red and yellow radials stemming out from your face to draw viewers' eyes in.
-Big letters! In a video, small words tend to be best. In a thumbnail, however, your text should be large and visible while leaving the images clearly visible. You can keep font smaller by separating font with a text box. Draw a solid color shape and write smaller text over it.
- Outline text. If you're using just text without a text box, it helps to outline the text with black or white. If you're using a text box, an outline may not be necessary unless you're using complementary colors.
- Use colors that play nicely. White on black. Blue and Yellow. Red and Yellow. Red and Blue etc. I might suggest avoiding complementary colors simply because it can cause strain on the eyes, but by the same token, that might draw attention. That's yours to decide
- Expressive faces. Emotions tell a lot about something's content. It can be a huge help to use that to your advantage in your thumbnail.
- Overlay images. Using images like emojis and other graphics can also help tell your story and entice an audience. If you're talking about a product, you can also get images of that product to overlay.
- Use some sort of branding! A lot of branded channels (and even non-branded channels) do something special in their thumbnails to let people who watch them regularly know who the video is from. They become recognizable to fans, which can also help create fans oddly enough.
- Stay relevant to the video content and congruent with the title and description. Basically... don't be misleading, and try not to confuse people.
- Avoid the bottom right corner! YouTube places a timestamp and watch later button in the bottom right corner, so please don't put anything important there as your potential viewers won't see it.
Here are some examples of thumbnails done right.
Thatcher Joe has the thumbnail for "I AM THE LUCKIEST BOY" right with very emotive facial expressions, text that i easy to use and doesn't obstruct the main image. He uses text boxes, and the color of the box (opaque gray) plays nicely with the text color (white). The saturation of the image looks to have been tweaked up a little which will also help draw the eye to the thumbnail. He also remains congruent with the title by using text that is taken straight from the title.
Tallasianchick did an alright job here staying congruent with the title "I am a BALL OF FIRE". She used an expressive face and an overlay image of literal fire. Though probably not done on purpose, the lines of the fire also draw your vision right to her face so you see what's going on.
DNews made a great thumbnail with a positive, pensive expression. Background images that are relevant to the video topic. And unlike the other videos: Branding! Notice how it's small, almost unnoticed, but present and impactful. They also (whether on purpose or not) used color in a way to make the thumbnail pop. The color scheme (including her shirt) is mostly black and white, making the moon stand out. The angle of the satellite also helps focus attention on the person by petty much pointing right at her.
Now... A lot of the elements I talked about (like color and lines) tend to magically happen on their own, but they're good to keep in mind. I could go on with more examples, but I don't want to bore you and there's a lot more to talk about. If, for a moment, you were thinking this was all useless information or stuff you already knew... well.. think of it as a refresher course. It's very important in promotion because being searchable is a big part of promotion. And when you promote outside of YouTube, you still want people to be interested, and these elements help.
Getting back on track with self-promotion, though, the next thing to talk about is social media. Sharing your video via social media not only gives you more of an audience, but it again makes your content more searchable. My big three social media networks are Google+, Twitter and Facebook in that order.
While I'm hardly active there, and while many people hate the platform, Google+ strongly helps with SEO ranking because it is more directly related to Google search. And though its userbase is far smaller than Facebook's, Google is more likely to show your posts to other people as "relative to you." Facebook isn't really that smart yet. It's getting there.
Twitter is sort of my main stick right now. I wish I had a stronger Twitter community because I love the platform. It's short, to the point, easy to scroll without getting distracted by large pictures or excessively long posts. (For the record, I use TweetDeck, so the site or app experience might be a little different.)
And Facebook, as we all know, is sort of THE online social media mogul at the moment. So... you can't NOT share there. If you're worried about your mom seeing it, you can either make a page for your youtube or use the custom visibility settings to block certain people from viewing your post. One of the great things here is that you can also create lists and just set that one list instead of individually selecting people to not share with.
My other favorite, though I don't use it enough, is Tumblr. Tumblr has a great search engine and helps you build community fast (if you know how to work the tags).
Across all platforms, the most important element for SEO is keywords and hashtags. Don't just list tags in the post. That's boring and doesn't involve your audience. Use a descriptive body and include hashtags. It can also help to use the platform to your advantage. For example... On Twitter, you only have 140 characters and that INCLUDES the link (for goodness' sake, don't forget the link). Say something short and witty that your current audience and potential audience would find interesting. (And don't forget the hashtags.) A common choice is to say something that leaves something open-ended. Don't give away the whole story. Use something that doesn't get shown or clarified until later in the video. By that point, most people have forgotten the title or reason they watched the video. All they know is that you're AWESOME, and they want more of you.
More than just posting to social media and letting come what may, post your videos to social media more than once. It's ok! Just don't be a spam god. Post two times the same day you upload, and if you're up to it, once about a week after. If you can, learn optimal times for posting. People research this stuff! Different demographic pockets use social platforms at different times. So if you're reaching out to kids, try posting after school's out and on the weekends. Makes sense, right? ;D
I also suggest bringing old videos to light again months after they're posted. That can help drive new traffic. One of my favorites to over-re-promote is this video I did with animal pictures that I voiced-over.
Post on other people's profiles! This might be considered spam (moreso if you do it too much), but it is an enormous part of driving new traffic. It's part of how a lot of old YouTubers got famous!! Shane Dawson recounted once that in his early days when YouTube allowed auto-play embedding, he would post his videos on famous people's MySpace pages with auto-play enabled. People would open the page and all the sudden hear him being... well.. him, and they'd hunt for the source. If they found it funny, SCORE! New viewer ;D
The same can be said today. Sadly, we don't have auto-play embedding anymore (except on Tumblr), but what we CAN do is post relevant videos to other people's profiles. Somebody famous posts a picture of their puppy and you have a video of yours? Comment with the link. If you watch other people on YouTube who do similar videos to you, post relevant links in the comments! **YouTube comments now filter out most posts with links, but if the YouTuber is friendly enough, they might allow the post.
Speaking of other YouTubers -- Get involved with other channels. Post relative comments on other videos. If people like what you have to say, they might check out your channel. You can also use hashtags in comments. This will boost the SEO of that person's video and of your post, thus feeding both of your search-ability. When commenting, though, be sure not to ask people to check you out. Just comment and enjoy the community aspect of YouTube. Part of the downfall of YouTube's community essence is the amount of people who only fish for views. How boring, right?
Another thing you can consider is directly reaching out to friends. Let them know you make videos, and if they're ok with it, send them links directly! You'll be surprised at how many of your friends are actually very supportive of you. They want to see you succeed, and they are a valuable source of viewership. Who knows, they might even share your video with their own friends!
If you can, collaborate with other YouTubers. This can be in a collab channel or a single video. And never rule out sending footage via the internet. You could both record separate parts to one video and send them to each other for editing. Though if you can get an in-person collab, TAKE ITTTT!!!! Remember to feature and link the person you collab with, and make sure they do the same for you. This will help cross-pollinate your channels and give you BOTH more viewers
Another great way to spread the word about yourself is going to events. If you go to things like VidCon or a local film festival, you get a chance to share your passion with like minded people and potentially bring in a new viewer or collaborator. How great is that?
If a you're a vlogger and you vlog in public, people might come up to you and ask if you're on YouTube. If they do, your immediate reaction should be, "YES!!! Here's my channel!!!" You could even get business cards made for easy passing, which are also great for when you meet new people anywhere. When they ask, "So what do you do?" You can say "I make videos," and hand them that fancy card.
If you're the more desperate kind (which I have totally considered this before) you can make a sign, stand on the side of the street and advertise yourself. Be sure to give a little dance and maybe wear a costume ;P
Another idea I've had that I've strongly considered is writing the link to my channel on post-it notes and sticking them around the city.
My last tip, and this can make a huge difference, is for you to edit your metadata once every now and again. Go through your videos and change the titles, change up the descriptions, remove unused keywords and insert new ones. I'd say do this maybe once a year? It can give both your channel and your SEO a much needed facelift. Plus your once irrelevant video might become relevant in a year's time, so adding more relevant keywords can do wonders.
That's all I can think of right now. I hope this helped. It's a lot of information, and there's SO much more than this.
If you're interested in learning more from people who present this information more coherently, I would highly recommend you watch
Video Creators and Savvy Sexy Social on YouTube.
And please feel free to reach out to me if you have any other questions! I might not be the best at putting my knowledge to use, but I do a lot of research in these areas, so I'm like a data bank of how to do YouTube right
>.> I really wish I knew how to actually put this stuff to good use O_O
Thanks for reading
I hope you're doing well!
EDIT:
Another great way to get the word out is forums, obviously. Join other forums relative to your content type and build reputation. Make sure your link or video is in your signature or on your profile. Any forum will work! It doesn't have to be YouTube oriented. It's just a great way to share what you love with more potential viewers
I wrote up a response there, but I feel like it deserves its own post so it's more available to you all.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
That's a really good question
When you figure it out, let me know ;PIn all seriousness... I'm pretty lax with self-promotion, which is probably why my turn-out is so low, but it's pretty easy. The first thing is to master keywords. Are you using relevant keywords in your tags? Do you incorporate those into the description without blatantly listing them. That's always a good start because it helps make you more searchable. Not all content is highly searchable, though. For example... there are a million "Cinnamon Challenges". It's hard to stand out from that in SEO.
However, your title can play a huge part as well. Let's say you did the challenge as a vlog and just used "VLOG #332" as your title (which is done far too often). NO ONE WILL WATCH IT... except maybe your grandma. You might have bumped it up to "VLOG #332 : CINNAMON CHALLENGE"... which can be enticing if that's what someone's looking for. But we want a gripping title that draws people in. Maybe something like "I ALMOST DIED!!!" (Just make sure the title isn't entirely misleading. If you were't choking yourself to death on the cinnamon (and do NOT do that on purpose), YouTube might have problems with the video for using misleading SEO to attract an audience. Be fun, but stay within the rules.
(In recap, though: Which title would you have clicked on?)
The next thing is the thumbnail. Thumbnails are valuable advertising space for your video! Now, I am not a thumbnail master. I wish I was. However, the general rule is: Design a thumbnail that is both enticing and relevant to the video, and NEVER use YouTube's auto thumbnails. That golden rule of not using auto thumbnails thumbnails can be ignored from time to time depending on the content you make. I, for one, sometimes let YouTube take the wheel for life-casting style vlogs.
If you're intent on making your own thumbnails, which you should be, there are some simple guidelines to follow.
- Use colors that pop. Bright colors like Yellow, Red, Pink, Light blue and Green tend to draw the eye. I like to make borders of bright color since they separate the thumbnail from others around it and force the viewer to take a second look. You should also consider how color can play as a background or font color.
- Lead the eye with color. Another thing you can do is use colored shapes to create lines that lead the eye to an object in the thumbnail. For example, if you have your head on a colored background, use red and yellow radials stemming out from your face to draw viewers' eyes in.
-Big letters! In a video, small words tend to be best. In a thumbnail, however, your text should be large and visible while leaving the images clearly visible. You can keep font smaller by separating font with a text box. Draw a solid color shape and write smaller text over it.
- Outline text. If you're using just text without a text box, it helps to outline the text with black or white. If you're using a text box, an outline may not be necessary unless you're using complementary colors.
- Use colors that play nicely. White on black. Blue and Yellow. Red and Yellow. Red and Blue etc. I might suggest avoiding complementary colors simply because it can cause strain on the eyes, but by the same token, that might draw attention. That's yours to decide
- Expressive faces. Emotions tell a lot about something's content. It can be a huge help to use that to your advantage in your thumbnail.
- Overlay images. Using images like emojis and other graphics can also help tell your story and entice an audience. If you're talking about a product, you can also get images of that product to overlay.
- Use some sort of branding! A lot of branded channels (and even non-branded channels) do something special in their thumbnails to let people who watch them regularly know who the video is from. They become recognizable to fans, which can also help create fans oddly enough.
- Stay relevant to the video content and congruent with the title and description. Basically... don't be misleading, and try not to confuse people.
- Avoid the bottom right corner! YouTube places a timestamp and watch later button in the bottom right corner, so please don't put anything important there as your potential viewers won't see it.
Here are some examples of thumbnails done right.
Now... A lot of the elements I talked about (like color and lines) tend to magically happen on their own, but they're good to keep in mind. I could go on with more examples, but I don't want to bore you and there's a lot more to talk about. If, for a moment, you were thinking this was all useless information or stuff you already knew... well.. think of it as a refresher course. It's very important in promotion because being searchable is a big part of promotion. And when you promote outside of YouTube, you still want people to be interested, and these elements help.
Getting back on track with self-promotion, though, the next thing to talk about is social media. Sharing your video via social media not only gives you more of an audience, but it again makes your content more searchable. My big three social media networks are Google+, Twitter and Facebook in that order.
While I'm hardly active there, and while many people hate the platform, Google+ strongly helps with SEO ranking because it is more directly related to Google search. And though its userbase is far smaller than Facebook's, Google is more likely to show your posts to other people as "relative to you." Facebook isn't really that smart yet. It's getting there.
Twitter is sort of my main stick right now. I wish I had a stronger Twitter community because I love the platform. It's short, to the point, easy to scroll without getting distracted by large pictures or excessively long posts. (For the record, I use TweetDeck, so the site or app experience might be a little different.)
And Facebook, as we all know, is sort of THE online social media mogul at the moment. So... you can't NOT share there. If you're worried about your mom seeing it, you can either make a page for your youtube or use the custom visibility settings to block certain people from viewing your post. One of the great things here is that you can also create lists and just set that one list instead of individually selecting people to not share with.
My other favorite, though I don't use it enough, is Tumblr. Tumblr has a great search engine and helps you build community fast (if you know how to work the tags).
Across all platforms, the most important element for SEO is keywords and hashtags. Don't just list tags in the post. That's boring and doesn't involve your audience. Use a descriptive body and include hashtags. It can also help to use the platform to your advantage. For example... On Twitter, you only have 140 characters and that INCLUDES the link (for goodness' sake, don't forget the link). Say something short and witty that your current audience and potential audience would find interesting. (And don't forget the hashtags.) A common choice is to say something that leaves something open-ended. Don't give away the whole story. Use something that doesn't get shown or clarified until later in the video. By that point, most people have forgotten the title or reason they watched the video. All they know is that you're AWESOME, and they want more of you.
More than just posting to social media and letting come what may, post your videos to social media more than once. It's ok! Just don't be a spam god. Post two times the same day you upload, and if you're up to it, once about a week after. If you can, learn optimal times for posting. People research this stuff! Different demographic pockets use social platforms at different times. So if you're reaching out to kids, try posting after school's out and on the weekends. Makes sense, right? ;D
I also suggest bringing old videos to light again months after they're posted. That can help drive new traffic. One of my favorites to over-re-promote is this video I did with animal pictures that I voiced-over.
Post on other people's profiles! This might be considered spam (moreso if you do it too much), but it is an enormous part of driving new traffic. It's part of how a lot of old YouTubers got famous!! Shane Dawson recounted once that in his early days when YouTube allowed auto-play embedding, he would post his videos on famous people's MySpace pages with auto-play enabled. People would open the page and all the sudden hear him being... well.. him, and they'd hunt for the source. If they found it funny, SCORE! New viewer ;D
The same can be said today. Sadly, we don't have auto-play embedding anymore (except on Tumblr), but what we CAN do is post relevant videos to other people's profiles. Somebody famous posts a picture of their puppy and you have a video of yours? Comment with the link. If you watch other people on YouTube who do similar videos to you, post relevant links in the comments! **YouTube comments now filter out most posts with links, but if the YouTuber is friendly enough, they might allow the post.
Speaking of other YouTubers -- Get involved with other channels. Post relative comments on other videos. If people like what you have to say, they might check out your channel. You can also use hashtags in comments. This will boost the SEO of that person's video and of your post, thus feeding both of your search-ability. When commenting, though, be sure not to ask people to check you out. Just comment and enjoy the community aspect of YouTube. Part of the downfall of YouTube's community essence is the amount of people who only fish for views. How boring, right?
Another thing you can consider is directly reaching out to friends. Let them know you make videos, and if they're ok with it, send them links directly! You'll be surprised at how many of your friends are actually very supportive of you. They want to see you succeed, and they are a valuable source of viewership. Who knows, they might even share your video with their own friends!
If you can, collaborate with other YouTubers. This can be in a collab channel or a single video. And never rule out sending footage via the internet. You could both record separate parts to one video and send them to each other for editing. Though if you can get an in-person collab, TAKE ITTTT!!!! Remember to feature and link the person you collab with, and make sure they do the same for you. This will help cross-pollinate your channels and give you BOTH more viewers
Another great way to spread the word about yourself is going to events. If you go to things like VidCon or a local film festival, you get a chance to share your passion with like minded people and potentially bring in a new viewer or collaborator. How great is that?
If a you're a vlogger and you vlog in public, people might come up to you and ask if you're on YouTube. If they do, your immediate reaction should be, "YES!!! Here's my channel!!!" You could even get business cards made for easy passing, which are also great for when you meet new people anywhere. When they ask, "So what do you do?" You can say "I make videos," and hand them that fancy card.
If you're the more desperate kind (which I have totally considered this before) you can make a sign, stand on the side of the street and advertise yourself. Be sure to give a little dance and maybe wear a costume ;P
Another idea I've had that I've strongly considered is writing the link to my channel on post-it notes and sticking them around the city.
My last tip, and this can make a huge difference, is for you to edit your metadata once every now and again. Go through your videos and change the titles, change up the descriptions, remove unused keywords and insert new ones. I'd say do this maybe once a year? It can give both your channel and your SEO a much needed facelift. Plus your once irrelevant video might become relevant in a year's time, so adding more relevant keywords can do wonders.
That's all I can think of right now. I hope this helped. It's a lot of information, and there's SO much more than this.
If you're interested in learning more from people who present this information more coherently, I would highly recommend you watch
Video Creators and Savvy Sexy Social on YouTube.
And please feel free to reach out to me if you have any other questions! I might not be the best at putting my knowledge to use, but I do a lot of research in these areas, so I'm like a data bank of how to do YouTube right
>.> I really wish I knew how to actually put this stuff to good use O_OThanks for reading
I hope you're doing well!EDIT:
Another great way to get the word out is forums, obviously. Join other forums relative to your content type and build reputation. Make sure your link or video is in your signature or on your profile. Any forum will work! It doesn't have to be YouTube oriented. It's just a great way to share what you love with more potential viewers
