Will changing tags, titles, and thumbnails hurt my top videos?

Pixel & Bracket

Pixel & Bracket

Loving YTtalk
Hey guys, this is actually less of a question and more of an experiment for the greater good. My top content is mainly Adobe tutorial videos with the majority of traffic through search. My videos have also gotten more and more traffic the longer they've been out. So what better time to muck with the meta information amirite!?

I've seen a thread or two about changing/adding tags to older videos and whether it's positive or negative to do so. People have had mixed responses, especially when it comes to messing with their top videos. The top videos on my channel are somewhere in the range of 20 views per day. Not much for some of you guys, but maybe a lot for others! I've decided to seriously adjust the meta information on all of my older videos: changing thumbnails, reworking tags & descriptions, and adjusting the titles.

Some of you might think, "uh why?", it's pretty simple really - I think they can be better. I'm not afraid of the potential drop-off because I believe I'm doing the right thing, and I'm in this for the long haul.

I wanted to start this thread to document the changes and provide a little insight to you guys, because I'm sure a lot of you are wrestling with the same decisions.

I will be updating as I go along, I've adjusted one video so far and will be doing more over the next couple of weeks. Would love to hear your guys thoughts!

Spencer
 
Someone here recently 'Improved' the Tags on their best video only for it to bomb.
So if you have a video already doing well - leave it alone.
Improve on the ones that are not doing well..
 
Appreciate the advice EVO, but I'm trudging on with this one, for better or for worse. I'd like to increase the sample size and add a lot more data to this conversation.
 
NO. This is a must not! When you modify a title, tags, or description, YouTube's algorithm runs it thorough like a new video, and if you already have success, the best bet to create a similar video to the first one. That way you activate a chain where people are watching your videos, which is plus in the eyes of YouTube. So if you want to do anything, make a similar video, make the first sentence of your description similar to your original video, and add similar tags. Goodluck :)
 
If your top videos are still getting more and more views, I would suggest to leave old titles until you will see views drop. As for thumbnail for tutorial videos they a bit less important than titles but I would suggest the same, leave them until views are growing and when you they start to drop then you can change them.
 
So what ended up happening here? I'm curious if changing the thumbnail will in fact hurt the videos or not? I too am thinking of changing some thumbnails on some popular videos of mine to reflect on a new style I've created that way there's a sense of consistency across all my videos, but if it's going to hurt them, then forget it. Too much money is at stake here and I'm not risking it.
 
If your videos are getting good traffic then I would leave them alone. I've changed titles of videos that I thought could do better only to regret it.
 
Definitely a bad thing.

A week or so ago I changed the meta data just slightly to go with a different style I want to pursue. Views went from around 10 a day (not great, but I'll take it), to me being lucky to get more than 3 in a day. It also took any of my content out of suggested videos, which is where it needed to be to get the kind of absolutely insane (10 views a day) numbers.
 
Tristin A. Evans said:
So what ended up happening here? I'm curious if changing the thumbnail will in fact hurt the videos or not? I too am thinking of changing some thumbnails on some popular videos of mine to reflect on a new style I've created that way there's a sense of consistency across all my videos, but if it's going to hurt them, then forget it. Too much money is at stake here and I'm not risking it.
Click to expand...

I changed about 10-15 of my top tags, titles, thumbs, and descriptions at the time. I've been letting them go for a bit, a few months now. I will go back to that list and check on everything to see the effects.
 
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