The Many Problems with YouTube...(Self-advertising)

[McShockz O]

We have all joined YouTube for many different reasons, and yet we all have many different problems with their channels. Even some of the biggest Youtubers like Pewdiepie still have problems with YouTube every once in awhile.

Some of us just simply want to entertain, others want to inform, and many others just want to provide opinions. YouTube in itself is a lot like writing a book. The purpose to persuade, inform, or entertain. The problems rarely lie in the purpose, but rather on how to achieve that purpose. It's like a never ending game of king of the hill in which there is never an official winner, although in Pewdiepie's case in is a debatable scenario.

I think the beauty in youtube consists of how you rise to the top. Is it by spamming people youtube comments asking for subs, or is it actually achieved by hard work and dedication. This is where I believe the problem lies, yet we never make any effort to fix it and instead find ourselves joining the band wagon.

So, what do you guys think we can do to fix it?

 

[Doom Video Vault]

I hate that sort of smug self-advertising by posting something like "sub to me" and nothing else.

 

[Dewmonic Abyss]

I don't think even PewDiePie can be considered a winner of YouTube. Can you imagine how much pressure the guy's under. Everytime there's something wrong with the website, people turn to him. And the media's certainly focused on him, too. He never even asked for any of that, either. You gotta feel bad for him. xD

As for my opinion on self-promotion.. The hard work approach doesn't really work. So many people on YouTube pour their heart and soul into their content and never get noticed. And the animators are a prime example of this. There's so much effort put into their content (production and time-wise), and the algorithm isn't going to promote that because it's not consistent and quantitative. So, I can't really blame people for resorting to scummy tactics. If you're a small YouTuber and you do this kind of stuff, I'd turn a blind eye to it. (Unless it's purely just obnoxious like spamming 'sub to my channel' in YouTube comments. Then I'm going to delete that just because it turns people away from my comments section.) If you have an audience, though, and have no problem getting views per video, then I think you're just being obnoxious for self-promoting. In that sense, you're not really earning your audience, because you're spending more time leaching off others, rather than creating your own content. It's a really grey area. It's a scummy tactic, but at the same time, can you blame people for losing hope in growing their channel through hard work alone on an over-saturated platform?

 

[Quick Question]

I think the top channels out now have done some sort of self-advertising or had someone do it for them. Now don't get me wrong I'm not referring to say "sub4sub, like4like," or any of that nonsense but like sharing your content to different forums or pages.

Having people write blogs about you, valuing your thumbnail looks, valuing your keywords, etc. Many channels lack the knowledge or proper execution of these SEO strategies and SEO is basically a way to self advertise your content without having to write anything somewhere.

That is what these big channels are doing and you can see that it works. Not the case every time, results may vary of course.

 

[PopsLetsPlay]

I don't think self-advertising is wrong whenever you do it in the right places, and aren't smug about it. If you join other forums..get to know other members and let them get to know you before you advertise something. Definitely don't advertise your videos on another videos comment, that's just rude.

 

[McShockz O]

I hate that sort of smug self-advertising by posting something like "sub to me" and nothing else.

I think there are a lot of wrong ways to advertise but also a lot of right ways to advertise depending on the audience you are trying to attract.[DOUBLEPOST=1497063049,1497062926][/DOUBLEPOST]

I don't think self-advertising is wrong whenever you do it in the right places, and aren't smug about it. If you join other forums..get to know other members and let them get to know you before you advertise something. Definitely don't advertise your videos on another videos comment, that's just rude.

I couldn't agree more

 

[McShockz O]

I think the top channels out now have done some sort of self-advertising or had someone do it for them. Now don't get me wrong I'm not referring to say "sub4sub, like4like," or any of that nonsense but like sharing your content to different forums or pages.

Having people write blogs about you, valuing your thumbnail looks, valuing your keywords, etc. Many channels lack the knowledge or proper execution of these SEO strategies and SEO is basically a way to self advertise your content without having to write anything somewhere.

That is what these big channels are doing and you can see that it works. Not the case every time, results may vary of course.

Sadly must people don't even know this term and typically follow other peoples lead. There is really no written combination or formula that works for those strategies either, since it is pretty dependent on the person.

 

[xingcat]

Every creative career relies on relentless self-promotion. Being able to promote your work and yourself as a creator (if you don't have people to do it for you, which, at the beginning, none of us really do) is essential, but it's something that's really hard to do right. So finding that balance is incredibly important.

 

[McShockz O]

First off thank you for such a thoughtful answer, and in many retrospects I completely agree with you. We've all been there when we were starting out, especially with only 10 or 0 subs. Desperate times call for desperate measures I suppose, and many do not really know any other way to advertise their channel. I almost feel as if youtube should provide some more resources to help them get noticed, but then that would just up the competition. However I definitely feel this should be a more broadcasted topic seeing as it affects the whole website as a whole.