YouTube is the largest social media platform for videos with 2 billion viewers per month. This is a very large user base that you can take advantage of by creating a YouTube channel and sharing videos.
And even though it’s a video platform only, there’s still a lot you can do by creating videos. Video is one of the most engaging types of content and it’s also very flexible. And there are tons of YouTube video ideas out there for you to try.
However, it’s not easy to just create a YouTube channel and be successful overnight. It takes a lot of time and effort to start a successful channel. But with the right tactics, you’ll start off right.
Here are seven expert tips to help you create and manage a successful YouTube channel.
1. Create Your YouTube Channel: The Basics
If you have a Google account, you can sign in with that account and don’t need to create a new YouTube account. If not, just click “Sign in” and create a YouTube business account.
One of the first things you need to do is fill in your information, choose a name, add a photo to the cover, and so on.
Profile Name
Choosing an account name is important because it is still yours. It is not recommended that you keep changing the account name. Therefore, you must choose the one that will remain a good fit for your channel even as it grows.
Come up with a name that represents you or your channel. Don’t do it for too long. And try to make it interesting, something that will make people discover more of it.
Cover Picture
The next task is to choose a fun and catchy cover that is suitable and catchy. The goal here is also to use something that will grab your audience’s attention.
About Section
In this section, you can describe your channel and provide other useful information. This is a brilliant place to tell your brand story and make a good impression on your audience. You can also use this space to provide your contact and other relevant business information.
2. Do Your Research
Before creating content for your YouTube channel, you need to know who you are targeting. For this reason, it’s important to do thorough research and understand your target audience.
While you can create a new YouTube channel, you can still get this information from other platforms. For example, your website could contain a lot of information about your current customers and their preferences.
Other social media accounts can also give you valuable audience information that you can use for your YouTube channel.
3. Plan and Upload Content
There is a lot of planning involved in creating content for YouTube and it’s not easy to just randomly post videos. You have to choose the type of video you want to make for your audience.
You’ll also need to plan ahead and set up channels (like a content calendar, but for YouTube). That way, you can post regularly without running out of ideas. A clear plan also makes things easier and helps you avoid last-minute challenges.
The type of content will depend on your type of business and audience.
For example, a product-based company might find that a training video is a good fit for their company. However, this may not apply to service companies, and they may be more interested in telling their brand story or building brand awareness.
Influencers post videos from their niche and may find that they want to focus on making deposits. In general, think about your business and audience before making a video. And always plan some topics and videos so you don’t miss posts just because you don’t have a great idea.
4. Optimise Your Video Titles and Descriptions
YouTube is not only a video platform, it is the largest video search engine in the world. Just as SEO works for your website, YouTube SEO works for your YouTube channel.
You need to optimize your YouTube channel for keywords to rank higher in search results for those keywords. And because channels only have video content, titles and descriptions are the best places to use these keywords.
You should always include your main keyword in the title of your video. Plus, keep your title short, relevant to the video content, and catchy.
The YouTube video description should also be optimized for keywords. And because the character limit is higher, you can add primary and secondary keywords there.
Video descriptions can be used for many other purposes. Here are a few ways to change the description of your video:
Write descriptions that clearly and precisely describe your video content in a way that will attract more visitors.
Don’t go into too many details and make people curious when you watch the video.
Use the long queue keyword as this is similar to what will actually be entered to search for videos.
Add appropriate hashtags to your video descriptions to categorize videos and improve search engine optimization.
Shorten sentences and paragraphs so that descriptions are easy to read and convenient for mobile devices.
You can also use your description to direct people to other useful resources such as similar or related videos by adding a URL.
Video descriptions can also be used to drive traffic to your website if you include a link to it in the description.
5. Integrate with Other Social Media Accounts and Your Website
Just creating a YouTube channel and gaining subscribers is not the end goal for most businesses. After all, social media is just another way to fulfill your bigger marketing goals such as increasing traffic and increasing sales.
And for that, you have to find creative ways to direct your YouTube viewers to your website or other platforms.
There are several ways to do this. You can add links to your website and other social media accounts in the Information section. You can link to specific product and service pages in your video description.
You can also embed a link on your social profile in the form of a social share button right on your cover photo, as shown below.
And, of course, you can always add links in the form of CTAs at the end of your YouTube videos.
Use one or more of these to place your social media account links and website links in your YouTube channel and direct traffic to where you want.
6. Cross-Promote on Other Platforms
Creating great content alone doesn’t always mean success. You can manage the best YouTube channels in your niche, but people won’t even know if you don’t promote them.
Optimizing your YouTube SEO channel will increase detection, but it’s not enough. Creating great video content takes time and effort and deserves to be promoted in the right way.
This means you have to promote your individual videos on other platforms as well. You can post teaser videos for upcoming videos or view Instagram posts. In order to increase the reach of your video and get more views, it is recommended to advertise it on other channels.
Here is an example of a beginner promoting their first video on an Instagram account they have created.
7. Analyse and Improve
Finally, analyze your performance to find out what worked and what didn’t. YouTube has built-in analytics tools that can help you find out how your account and individual videos are performing.
You can take an overview of your audience, including demographics and key interests. It also provides information about the search words you are ranking on the video. This is very useful information as it will help you fine-tune your SEO strategy.
Below is a screenshot of the user interface showing the different tabs and types of insights you can get.
The better you understand your audience and your account’s current performance, the more you can improve in the future. Starting a successful YouTube channel is a constant endeavor and requires constant effort. The more you improve your strategy, the better your future performance will be.
Final Thoughts
These are some of the most important things you need to know to build a successful YouTube channel. Use these tips to get your channel up and running, rate your videos, and get more subscribers.
They are especially useful if you are new to YouTube and starting from scratch. They will get you started well and prepare you for success.
Now start your channel and watch it grow with this tactic.
