11 Quick & Easy Steps to set up a YouTube based Media Company

Do you know that YouTube is currently the top-visited website and has easily overtaken Facebook, Wikipedia and Twitter? It is quite evident that media consumers more likely prefer to get their dose of worldly wisdom online by watching videos than reading posts, tweets or articles. Let’s understand the popularity of YouTube through calculations: With over 1.8 billion active users and 1 billion hours of videos being watched daily, it comes down to an average of 6 hours per day of an individual’s time spent on YouTube. You will not be missing out on anything if you make a direct transition to YouTube without a TV debut as a media organisation. To top it all, it’s easier to gauge and appeal to your viewer’s binge-watching tendencies through a YouTube Channel.

However, the challenge lies in increasing your subscribers without buying them. Those who have not laid out a strategy before launching their channel have often resorted to buying subscribers out of desperation only to realise much later that this is indeed a futile exercise. It is evident that the fake accounts hardly drive active engagements or viewership on the videos uploaded. Hence, they do not end up influencing YouTube to recommend your channel to actual viewers in the near future.

Discover your niche and find your ideal audience to maintain consistency

Before you produce your own media channel on YouTube, you need to figure out the purpose behind the same. Do you want to make your viewers laugh, do you want to teach them new skills or life-hacks, or narrate them riveting stories? You can only maximise your views on YouTube if you know which video style your target audience prefers to watch. YouTube Analytics gives out important statistics like audience demographics and location to help you figure this out.

Popular media channels on YouTube

Some of the most popular YouTube categories that viewers browse for are comedy skits around everyday human problems, live gaming commentary sessions, makeup tutorials, product reviews of gadgets and family vlogs.

Shoot your Introductory video

You need to produce a programme with different episodes but with the same format and a proper schedule. You can present this through an introductory video, giving a heads up to your viewers about the nature of your videos. Ease them into your world and enable them to form a connection with you by describing yourself in depth in this video.

Follow your competitors on YouTube

Whether you are producing a talk show, running a gossip channel or covering local community news, chances are someone is doing the same on YouTube and enjoying immense popularity. It’s always important to follow them to know what not to follow in your content. Researching your competitor’s content helps you to bring out a different perspective on the same subject and develop a voice of your own. It’s very imperative to develop a unique voice that your audience loves tuning to while they filter out the rest of the other channels.

Develop catchy titles and thumbnails for every video

Do you know why the proverb, “Don’t judge a book by its cover” came into force? Because we all do form opinions (though we cannot help it) at the drop of a hat by visual cues! Just like how important a book cover is to sell the novel, so is your thumbnail - the static image which is the deciding factor for a click or a pass. It’s important to choose the right resolution, mobile optimised image for your thumbnail because it makes its appearance on search engines, social media handles and websites. According to digital marketing expert Neil Patel, the right thumbnail can increase engagement up to 154%.

If YouTube has 1.8 billion active users, Facebook has 2.23 billion users, Instagram has 1 billion users, and Twitter has 330 million users. Your prime audience is probably also using the other channels and are scrolling through their newsfeed to click on the content that grasps their immediate attention. Videos are opened the most on Facebook, followed by memes and then simple posts. One of the ways to increase the popularity of your videos on YouTube is to build the very much necessary social media excitement on Facebook and Instagram through video teasers. Video teasers are the best ways to keep your viewers guessing and waiting for the full YouTube video to give them the answers that they are looking for. Using the Native Video Uploader on Facebook and call to action buttons can increase subscriptions. You can also live stream debates or events as you cover them on Facebook to increase the comments.

Collaborate with influencers and other creators

From beauty, fitness, travel, fashion to activism, there are social media sensations whose lifestyle garners immense popularity. Collaborating with them on one or more episodes where they discuss their personal lives and share their interests will help you get subscribers from their followers.

Improve your YouTube SEO

While YouTube is the second largest search engine on the internet, 70% of the top 100 search results pop up YouTube videos before any blog or articles. Few of the best practices to improve the SEO rankings of your YouTube video includes using tools like Keywordtool.io for target keywords in your descriptions and titles. Add the categories you feel suitable for your video along with tags on your video description to give a background of what transpired the video. Bettering the comments, views and likes on the video will ensure higher search rankings on Google. It’s also important to embed your YouTube videos on your Media Website Channel as this can improve conversion rates and reduce bounce rates on onsite.

Be responsive and engaging with your YouTube community

It could be giveaways, freebies, contests, polls, giving your fans a chance to vote on their preferred topics or even simply liking or pinning their comment. You need to turn your YouTube channel into a social media handle just so that a loyal community can keep up with your upcoming videos. The more interactive your viewers, the more user-generated content you can avail for your media channel.

Create specific series and playlists on a recurring subtopic

Suppose you are covering a docuseries on a celebrity, do you think it will be better to present it as one video or to break it up into many series? The latter approach can make your audience look forward to the next video and hence is reason enough for them to return back to your channel again and again. It’s a win-win situation for you as well as you would automatically feel obliged to create new content within the same series.

Majority of the viewership, (around 55%) on YouTube is because of the suggested, related and recommended video column on watch-pages. While recommended videos solely depend on a viewer’s preference, related video suggestions are based on the similarity between two videos of different channels and suggested videos are 4 random videos from the channel’s creator itself. One of the ways to execute this is to ensure that your video content is above 7 minutes and engaging enough for your viewer to watch it till the end. Another way to get the YouTube algorithm work in your favour is to let it know that many of your videos are related to each other by including the same keywords in your Title with episode numbers. Another way is to ensure that your YouTube Descriptions have a minimum of 3-5 sentences before introducing links or generic tags. You can also create your next video content based on the popular search suggestions on YouTube on certain keywords you enter.

A final thought

While scripting your video content plays a role in determining the success of your channel on YouTube, your production quality also needs to match up to the blueprint. Always use the right mic and be animated as the anchor of the video with elaborate hand gestures. This can definitely attract viewers to linger on longer and not get bored by a flat, monotonous presenter.

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