How To Grow Your Youtube Channel

[Gijs]

Hello members,

In this thread I want to discuss what tactics can be used to expand your youtube channels. I'll discuss the appoaches I know in this post. Let me know if you have anything to add to this list, what you think of these strategies and whether you agree with my explainations. Of course the most important strategy is uploading great songs and video's. I won't go into that here, since that's besides the scope of this group.

- Uploading regulary

If you upload regulary your subscribers will percieve your channel as active. Since Youtube is a community it will let your subcribers and other youtubers know you are an active member. Next to that: More video's means more exposure.

- Being part of community

Like I mentioned Youtube is a community. You have to be part of it to grow into it. But how do you do this? One thing is commenting on, rating and sharing other peoples video's. Don't do this for the sake of selfpromotion, since people will notice this and may start to dislike you for it. A great way is to upload video's adressing the community in one way or another. I haven't done this myself, but I'm trying to figure out how I would like to do so.

- Good titles, descriptions and tags.

The video's on Youtube are filed by their titles, descriptions and tags. If someone searches for something specific their seachwords are crossed with these words in the titles, descriptions and tags. Make sure your titles are correct and cover the content. Make sure you have a detailed decrription and don't be shy with the tags.

- Video-responses

Videoresponses are a great way to get some views. Videorespond your video to a video from another channel that has a lot of views. Make sure the video is indeed a contribution. People will not like a video of your classical string quartet as a respons toBritney video. Or will they?

- Enter youtube indiemusicians contests

I haven't gone about doing this myself at this point, because I have to work on my demo's some more. Once I finish a song/video completely I will defenitly submit my video to as many contests as I can find. This is a great way to possibly gain exposure and see what the public thinks about your stuff. I will make a thread of these competitions/contests in the near future in this group.

There are also a lot of less "legit" ways to gain subs like sub4sub websites and missleading titles, descriptions and tags. I would strongly recommend you to steer away from these types of growth, since they will backfire at you. In the very least they make little contribution, since you will not attract views/subs because of your content. These subs will not watch your video's most of he time anyway.

Keep in mind that the youtube game is a process that will mos tlikely not succeed over night. It takes time and hard work to get a decent channel. I'm still in the babyfase with my channel, so I think it's nice to go thru this progress with you guys.

[john]

Great post Gijs

[Brad Barnett]

Great Post Gijs.  Especially the part about being part of the Youtube community.  That goes for all social networks.  Most bands create accounts, upload videos and then do nothing else.  Being active and creating relationships in the community are how you get noticed.  Networking online and off is crucial for all serious musicians.

[Brad Barnett]

I won't dispute that videos, social media, image creation, online subscribers and followers, and all other manner and modes of promotion and marketing may be very important to the business of music, and even as a validation of one's creative efforts.  But those things have nothing, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING, to do with being a serious musician.  Anyone can play the game, and zillions of wannabes do.  A "serious musician" continually strives to be one who's actually "got game," and that's solely between them and the art.   

 

 

HoboSage, I am talking about musicians and bands that want to make a living playing, recording and performing their songs.  I am not saying that musicians who don't use social media aren't serious and dedicated at what they do.  That is far from the truth!

[jenellegarrett]

Get people who already watch YouTube to watch your videos. While your family and close friends will watch and support you, the bulk of your YouTube channel will be from people around the world who you’ve never met. You have to target the community already existing within YouTube. The more you watch other YouTubers, the more you’ll realize how addicted people get to YouTube – and you will probably turn into one of these people, just like we did.

[Zarven Kara]

Facebook promotion definitely helps as well...

 

great post.....

[Fanfika]

1. Upload new videos regularly, and preferably on a schedule. If your audience comes to expect a new video every Tuesday, they’ll look forward to Tuesdays! When you upload a new video, those who have subscribed to your channel will receive a notification (which helps trigger new views).

2. Post each of your YouTube videos on Facebook using Facebook’s native video uploader Include a call-to-action within the Facebook video post to “check out my other videos on YouTube” with a link to your YouTube channel.

3. Keep your video titles to 50 characters or less. Any longer, and your title will get cut off, decreasing the chances it will get clicked in search.

4. Embed your YouTube videos on your blog and promote them to your social media audience. This will not only increase video views, it will increase your site’s pageviews.

5. Try keeping your videos to around 3 minutes by Buffer Social shows the ideal length of a YouTube video is 2 minutes and 54 seconds.

6. When choosing keywords for your videos, run a quick Google search to see if there are video results for those keywords. If there are, your video has a better chance of ranking in search.