1.Build your videos around a single topic/keyword
Though it may be obvious, building your videos focusing on a single keyword or topic is the sure-shot way to garner targeted traffic and keep growing. Many people tend to skip this all-important step since they have little or no knowledge of the best SEO practices and how it impacts the ranking of their YouTube channel. More importantly, you should have zeroed in on your keyword even before you start building your videos for the channel. This will also help you to build your content around the chosen keyword and also help YouTube pick up your channel when you have also added closed captions. Use your keyword to also understand the level of competition for the keyword. If there are, say 1,000 YouTube channels for the keyword you have chosen, then you may need to shift focus to some other keyword. When you start out with your YouTube marketing strategy the first time ever, you may be tempted to make 10 or 15 minutes long videos. But in fact, as you would learn later, most YouTube videos are typically around 5 minutes or less. Keeping it sweet and short is, therefore, the way to go.
2. Reformat quality content you already have
Building great content is obviously the best way to succeed with YouTube marketing in 2019. But, it is not always essential to build your videos from scratch. Check your library and see videos that can be repurposed to make it more actionable, useful and valuable to the viewer. Videos on various sporting events make a good candidate for repurposing. You have made some videos on certain aspects of last season’s football games and those have now been moved to your library. Updating the same video with current content should take only about half the time you spent on your original video. Two-thirds of all millennials also agree that they can always find a YouTube video on nearly anything that they are looking to learn. Many established YouTube marketers have successfully adopted this strategy.
3. Engaging with your target audience
Social interaction is at the core of your YouTube marketing strategy. Therefore, your videos should encourage discussion and comments and without your visitors interacting this way, you may fail to reach your goals. When visitors engage with your channel for a longer duration, leave comments or discuss the topic further, YouTube also rewards channels that are most active with users.
4. Get branded
You have gone through great pains collating great content for your YouTube video. But, how much attention have you paid to the visual appeal of your channel? It is essential that your channel looks professional. By branding your channel visitors can easily recognize it. If you are also operating a website or blog, you already know the art of distinguishing the visual appeal. When you engage yourself in the branding exercise remember also to ensure adding custom URLs to the channel header as well as an interesting bio about you and your videos.
5. Use other social media platforms to promote your videos
With social media, you have the ability to cross-promote content through different channels. Promoting YouTube through these channels is also the easiest method of garnering more and more visitors to your channel. Choosing platforms where you are most active is the way to go.
6. Importance of showing up
You could be running your YouTube channels as an individual or part of an organization. In either scenario, it is beneficial to add your face to the screen. Your audience can connect with you more easily when a brand also has a face. This is particularly important for business, life, fitness coaches, tutors, and bloggers. Every video need not necessarily have your face, but you should be reaching out in person to your target audience at regular intervals.
7. Thumbnails
Thumbnails may be tiny in size but create a huge impact. Thumbnails are used by YouTube to advertise other interesting videos using the sidebar to show the thumbnails. Usually, videos that have appealing thumbnail and catchy titles rank higher on YouTube even when the content is less valuable because of the higher CTR. You can also use many small tricks like large text, arrows etc to take your CTR to where it should be.
Conclusion
With a mix of text, video, and audio, YouTube represents a great way to extract the best from your digital marketing efforts.