YouTube Question Skipping a week?

[Boating Journey]

We have been posting a new video every Sunday. While our channel is still relatively small at 2900, we are considering skipping this week to allow us more time to edit our next video. Are there any adverse effects for doing that and also, what is the best way to tell your viewers what you are doing? Post a short update?

 

[Stanley | Team TB]

You will see a steady decline in impressions from your pre-existing library and you may see some viewers asking where you went. But it is ok to take a week off. I would hype up the video that you have coming... let your audience know on social media and via a YouTube community post that you are working on something special and it is going to take a little extra time to edit. Get them excited. The week off may end up working very much in your favor.

 

[Beanie Draws]

We have been posting a new video every Sunday. While our channel is still relatively small at 2900, we are considering skipping this week to allow us more time to edit our next video. Are there any adverse effects for doing that and also, what is the best way to tell your viewers what you are doing? Post a short update?

Technically you will see an impact, but realistically it's kinda dependant on the channel and how you've set up your audience expectations and such.

I've never set any set schedule, and I've taken MONTHS long breaks that haven't overly impacted me. Naturally things have slowed down, but I believe once you get back to posting, new viewers will be there regardless if you miss a week or not.
Here's some of my detailed stats to show how short term and long term breaks can impact your channel, keeping in mind my channel is art, focused mostly on evergreen content, and has been around for 6 years, so I have enough content to let the channel idle on old content. If I were more consistant (I need to find an editor I gel with) it might improve, and thus taking a brake might be more noticable to my stats.

1 month pretty consistent uploads with a week break (the arrows indicate uploads

subscriptions gained over a year. You can see the amount of uploads doesn't deem to change the numbers (for me) much

my views over the space of a year. You can see this is more impacted by the lengthy gaps in uploads, but nothing that would really concern me.

and here's the new stats YouTube has given us for new and returning viewers.

So my channel is different to yours, so take what I say with a grain of salt, but personally my stats tell me, for my channel, missing content isn't the end of the world. But I also have 6 years worth of content to keep my channel afloat when life gets in the way.

 

[Stanley | Team TB]

That is such great info, love it.

 

[Legacy]

I always say focus on quality over quantity, and that everyone needs at least a small break every now and then. If you have any preview of the video, even just a picture you could make a post and include that small preview just to let them know that you are working on a new video. Recently, a channel I watch (called Channel Makers) needed more time to work on one of their videos that they were going to post that day, but since they needed more time they went live on the channel for a short while instead. I'm not sure if you could make that work somehow or if you would want to, but that could be an idea too.

 

[Kindred]

Deffo focus on quality, we all need a break sometimes - but just bear in mind that it might give you a slightly lower overall watch time for the week. Sometimes that is worth doing so you can come back refreshed and strong

 

[HenryBR]

The way I see it is if you have been posting every week religiously as you have said. Then I'm sure you won't get any backlash over it. Sometimes you do need to a little longer to create a video. Rather someone create a quality edited video then a half-efforted edited video. No need to worry. Do what's right for the channel. Even if it means losing a certain amount of views for that week.

 

[BraveStar]

One piece of advice I can give for those who find themselves needing to take time off or being unable to keep a schedule to upload their next video is to create backup content specially designed to be uploaded or published quickly, like a spare tire. These backup videos can be short, simple content based on your regular content. For example, if you're a tech YouTuber who makes content around PC hardware than you can make some simple backup videos on things like a USB device like a card reader or a cheap wireless mouse to have as a backup in case your main mouse breaks. These videos can be stored on your drive or even uploaded as drafts waiting to be published. Because these are supposed to be simple videos meant to be used in case of emergency they don't need to be done in a rush which allows you time to properly set up SEO, thumbnails and more. Just simply create a few of these ready to be published if you fail to maintain your schedule of a regular video and it can save your channel from potentially losing views CTR and more.

 

[Beanie Draws]

create backup content specially designed to be uploaded or published quickly, like a spare tire

This is fantastic advice and what a lot of creators do anyway. Some creators will record a while weeks worth of content in one day. I've known some channels to have 6 months worth of backed up content ready to go for holidays.

So while trends are fantastic, this always pinpoints the importance of evergreen content to, and planning a long term content strategy so you have an idea of what future videos you want to release, weeks or even months before you release them, and if you're organised enough, you can get quite a lot of content batch recorded and edited specifically for situations like this.