YouTube Tips Shorts Thumbnail

[Albercook]

So I saw in a video, vidIQ I think, that you can add an image to the front of your shorts. Since it takes a second to run the first image will show like a thumbnail.

This does not make any sense to me. It seems that my shorts are displayed as the thumbnail. So when does the first image come in?

 

[SILTHW]

Unless they have changed the behavior, the thumbnails are shown when viewed from a desktop device. You can add an image at the beginning since shorts usually show the first frame of the uploaded video to fake having a "thumbnail". Not sure how effective it is though.

 

[CrisVillorejo]

How to create a thumbnail?

 

[Dr_Alan_Science]

Tubebuddy Forums Engine is angry now, because you mentioned 'VIDIQ' lol

 

[Albercook]

... since shorts usually show the first frame of the uploaded video to fake having a "thumbnail".

Sorry I still don't get it. What do you mean by ".. show the first frame". Show it where? When? How is showing the first frame like a thumbnail but not a thumbnail. When is the first frame shown in place of the thumbnail. I see a thumbnail in my list of videos is that not what shows up on the short shelf?

 

[SILTHW]

When you view shorts from the shorts shelf, they just start playing. There is no thumbnail because they autoplay. The other quirk is that the shorts shelf doesn't show the description. Only comments.

If you add a thumbnail to your short, it isn't shown on the shorts shelf. It is shown when you view shorts from a desktop/laptop/mobile browser.

What some people are doing to fake thumbnails are adding what would have normally been their thumbnail as the first 3-5 seconds of their video. That way when you flip through videos on the shorts shelf and they get to your video, it looks like there is a thumbnail before the video starts. But there isn't. It is just a trick to make it seem like a thumbnail.

It is hard to say if it has value. Very little details about viewer's behavior with shorts is know.

 

[Albercook]

What some people are doing to fake thumbnails are adding what would have normally been their thumbnail as the first 3-5 seconds of their video. That way when you flip through videos on the shorts shelf

Sorry to be so slow but with regards to the short shelf what is the difference between the first frame and a thumbnail?

It seems that when a short autoplays there is no CTR involved just retention time. On the other hand when someone flips through the shorts shelf they see an image. Which is no different functionally than a thumbnail. In this case CTR as well as retention time has meaning.

I have read that with shorts YouTube "randomly selects an image" for the thumbnail. What does that mean? On the shorts shelf the first image is shown. On my channel I can still select a thumbnail which people will see when they browse videos on my channel.

What don't I get?

 

[Albercook]

Are they just saying that by selecting the image for the first few seconds they can get the hook functionality that a thumbnail could provide?

 

[SILTHW]

Sorry to be so slow but with regards to the short shelf what is the difference between the first frame and a thumbnail?

It seems that when a short autoplays there is no CTR involved just retention time. On the other hand when someone flips through the shorts shelf they see an image. Which is no different functionally than a thumbnail. In this case CTR as well as retention time has meaning.

I have read that with shorts YouTube "randomly selects an image" for the thumbnail. What does that mean? On the shorts shelf the first image is shown. On my channel I can still select a thumbnail which people will see when they browse videos on my channel.

What don't I get?

You are right and that's the point I'm making. There is no CTR. But some people feel like a "thumbnail" helps grab the attention of people swiping through shorts and makes them stop and watch. So they fake a thumbnail by putting a thumbnail-like image in the first few seconds.

I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with the strategy. I haven't seen any significant data to show it works. I'm simply answering your question as to what people are doing and why.

 

[Albercook]

Thanks for the reply. Maybe I don't get the terminology yet. What exactly is the short shelf. If I go to YouTube >> Home and scroll down I see Shorts Beta. Those images are not autoplaying.

Once I click on one of them then it starts with autoplays.

Furthermore I added a shorts section to my YouTube channel, which I'm told shows what my shorts will look like on the shorts shelf. I can change the thumbnail for the video and it changes the thumbnail on the static pre-autoplay image that shows up in the shorts section. In an incognito browser window I went to YouTube, searched my YouTube page. In the shorts section the image is the custom thumbnail that I made and selected.

This is exactly what I understood was not supposed to happen from channels like vidIQ etc.

Do I understand things correctly?

Could this be an upgrade in YouTube.

Again thanks for your time.

I'm I have actually discovered something or at least helped other people that are/were confused the same way that I was maybe I have contributed at least a small bit to the community.

 

[SILTHW]

Thanks for the reply. Maybe I don't get the terminology yet. What exactly is the short shelf. If I go to YouTube >> Home and scroll down I see Shorts Beta. Those images are not autoplaying.

Once I click on one of them then it starts with autoplays.

Furthermore I added a shorts section to my YouTube channel, which I'm told shows what my shorts will look like on the shorts shelf. I can change the thumbnail for the video and it changes the thumbnail on the static pre-autoplay image that shows up in the shorts section. In an incognito browser window I went to YouTube, searched my YouTube page. In the shorts section the image is the custom thumbnail that I made and selected.

This is exactly what I understood was not supposed to happen from channels like vidIQ etc.

Do I understand things correctly?

Could this be an upgrade in YouTube.

Again thanks for your time.

I'm I have actually discovered something or at least helped other people that are/were confused the same way that I was maybe I have contributed at least a small bit to the community.

Context is important. YouTube was working on Shorts as a competitor to TikTok. India banned TikTok, so YouTube rushed out shorts into the mobile app. This is key - the mobile app's behavior is very different than the behavior from a browser. It functions almost identical to TikTok where videos auto-play and you simply swipe through them.

But because Youtube isn't just a mobile app, they ultimately expanded the Shorts feature to the rest of the world. They allowed you to upload outside of the mobile app as long as the video was in a 9:16 (not 16:9) format and included #shorts in the title or description. And they also allowed you to upload a thumbnail just like any other video. Only the thumbnail is only visible via a web browser, not the mobile app.

Some people wanted the mobile app experience to work like the browser experience, so they are faking that experience by making the first few seconds of their video the same as the thumbnail they would normally include. They can use that as their thumbnail for the regular uploads by selecting that frame as their thumbnail. So there is a similar look/feel whether the video is viewed via the mobile app, or via a browser.

There is no evidence that it helps increase views from the mobile app. It is just "yet another" way people are trying to game the short shelf.

The shorts shelf name is admittedly confusing. Originally It only applied to the shorts feature in the mobile app, but with YouTube Studio now allowing people to add a Shrts playlist, it is being used to refer to the shorts part of the mobile app and the shorts playlist. That is causing a lot of confusion.

 

[Albercook]

My god this is confusing. So the Shorts section on my phone does show how my short will appear in that section of my YouTube channel and presumably the way that it will appear when other people see in in the app and on the shelf before they select anything and autoplay takes over.

Thank you for your patience. Now that I understand things I think I can ask my original question. There is a scene in my short that I want to be the thumbnail (I'm referring to the image that people see before autoplay). Since there are really only so many scene changes during my short can I upload several versions with only slight variation and see if I can get the algorithm to pick a still from the scene that I want as the app thumbnail?

 

[Albercook]

In my library they have the thumbnail that I chose.

From my my channel videos they have the thumbnail that YouTube chose.

Once shorts start playing thumbnails don't mean anything.

 

[SILTHW]

In my library they have the thumbnail that I chose.

From my my channel videos they have the thumbnail that YouTube chose.

Once shorts start playing thumbnails don't mean anything.

Correct. And the mobile app defaults to autoplaying them. Note, I don't know if you are in the US or not but the app behavior is slightly different based on where you are located.