Subscriber amount stuck at 422 after using Google Ads

[The Calm Sounds]

Hi there YouTube helpful people. Greetings from London.

I started my channel about 1 year ago.
For the past 2 months it seems to be stuck at around 420 subscribers.
I'm not sure if it has anything to do with using Google Ads about 2 months ago. I fell for the the Google Ads £75 free credit offer with the hope that I might get more subscribers more quickly. I guess the whole thing cost me about £50 so I stopped the campaign as it didn't have that much effect. I'm up to date with payment on the ads account.

Before I used Google ads I was getting a steady 10-30 subscribers a month. Now it is only 1 or 2 a month, even though I have added more videos which I think better videos than before.

Has anyone had a similar problem after using Google Ads? Or could there be another reason why my subscriber count seems a bit stuck? I've had no warning or notice that there is anything wrong with my account, so it's a bit strange that it was going up slowly but steadily and now it is going up hardly at all. I've tried running a test by asking a friend to subscribe and that did make the subscriber count did go up.

I hope someone out there has some wise and kind advice !

My channel -

Richard

 

[The Calm Sounds]

Ps, I have 17,501 watch hours but still only 422 subscribers. Any ideas why?

 

[lostview creator]

i have the same problem as you but to me its worse than you have because I have only 100 watch hours

 

[CertifiedViralTikTok]

At least i am learning not to buy ads or other stuff for my channel

 

[The Kitchen Gamer]

I've not heard of this happening due to Google Ads but for me personally I've had times where I've plateaued and not gained subscribers for a while (I've not used Google Ads or anything similar to promote my channel expect for forums and discord) but the biggest thing is to remain consistant and continue producing a high level of content. It does take time for subscribers to come and you just have to remember that YouTube isn't a sprint it's a marathon.

 

[BensTechLab]

@The Kitchen Gamer is spot on here. Don't over think it, just focus on producing good content on your channel that serves your audience on a consistent basis. It takes time.

But on a technical note, google ads will never reduce your subscribe rate. They are disconnected systems. Ads may increase your "impressions" (number of times someone is offered to click your video). But then increasing impressions is only one part of it, then you need to check what your CTR is (click through rate). CTR may be influenced by having quality thumbnail and title. Then if CTR is good, check your viewer retention in channel analytics. Are users watching the whole video? Do they drop off frequently or at a certain point in time? If retention is poor then you may need to continue practicing your video skills which only comes with experience! (ie: publish more videos and learn along the way and you will become a more experienced video maker).

TLDR; Impressions -> CTR -> Viewer Retention -> Watch Time -> Engagement (Google ads only boosts the first one, impressions).

 

[JTM MINISTRIES]

That is great information ! I'm learning a lot from these questions