• Guest - Earn a FREE TubeBuddy Upgrade for being active on the forums! Click Here to learn how you earn free upgrades for TubeBuddy!
  • Guest - TubeBuddy has a discord! Click Here to join in the conversation!

YouTube Tips Advice To Give New Channels Starting In 2023?

MediaMan

Very Well-Known Member
364
12
Seems like so much has changed the past few years with YT and possibly just as much the past 6 months. It would be great if we could all post a few tidbits of our recent experience on YT and perhaps give some advice for new channels in 2023. Here's a few things I've learned based on my own experiences.

1) Limit your channel to 1 narrow focused topic. This allows the YT AI to really dial in your target demographic resulting in better recommendations.

2) If you simply HAVE to focus on more than 1 topic, limit it to 3 and focus on a singular topic for several videos in a row. This allows momentum for each topic which could result in more views and at the least better recommended views.

3) Treat shorts and longs like two different markets each with their own demographic target. Shorts seem to prefer more visual pizazz, brash graphics, sound effects, music, etc, something that gets their attention right away which helps get that impulsive sub. Long content seems to prefer a more laid back approach where the message, content of the video itself is more important than production bling. However... when combining good production skills & good content, that's what increases the odds of a sub dramatically imop.

4) Shorts Scheduling. If you're capable of posting daily or more than once a day, I don't think it matters too much when you post. Eventually you'll get some audience metrics telling you when your audience is online the most, that may be something to consider when you have a few hundred subs. But just starting out, you're in affect "seeding you channel" so I wouldn't be too concerned when you post shorts. Typical times 9:00am, 12:00noon, 6:00pm, 9:00pm should be just fine. If you're only posting 1-2 shorts a week it probably makes sense to adhere to some schedule, but I wouldn't stress too much over it.

5) Long Form Scheduling. There's enough research data out there to show scheduling does make sense for long form videos. So once you get in your groove and have a stable production pipeline, stick to it.

6) Gaps in production may not be a good thing. I would "hyperfocus" and bump out a lot of content, things would be rolling along well, then I would take a few days or weeks off, and my channels would slow to a crawl. What I would do differently instead is go ahead and produce the videos, but don't release them all at once, release them over days or maybe even over weeks. At the very least... try to produce 1 video every 2 weeks.

7) Personal connection with viewers. I see this over and over again. Channels where the viewers have some kind of relationship with the channel host seems to increase the odds of the channel being successful. If you're shy, etc, etc, try to get over it. It's hard...I know! So what if you have a faceless channel or a channel where there is no spoken word? Tough call, you can still succeed but maybe add some personal photos, comments, etc, in the community tab once in a while or maybe even a behind the scenes video of your production with a meet and greet style of video, etc. People seem to really enjoy meeting the team behind the channel!!

8) Careful with adding external links too soon. I verified this with other new channel owners as well, but it still seems a bit random. Adding external links in your video description (amazon affiliate, etc) might cause the YT AI to not push your video. Granted this a good way to monetize your channel from day one, but I would wait until you have 50 or so videos, or maybe 100+ subs before doing this. I had shorts with under 50 views that had affiliate links in them. I deleted the video, removed the links, reuploaded the same video and started getting 1000s of views. Your results may differ, but this happened to me so much I stopped adding them.

9) Are shorts worth it? I used to think shorts were a valuable took for any channel. But since shorts views do not apply toward the 4000 hours required to get long form monetized, shorts monetization requirements are insane, the revenue form shorts is abysmal, what good are shorts for most channels? Hard to say... it does seem like it's easier to get views from shorts than longs, but it also seems to take a lot more views from shorts to get a sub than it does from longs. You'll have to experiment and decide for yourself, but again.. for channels that will never be monetized from shorts.. what exactly are they doing for your channel? There is plenty of debate out there questioning if channels with both longs and shorts confuses the YT AI and ends up stagnating growth. All I can add is, I have one channel with zero shorts and overall growth is acceptable.

10) How many views does it take to get a sub on your channel? Divide your total views (on your about tab) with your current subs. The lower the number the better, this means your content is hitting the right demographic target and they like your content. Higher numbers could represent that while you're getting views, the content is not focused enough or not compelling enough. Imop a good views/sub number is 200 or less, with 100 or less being fantastic. Typical numbers are probably 300-400. Anything over 500 I would be concerned with. My broad based channel gets an incredible number of views from shorts and longs, but my views/sub value is over 500 and there really is nothing I can do since the channel itself is about a very broad subject. For comparison, my narrow focused singular topic channel without shorts, the v/s is currently at 75.

Hopefully others will chime in with their own experiences. Maybe we can find some repeatable data to experiment with. Thanks in advance for anyone else commenting.
 

MattCommand1

On sabbatical
TubeBuddy Pro
Trusted User
1,020
25
Subscriber Goal
5000
SocialBlade is a good place to check out various channels and see how they are performing. Data may not be 100% accurate but it's enough to get a fairly good representation of the channel. Check it out, type in a channel name at the top right. ;)

I use this all the time to assess other people's channels. It is a great tool. I bookmark my own channel with SocialBlade to get a macro and graph view of my own channel.
 
  • Like
Reactions: MediaMan

The Jungle Explorer

I should have been born 200 years ago!
TubeBuddy Pro
549
19
thejungleexplorer.com
Subscriber Goal
20000
That is some really solid and awesome advice MediaMan. The only things I can add to that are these.

  1. Use TubeBuddy as a guide to do your basic SEO.
    1. It does not do it for you, but it does help guide you through the process, which is quite complicated for a beginner. SEO will not help you win the race, but it does get you in it. It is a minimum standard, a starting point.
  2. YouTube and Google indexes are 2 different things.
    1. Understand that where your video is ranked in the YouTube index has nothing to do with where it is ranked in Google's. SEO has a lot more affect on Google's indexing of you video than it does on YouTube's. Google's index is a TEXT-based index, whereas YouTube's index is a HUMAN index. In other words, Google uses the text of the SEO to organize the indexing of where content shows up, and YouTube uses human interaction with the content to decide where to place it. So, while SEO may not affect much on YouTube, it does affect the Google index. This is true for all other search engines as well.
  3. You are not going to Game the system.
    1. Many people think that by manipulating SEO they are going to somehow "Game" the index. You need to understand that there are multimillion-dollar production studios out there with the best SEO experts on the planet doing SEO for their content and that is who you are directly competing with. The best thing you can do is create watch-worthy content.
  4. Create Watch-Worthy Content
    1. At the end of the day, the thing that will ultimately decide your success is whether people want to watch your content. We all have many passions, but you are creating content for other people, not yourself. You have to be honest with yourself. Watch your content and honestly ask yourself, "Would I choose to watch this if it was not mine?" If your first answer is NO, then figure out what you can do to improve your content to where you would want to watch it. People have less time than they have money. Their time is precious. Make sure you are respecting their time by creating content that has value for them to watch.
  5. More money does not equal successful Content
    1. Do not fall into the trap that if you spend more money, you will be more successful. You need to understand that when you become a content creator, you paint a target on yourself. There are thousands of people who are going to target you to try to get money out of you. They do not care if you become successful. They want to take advantage of your desire for success to suck as much money out of your pocket as possible. They will all SAY that if you just pay them, they will help you. However, if your content is not Watch-Worthy, no matter how much money you spend, it will never equal success, but all those marketers will gladly blow smoke in your face and empty your pockets anyways.
    2. The same is true for equipment. You need nothing more than a decent used smartphone you can buy off of eBay for less than $100 to be a super successful YouTuber. I started my channel with a Galaxy S2 and a $30 action camera back in 2014 The videos I produced with that phone and cheap action camera are some of my best-performing videos ever. I recently started a TikTok channel. My best-performing video is some crappy footage that was caught on a $45 trail camera, but my professional quality 4K footage that I produced with equipment costing thousands of dollars has gone nowhere.
  6. Reality Check! Don't quit your day job
    1. Understand that while many people may become wildly successful as a content creator, they are one out of a million. There are literally millions of people with the dream of "Making it Big", and 99.99% of them never will make enough money to justify even creating the content they make. In the US, the federal minimum wage is $11.25 an hour. If you are not making at least that, you are losing money and wasting your time (from an economic standpoint) as a content creator and you would make a lot more money flipping burgers at Burger King.
    2. My point here is to give you a reality check. Making it big as a content creator is not impossible, but it is lot like playing the lottery; it is not likely. Some people do win the lottery, but not many. So, go into this with your eyes wide open. Online content creation is a highly competitive market and everybody and their brother wants to Make it BIG doing it. So, go ahead and do it, but do it for passion and as a hobby, not for the money. If one day you strike gold, AWESOME! Just don't quit your day job until you do.

 
Last edited:

LiteL

New Member
9
4
8) Careful with adding external links too soon. I verified this with other new channel owners as well, but it still seems a bit random. Adding external links in your video description (amazon affiliate, etc) might cause the YT AI to not push your video. Granted this a good way to monetize your channel from day one, but I would wait until you have 50 or so videos, or maybe 100+ subs before doing this. I had shorts with under 50 views that had affiliate links in them. I deleted the video, removed the links, reuploaded the same video and started getting 1000s of views. Your results may differ, but this happened to me so much I stopped adding them.
Hopefully others will chime in with their own experiences. Maybe we can find some repeatable data to experiment with. Thanks in advance for anyone else commenting.
I mean if you have less than 100 subs, your not gonna get any conversions for your affiliates anyways
 
  • Like
Reactions: camille10

The Jungle Explorer

I should have been born 200 years ago!
TubeBuddy Pro
549
19
thejungleexplorer.com
Subscriber Goal
20000
YouTube and Google have different indexing systems. Your video's ranking in the YouTube index doesn't directly correlate to its ranking in Google's index. SEO primarily affects Google's indexing, as it relies on text-based factors to organize search results. On the other hand, YouTube's index is influenced by human interaction with the content. While SEO might not have a significant impact on YouTube's index, it does affect Google's index, as well as other search engines.

Wha....? You quoted me almost verbatim. Something fishing going on here.
 

Sophia Tell

New Member
6
3
That is very comprehensive! I like doing shorts, but take your point. I have 90 percent long form and use the shorts as funny videos. Interesting about the links. Thanks for sharing that!