You’re starting a Youtube channel!!! Congratulations! It takes a lot of guts to put yourself out there… I procrastinated for years before I finally started my channel. Youtube is a ton of fun and so rewarding, but it’s also a lot of hard work and can be discouraging for beginning youtubers when your numbers aren’t growing the way you want them to. While there is not “fastpass” to Youtube success, following these tips can help to grow your channel and avoid spending unnecessary resources on things that won’t help!
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It’s Not Worth it for Beginning Youtubers to do giveaways
You see someone who does a giveaway and gains thousands of subscribers and you think “Hey, I could do that!” And you could. But don’t. Trust me. Giveaways boost your subscriber count and can increase views for the duration of the giveaway (if you offer extra entries for watching your videos,) but the engagement drops off as soon as the giveaway ends. I learned the hard way that all of those extra subscribers will likely never return to your channel again. Even worse, they might only return to unsubscribe when they don’t win. It’s beyond discouraging to watch your sub count and views tank after a period of rapid growth. As beginning Youtubers, your resources are much better spent buying new equipment (I recommend these softbox lights
Videos with Coupon Codes Do Better
Offering your viewers coupon codes is a great way to thank them for stopping by your channel and earn some credit at your favorite stores! You don’t have to have a brand ambassador agreement to get coupon codes for some sites. I offer my subscribers 10% off their first Glossier purchase, 20% off their Aerie purchase, and $13 off at FeelUnique. The videos where I use these coupon codes get significantly more views and I earn store credit at some of my favorite stores. I can then use this credit to do reviews and haul videos!
Promote Your Videos Differently on Different Social Channels
I watched this video, which had this amazing (if blunt) advice: no one is searching for you. Respect the different social platforms you promote on by differentiating your images on each. I like Canva for creating images for Pinterest. For Facebook, it’s best to remove the link preview on your post and attach the thumbnail photo so that it doesn’t get cropped. Put your links in your Instagram bio instead of the caption. You can embed your video directly into Tumblr (and be sure to use tags!)
Tags, Tags, Tags
Speaking of tags, go listen to this podcast. It details why tags are soooo important to your videos, and how you should be tagging your content. A few helpful hints: tag your full title, each word of your title individually, the name of the series that the video is part of, and any products you use. Your title and tags should work together to tell Youtube what your video is about and which searches it should appear in.
Join a Facebook Group
Facebook groups like this one and this one can help your get feedback on your content and advice from more successful influencers. Not only will you learn a ton, but interacting with other members of the group can be loal subscribers, viewers, collab partners, and friends! It’s important to have a support group of women who can all bolster you up when you are feeling discouraged.
Did you find these tips for beginning YouTubers helpful? Do you have any advice to beginning YouTubers to add? Let me know in the comments below!