Few things have had as much impact on the world as YouTube’s recommendation algorithm, yet few people understand how it really works. This bit of code serves more than 1 billion hours of video every day to people around the world, and understanding it is the key to building an audience for your brand or community.
We dove into the latest research and picked out the most useful information for brand builders looking to make the most of their marketing budgets on YouTube in 2021 and beyond.
A Brief History
The first thing to know is that the algorithm underwent major changes sometime in 2016. That was the year Youtube released a report that made waves across the internet, detailing plans to automate much of the recommendation engine using a form of machine-learning known as a Neural Network. A Neural Network loosely mimics the structure of the human brain to analyze thousands of training examples to learn and improve over time. In the case of YouTube’s Neural Network, billions of hours of data on how users engage with videos feed the system, leading to the right video at the right time for the right person. Before the modern-day machine-learning driven system, videos were ranked mostly on the number of clicks (2005-2012) or watch time (2012-2016), which led to mixed results for viewers.
Hootsuite breaks down the various elements that go into judging a video’s performance, with some of the most important including watch time, likes/dislikes, view velocity (how quickly it gains traction after posting), how new a video is, and how often a channel uploads new videos.
Where Marketers Can Drive Results
Brands should focus on the things they can control from day one. You can’t force people to watch your videos all the way through, but you can make them shorter if you see they aren’t being watched to completion. You can’t make people like your videos, but you can increase the chances of them being seen by posting on a regular cadence. What other behaviors does the algorithm reward that you can start doing today, regardless of subscriber count?
Don’t Skimp on the Copy. YouTube’s Creator Academy suggests that the description text for your video is one of the most important factors in rising to the top of search results and getting interested viewers to click in. Descriptions should include terms that your target audience is searching for, links to other content and social channels, and hashtags that will find people interested in adjacent topics. Another important attribute is making sure people know what they’re clicking on. If the description sets up the expectation that I’ll be learning about back-country camping, the video should not veer too far off into product placement or other topics.
Optimize for View Duration. Just like a great TV show or movie, you need to keep people interested until the end. Have something for people to look forward to or a compelling reason for people to stick around. Of course, the easiest way to increase your completion rate is to shorten the length of your videos. Hubspot found that the ideal time for YouTube videos is around two minutes, in terms of driving engagement and watch time.
Engage with Your Community. Diving into the comments builds valuable relationships with viewers, potentially converting them into subscribers, and also increases the engagement score for your video. Besides pleasing the algorithm, you’ll also learn more about the people you’re making content for in the first place. Comment sections can be wonderful sources of feedback and new pain points that your brand can solve for potential customers. Luckily it’s not as intimidating as it sounds and there are best practices for managing your comment section that can go a long way.
Measure and Adjust. Make the most of your data by understanding the core pillars of YouTube analytics. Beginning with the Overview report, you can see high level metrics like total views and watch time by video. You can also see how many people are watching in real time and how metrics change by audience. This last point can be especially powerful as you understand how a video performs differently with one group of buyers vs. another. Imagine finding out that your outdoors brand has an unexpected following in northern Italy. Your next video series might cover mountaineering in the Swiss alps or hiking through the Tuscan countryside to cater to this group and drive return purchases.
Be Consistent. Studies show that one of the most reliable ways to boost your brand’s traffic on YouTube is to post on a regular basis. What’s the right amount of time to post? Generally, more is better. But the honest answer is what you can genuinely commit to posting on a regular basis. Two weeks of daily posting followed by a week of silence is not preferable to a weekly video done over months. Consistency also relates to the topic of your channel. Channels with simple premises that stay relatively similar over time (First We Feast, Will it Blend?) tend to do well as audiences come to expect a certain style, cadence, and feeling from your content.
Keeping up with the volume of content needed to program a growing brand’s YouTube channel can be a real challenge for brand leaders and creatives alike. One way to keep up with demand, while generating more ideas more efficiently, is through a content creation platform like Tongal. Check out our case studies to see how brands like PayPal and NBCU have leveraged our community of 200K+ Creators to develop award-winning campaigns all over the world, across formats and channels.
