What Makes a Video Go Viral? – Making Viral Videos on Your YouTube Channel

Today we are talking viral videos!

We all want them!

So let’s break it down!

What makes a video go viral? Can a YouTube creator make a video go viral?

The answer is maybe

The best way to create a viral video is to make great content, title it correctly, create an eye catching thumbnail and then share it all over social media. 

 But even then, there are no guarantees.

That said, I have had many of my videos go viral and usually, I did nothing special to make it happen.

 Videos go viral on YouTube when lots of people share the video. 

 It starts taking off and you really don’t know why.

Sometimes a video gets a boost when something is trending and if your video is related, it can get a boost, too. 

Other times, an older video gets discovered and then you realize that stats are off the charts! 

That’s always fun!  

You just can’t predict what will go viral.  It’s a like a singer writing a song that they hope will become a hit

You can try, but only the people and their preferences, clicks and watch time can make a video go viral.

But keep going anyway! You’ll get there!

Do you have any topics you would like me to address? Just send me an emailand let me know!

I’d love to hear from you!

 

Understanding Click Through Rate – CTR for YouTube

If your channel is struggling to grow, check on your CTR  or Click-Thru-Rate on your videos and channel as a whole. This will give you important information on how to make improvements.

It’s not hard once you understand…

You can find your Click Through Rate on YouTube Analytics in your YouTube Studio, on both your channel and your individual video analytics.

They can be found under the menu – Reach.

You see…

YouTube shows your video in various places, through search, on your channel page, suggested videos and browsing.

The impressions are how many times the video has been shown and the click though rate or CTR is the percentage of how many people have clicked on your video.  C-T-R

Average CTR for YouTube is around 4-5%. 6% and above is good and under 3% is not so great.

 Understanding how videos show up on search is by creating keyword rich titles. Google is a search engine.

 So if your title isn’t descriptive enough, that is a problem. The other consideration is the thumbnail.

The thumbnail must be enticing and clearly demonstrates the topic of your video.

If you do not have custom thumbnails or you have thumbnails that are too busy, too many words or subject matter doesn’t match the title, you will see that in the CTR.

But with all that, sometimes some videos just aren’t as popular as others.

YouTube success is about understanding and learning how to improve not only your videos but creating thumbnails and titles as well.

Keep learning and growing!

How to Create & Use YouTube Clips ✂️ to Share on Social Media

Some people just don’t want to invest in watching a longer video..

So now YouTube has created clips you can share, just like a movie trailer to entice people to watchmore of your video.

YouTube has created a new feature where you can create short clips of your favorite videos to save and share to social media and embed or link on email.

This feature is available for all users and not just for YouTube creators. Anyone can create a clip on any video.

When the clip has been created, it will be saved under a menu in the YouTube interface. You will see it on the left hand menu over Watch Later.

It looks like a scissor ✂️ and says Your Clips. All your clips will be saved there.

To create a clip, go to the video you want to create a clip for, go into the video and find the general area that you want to clip and then click the scissor icon ✂️ at the bottom of the YouTube player, right next to the Save button.

From there, you can take the window box and move it around to define your ideal clip, usually 30-60 minutes in length.

Once you define it, you need to make a title and then press  Save.

Here is the clip I created in the tutorial video below, so you can see how it looks and how it points to the original video.

You can then share on social media from the pop-up box or you can share later because your clips will be saved for you.

The nice thing about sharing clips is that the clip will guide people to the full length video. Because some people need a sample before they want to commit to the whole video.

It’s another great option for sharing on social media!

How to Add Chapters to Your YouTube Videos – Using Timestamps

Want to keep people watching your longer content?

Learn how to add chapters to your videos!

 Chapters are a fairly new feature for YouTube.

If your video has several topics or talking points, you can separate them into chapters.

The benefit of chapters is that people can quickly find the information that they are looking for.

Chapters help people see what topics are coming up.  They will more likely to keep watching if they know what’s coming.

And last of all, chapters can help your video’s SEO – Search Engine Optimization.

 Google is connected to YouTube and they use the same search engine.

SEO helps your videos get found in the search. The more keywords in your titles and descriptions (and chapter titles) the higher your score will be for those key words!

You create chapters by putting in timestamps in the video description.

Follow along with me in the video so you can see how easy it is to create chapters.

It does take some time but once you get the hang of it, it’s really great for managing your content and keeping people watching.

 

Keep on keeping on!

 

How to Go LIVE on YouTube – Beginner’s Guide for a Successful Livestream

You only need to have at 50 subscribers to go live on your desktop but you need 1K subs to go live on your mobile device.

 Weird, I know, right? 

Once you have 50 or more subs, you can go live on your desktop.

Going live is a great way to build your community. When you go live, people can ask you questionsin the chat and you can answer them in real time.

I suggest that you create a topic that your subscribers would like to talk to you about but also a topic that will do well in the search after it’s finished.  

You can set up your live stream in advance so you can publicize your live and get people exited and energized before the event.

The way you do it,  is you schedule your live for your preferred date and create a custom thumbnailand description.  It’s best to schedule it one to two weeks out so you can build momentum.

Follow along with me as I show you how to set and schedule your live.

 YouTube lives work a little differently than lives on social media but the community building aspects are great.

Your subscribers and fans would love to interact with you on your live.

Make it your goal to get to the 50 subscribers benchmark so you can use this amazing tool!

 

Until next time,