 So you just started your new YouTube channel. You want to get subscribers. You want to get eyes on your videos. We're going to go over some strategies of how to do that here on the journey. All right, so you're an entrepreneur who's finally decided to start investing in YouTube. We all know video is just a powerhouse, right? Definitely. About 33% of all online activity is spent watching videos. I know I watch a lot. Do you? I watch it basically the whole day. Exactly. Even in the US, an estimated 85% of all US audiences are on the internet watching videos. But of course, if you're watching this, you already knew that. Right, so we're not going to sell you on the merit of video. Instead, we're going to talk through different strategies to increase your YouTube subscribers. So in getting more subscribers, you want to make sure you have a channel. So you want to first, of course, create your channel. Think of focusing on something unique and an engaging experience, making, for instance, an icon that's identifiable, unique, and recognizable. Yeah, definitely. And within your channel, there's a place to create a trailer. Now this trailer is typically 30 to 60 seconds that will essentially tell your potential subscribers, even existing subscribers, what it is that you do and what you stand for. So when creating your trailer, we recommend basically creating a little bit of a highlight reel of all your best content. Because this is typically what people are going to see first when they come to your channel. Now Brian Dean of Backlinko has a bit of an acronym that he uses to basically create that killer channel, and that's called Top. So starting with T, that's your target audience. So when you basically introduce who you are and what you do, talk to your target audience. If you create killer content for service-based providers, introduce them and talk to them directly. That way, when they see your video and they hear it, they're like, OK, cool, this is for me. So they feel like they're included. Absolutely. And then O is your origin story. What makes you unique? What is it about you that's really going to compel your audience and what's that story look like? Then lastly with Top is P, and that's for your pitch. With any of your videos, especially your trailers, you really want to basically just give a pitch, whether that is to subscribe to your channel, watch the first video, whatever that looks like, have a pitch in your video. It's your call to action. All right, now that you've created your channel, you want to start thinking about how you can customize your page. For instance, you can have a unique header. So for me, I'm a public speaker, so I may want to have something where I'm talking. See people, see me on stage. But then also, another very important about who I am is my wife. So have a nice picture of her and I together. So it shows people how unique you are. Also, different things on your page can be moved around. Your playlist, you can have some of your most unique and intriguing videos at the top to encourage people to click on those as well. Yeah, ultimately, you want to be very strategic about what you do with your page, since many people go to your page first to see what you are and what you do. So you want to have basically pictures of what you're doing, those most prominent videos, everything there strategically. So next is writing a channel description. It's just the opportunity to tell them a little bit more about yourself. It's like a bio. You talk about who you are, what you stand for, what you're going to be talking about. And you can even put some calls to action. You can add links to your other social media or maybe a website. So next is your channel description. Now, this is your opportunity to give you a little bio about who you are. Also, you can add a call to action, like going to your different social media links or even your website. Yeah, a pro tip with your About page or your description here is also talk about how you help that visitor, right? It's not always about me, me, me. It's really what can they get from your channel? So in the same vein of answering pain points, you want to make sure that your videos are optimized to actually speak to those. Making sure to know that YouTube is a search engine first. So YouTube wants to make sure that its users are finding relevant information for whatever they're typing in. So another tip is making sure that your titles have certain keywords that are searchable, meaning what is your audience searching for? Put that into your title of your video and your descriptions. Yeah, and YouTube actually makes it pretty easy. So if you start typing in your keyword or topic, it'll try to basically give you a bunch of suggestions on what it thinks you're going to end with. So your title could essentially be that because that's what other people are searching for. So another little tip, add a transcript. It may be a little easier for some of your audience to just read through or also some of your audience could be speaking a different language. This makes it a lot easier for everyone across the board. Other things to add are thumbnails and also, what would you say, Nellie? Yeah, definitely make sure your description is on par. Add some content there in case they want to get the synopsis of the video itself and have a call to action in that video. But you mentioned thumbnails, so what a lot of people struggle with is they'll create their video and then try to capture a thumbnail from within the video. It's really hard to do. Maybe you're making some weird, awkward faces. I know I do when I talk. So what I would recommend doing is take a separate photo for your thumbnail and then use that. Don't just try to grab one from the video itself. Pro tip. So building YouTube subscribers is all about building connection with them. So the way to do that is to actually respond to each and every comment that you get. Yes, definitely. And on top of that, take the opportunity to actually keep the conversation going. It's more than just saying, hey, thanks for leaving a comment or thumbs up emoji. Ask questions, make it conversational, let that person know that you are really interested and you're appreciative that they reached out and left you a comment. That's going to be beneficial to let people know that you care about them and also encourage people to continue to subscribe. So if you think about some of the YouTube channels that you watch, even if they're super popular, if you've added a comment, has that person ever replied back to your comment? How did that make you feel? You could essentially do the same thing with your fans. As we said, subscribers are people too. Well, this might sound counterintuitive, but we do recommend you actually go on other people's channels and other people's videos and add comments and add comments to other people's comments and continue those conversations and show that you're an authority in the field. Somebody has a question that they asked and no one's answered yet and you know the answer, give them the answer, right? Or just have some value to that conversation and keep it going because they're gonna see someone else comment on that post and go, hey, who is this person, right? They'll maybe check out your channel and then find out that you do X, Y and Z that helps them and now you got that new subscriber. Exactly and another tip is competition, no, collaboration. Don't think of actually helping someone else out as you're just helping out your competition, but think of it as a way as introduction to potentially collaborating with that creator and you're both able to grow your audiences at the same time. Yeah, there's definitely that cross promotion aspect there. Now the next thing you need to do to really boost your YouTube subscribers is to use your video real estate. This is everything from the end screens to the watermarks, all the way to those info cards up above. Oh, look there, oh yeah. The real estate on your video can be a useful place to entice people to subscribe. So don't remember the watermarks, info cards while you're creating these videos. And also the end screen is a good pop-up that happens over your video that can also entice them to subscribe or click on other videos to view later. Yes, and when you go ahead and add those videos on, make sure whatever video you're recommending them to watch is similar to the video that they've just watched. That's a good point. They're watching something on how to increase their YouTube subscribers like this. Cool, make something next video, something about YouTube, not about digital marketing strategies for your website. It just doesn't make sense. It's not that good transition that you're gonna want. Truly entice them to keep watching. So next, ask for subscriptions. Speaking of, subscribe now if you haven't already. The time for subtly is gone. You have to let people know what you want them to do. So asking for subscriptions is completely normal. Yeah, and our attention spans are nothing, right? I know it's bloody all over the place, but 20% of people actually balance 10 seconds into the video. So you wanna have those call to actions early and then also at the end of the video, subscribe now. So next tip, use social media. It's great to be able to cross promote on other channels like Facebook, Twitter, but do know those sites don't necessarily like for other links taking you off of those pages because just like YouTube, they want people to stay on the platform. But do know, native video is actually encouraged. So instead of just sharing a simple link on a Facebook post, you wanna share some of your own native video from your YouTube video on that post. Say your video is say 10 minutes long, a good two to three minute segment of that video in that post and in the caption, then share the link. Yes, we said they don't like links, but having that native video will still help out with your organic reach and encourage people to click on that link to see the full video. Yeah, and it'll definitely entice them, especially if you're creating killer content. They'll see the first two to three minutes and they're like, wait, I do wanna see more, so they'll click that link and they kinda counterbalance each other, right? It hurts if you link off, but it also helps if you add those native videos so it washes out. Figuring out how to really grow your YouTube channel and subscribers takes a ton of time and commitment, but I promise you it's worth it. Well, that's a wrap. You just learned how to increase your YouTube subscribers. Make sure you like this video and share it with someone. And hey, subscribe and ring that bell to see these episodes. First, this is The Journey. We'll see you next time.