YouTube has been around for a fair number of years. However, it remains the powerhouse of social media. Businesses, content creators, even celebrities flock onto YouTube to grow their brand and gain as many subscribers as they can.
Let’s say you aim to expand your business and use YouTube as a marketing channel. You’ll ultimately need subscribers and high viewership to gain work in favour of the YouTube algorithm.
Alternatively, let’s say you wanted to earn an income directly from YouTube. To do this, you’ll need at least 1,000 subscribers to become a YouTube partner and even more so if you want to earn more money.
Bottom line, subscribers are the lifeline to your success on or off YouTube. Keep on reading to find out the nine ways you can authentically build an audience on YouTube.
1. Interact with Your Audience on Every Platform
Responding, liking, and commenting on viewer posts will help you establish a strong YouTube community. You can even return the favour and subscribe to their channel.
This communal spirit encourages your audience to subscribe and to continue to watch your content. But think bigger than just YouTube. Use your other social media platforms like Instagram and Facebook to promote and leverage your YouTube channels.
Chances are, if your audience enjoys your content on one platform, they’ll more than likely enjoy your content on your other social media channels as well. In the end, it’s a double win for you – you gain more YouTube subscribers and increase the traffic to your business.
2. Design a Stellar Channel Banner and Icon
To make a stellar first impression, consider the look and aesthetic of your entire YouTube channel. We’re not only referring to your video and thumbnails. How does your channel banner look? What does your channel icon look like? While these aspects may seem minor, neglecting them may leave viewers less impressed than they would be if you designed quality channel art.
Your channel banner does not need to be overly artistic – it just needs to align with your brand and look presentable. These visuals components elevate your professional presence on YouTube, so we highly encourage you to spend time on your channel art.
3. Use YouTube’s Clickable Subscription Tool
You can use visual cues in your video to entice and remind viewers to subscribe. Thankfully, YouTube allows you to do this in two ways: your brand watermark and end screen.
For a brand watermark, it’s a subscription button that appears directly on your video when you hover over your cursor. You can find it in the bottom right corner.
The end screen involves a final image that appears after your video. You’ll often see people place their previous videos here to entice viewers to watch and another subscribe section. If they’ve made it to the end of the video, this end screen will either prompt them to subscribe and/or watch your old content. Either way, it’s a win for you.
4. Ask Viewers to Subscribe
If it sounds straightforward, it’s because it is. You see almost every YouTuber do the same thing – “don’t forget to like and subscribe!”
There’s nothing wrong with embedding that message directly into your videos to remind viewers to subscribe to your channel. While it seems like a minor action to take, it can turn one-time viewers into lifetime followers.
5. Consistent Uploads
Subscribers want to hear and see new content from you. While the video quality is important, you need to implement a consistent upload schedule to gain a strong following.
Consistent uploads make your subscribers look forward to something and keeps them engaged. The more content you can produce and put out in the YouTube space, the more relevant you’ll be among viewers.
6. Collaborate with Other Creators
The classic cross-promotion tactic works in almost every marketing strategy – this includes YouTube. By collaborating with another YouTuber, their audience gains exposure to your platform and your work.
These viewers already trust you since they’ve been introduced to your through a YouTuber they trusted. As such, this tactic allows both YouTubers to benefit. Make sure to work with a creator within your niche or whose values align with yours.
7. Keyword Research
Thinking of SEO tactics may not be the most appealing part of running your YouTube channel, but it can do a world of wonders for your platform. When you understand the keywords viewers search for in your subject, you can intentionally title your videos accordingly.
We recommend utilizing keywords that have medium to high search volume but low video count. This means you won’t need to compete with other channels for viewership. Use these keywords in your title, description, and hashtags for the YouTube algorithm. Besides these benefits, keyword research can also inspire new video ideas!
8. Make Amazing Content
Like step #4, creating high-quality videos seems to be a given. However, it’s so important that it deserves its category. Investing time, energy and money into your YouTube videos seeps into the quality of your content.
You want your viewers to walk away from your videos gaining something. Whether it’s educational content, entertainment, or emotional value, this is one of the most important factors that pushes viewers to hit the subscribe button.
To be clear, creating successful YouTube channels doesn’t require a down payment. You can easily film videos from your phone and edit with basic editing software: as long as you provide value, that’s all that truly matters.
9. Eye-catching thumbnails
We all have fairly short attention spans. That’s why anything that can grab our attention immediately gains extra brownie points.
Thumbnails are the first thing that viewers come across and it plays a huge role in your channel branding. Your thumbnail can either steer others to scroll past your video or click on it as soon as they see it. We suggest using a consistent colour palette and font along with a high-quality thumbnail graphic.
Can’t I Just Buy Subscribers?
All the work required to grow your YouTube audience may prompt one big question; can I just buy subscribers? After all, it requires much less time and effort. While we understand the urge to gain as many subscribers as possible, buying subscribers may lead you to more trouble down the line. You may:
- Get banned from YouTube for their fake engagement policy
- Receive no engagement from subscribers (which doesn’t do much for your channel)
- A bad reputation from viewers and potential brands
If it sounds far too good to be, it’s probably because it is. After all, the time you spend plotting ways to cheat the system, you can use to create memorable and awesome content that naturally entices an audience.
Building a YouTube channel, let alone a successful YouTube channel requires a heightened level of patience and perseverance. However, using all or any one of the tips above will certainly put you at an advantage. And trust us, it’s all worth it when you witness the growth in your YouTube community.
