5 steps for an effective YouTube marketing strategy

Summary

Thanks to its huge diffusion and the richness of its tools, YouTube can be a useful tool for giving visibility to your business. Here are the 5 macro-steps to implement an effective YouTube Marketing Strategy:

1. YouTube analytics data
2. Competitive analysis
3. Optimization of channels and content
4. Channel promotion
5. Progress monitoring

Why YouTube?

By now, everyone knows that, after Google, YouTube is the most visited website in the world. On any kind of social network, users increasingly prefer video content. This evolution fuels and confirms the idea that YouTube is the perfect medium to focus on if you want to implement an efficient and effective marketing strategy. If only because of the large user base it offers, this makes it a perfect fit for both B2B and B2C marketing.

In this post, we’re going to go step by step and discover and analyze the actions companies need to take in order to exploit YouTube in the most correct way and to set up a solid YouTube Marketing strategy to conquer your audience.

A good starting point? If you don’t already have a YouTube channel, the first step is to open one!

Step 1: YouTube Analytics Data

Building and growing your channel isn’t easy. It takes time to bear fruit, to expand, and gather a following.

This is where YouTube Analytics is fundamental. It’s an essential tool for content creators. The YouTube Analytics tool allows the channel owner to collect useful information for optimizing tactics that conform to your user base.

There are three metrics that it takes into consideration:

• Interactions
• Viewing times and traffic
• Income

Your analytics can also be customized by manually entering the time periods that you want your analysis to cover, as well as in real time, so you can compare data.

But now let’s look specifically at the three metrics.

1.1 Audience Interactions

Interactions are the actions that subscribers take on your channel. Among likes, dislikes, and comments, to which it is always recommended to respond in order to increase engagement, shares are important. It means that in addition to appreciating the content, the user is ready to share it and recommend it to friends and acquaintances.

It is important to check not only the quantity of subscribers but also their growth or if they are decreasing, and take into account when it happens and which publications it corresponds to, because the two factors are probably connected.

It’s not only the quantity that counts: geographic location, age, gender, and preferences based on views can all give you an idea of your audience, what they like, and what they don’t like. This is where another element comes in handy.

1.2 Viewing Times and Traffic

YouTube Analytics provides comprehensive reports on the amount of time users spend on a given video, the number of views, audience retention, and where the traffic is coming from.

Where do the views come from? From the channel itself, through social sharing, from a playlist search, and from the platform board itself. What is the medium used? A smartphone, a tablet, a PC, a television.

What is the average viewing time of an uploaded video? You’ll be able to discover your audience’s favorite content, to understand their preferences, and to exploit this index of liking in your favor, creating quality content, and focusing on the first seconds of the video, which is when the user decides whether to continue watching or not.

1.3 Income

In this section, you can check where your income comes from. From transactions made for paid services, YouTube Premium subscriptions, and the number of times ads are shown in your videos. You can see how many ads there are in a single video and the monetized plays.

Not every video has ads, so the number of views may not necessarily match the estimated monetized plays.

Step 2: Competitor Analysis

A careful and conscious study of your competitors represents the first real source of inspiration for an effective YouTube Marketing strategy.

Researching possible competitors is the second phase of this path. Analyzing the trending videos of your industry, understanding their strengths and weaknesses, both on a technical level and on a more strategic level, is useful for growing your business.

Here are the aspects you’ll want to focus on: the content and its quality, the richness and structure of the channel, how competitors interact with their audience, and how they communicate on social media.

Step 3: Channel and content optimization

After you’ve gathered all the necessary information, you need to optimize your channel and content so that it’s “user-friendly.”

Complete your profile with a description, logo, curated graphics, and links to your website and social pages. The language you use to communicate is important.

3.1 Language and keywords

You need to pay close attention to text sections: titles should be catchy, meet SEO principles, and facilitate search through YouTube’s voice search system, using more informal language.

Users prefer to watch videos without audio, so the inclusion of subtitles and closed captions make it easier for viewers and it’s a great way to highlight important keywords.

Keywords are the words that you use to optimize your content. This can be done in two directions: through the SERP by searching for them on Google, or through tools that go deeper into the search and rank within the YouTube search engine.

3.2 Brand Awareness

Your channel and videos must be easily recognizable. The logo is your trademark and should be highlighted.

The presentation frames of the videos represent your business card. They must be recognizable and of high quality so that the user immediately understands the content and the main topic.

In addition to the presentation frames, the so-called end cards are also important. They are the final signs of a video that must be optimized in order to create a connection between the different content and to guide your users in navigating the channel.

CTAs (Calls To Action) should be present at the end of each video, inviting the user to subscribe, comment, share, and help the brand forge a more lasting bond with the audience.

Finally, there are Stories, which have been recently implemented by YouTube. Creators with over 10,000 subscribers can create short videos to which you can add filters, music, and text. They are visible for 7 days and can help diversify your content while establishing more direct contact with your audience, stimulating interaction.

3.3 The rest is creativity…

Alternate wisely with live, streaming, tutorials, and guides to offer your users a rich and complete content landscape and to avoid being repetitive.

Subdividing your content into playlists not only makes navigation easier, it also gives order and professionalism to your work.

And never forget the needs of your audience: knowing the habits of your audience gives you the opportunity to publish your content on predefined days and times, maximizing views and creating a mechanism of loyalty and expectation.

Optimizing each of these aspects facilitates and entices user research and facilitates ranking.

Step 4: Promote your channel

Properly promoting your content on YouTube is only part of the strategy you’ll need to implement. This must necessarily be accompanied by a cross-promotion with other channels. Let’s see which ones.

4.1 Social media

Spreading the word about your business is of primary importance. The presence on social media will allow you to reach a much wider audience. Depending on the social channels where you choose to promote your business, you’ll need a different approach for each one. However, it is important to create an overall unity and consistency that makes each feel part of the brand’s world. In addition, promoting the best-performing content on social will allow you to receive more visibility.

4.2 Influencer Marketing

Including partnerships with influencers who share your values is a big plus for your strategy. Influencer Marketing not only helps promote your YouTube channel, they will also give you access to a large and new portion of your audience that can come to you because of the trust placed in the influencer.

4.3 Using ads

Paid ads are an essential element of any strong and lasting marketing strategy. Here are some of the different types of ads :

• Display ads or video discovery ads: the kind of YouTube ads that appear on the right side of your video and above the list of suggestions, available only for desktop.
• Overlay ads: semi-transparent ads that can be found at the bottom of your video, also available for desktop.
• Bumper ads: an unskippable ad placed before your video, lasting up to 6 seconds and also available for mobile devices.
• Skippable video ads: can be placed before, during, or after the video; they last up to 3 minutes but are skippable after 5 seconds.
• Unskippable video ads: always have the same placement but unlike skippable ads, it will play at the end of the video and can last up to 20 seconds.

Investing in YouTube Ads is worthwhile, especially considering that paid advertising on the video platform is much cheaper than on other social media platforms. Check your most viewed content and move in that direction.

Step 5: Monitor progress and stay up to date

Once your channel is up and running, don’t forget to monitor your progress. You can use YouTube Analytics and other tools to receive comprehensive reports on your channel’s progress that take into account different metrics and over the time periods that you set.

Knowing which videos your users prefer will allow you to shape your content according to their preferences.

This also means staying on top of industry trends. Marketing is a dynamic industry, so it’s essential to stay aware of what’s new and leverage it for your channel.

Finally, don’t lose track of your competitors. Visit their channel and scroll through their comments to discover any mentions of your brand and remember to respond to any comments.

Monitoring your competition as well as yourself will allow you to not only grow professionally, but also build connections.