Eighteen million views, 62,000 subscribers, and a whole lot of YouTube mistakes later. You could say I’ve learned a lot in my first five years as a content creator on YouTube. If I had to restart my channel all over again, there are countless things I’d do differently. Things that would fast-track my growth and earn more revenue in less time. Looking back, I realize that the mistakes I made were normal. Additionally, almost all small creators are making the same mistakes. These are costing them thousands of views, subscribers, and ad revenue. In this article, I aim to outline the common YouTube mistakes that most small channels make. I’ll also show you how to rectify them to help your channel grow and expose your videos to new audiences.
The YouTube Mistakes You’re Making
When I was growing my channel from the ground up, I found it incredibly frustrating that I felt like the quality of my content was equal to or better than that of the larger pages in my niche. Yet, my videos were getting a fraction of the views. Yes, high-quality content does play a factor in viewer retention and subscriber rates. However, you’ll see diminishing returns once your setup and video editing skills reach a certain point. For that reason, I would recommend not focusing your energy on improving the production quality of your videos. Instead, I would recommend spending time considering the topics, titles, and thumbnails you use.
YouTube has been around for over 20 years. Nearly every topic imaginable has been covered by a creator at some point. All of the broad and basic topics have been covered hundreds of times. Thus, creating a video covering a broad topic often will result in a video that flops. However much it may seem like it would garner massive viewership. This is because the YouTube algorithm tends to show high-performing videos at the top of each search. This sets up videos that perform well to continue to perform well. This makes it difficult to create videos on these broad topics that will get hundreds of thousands of views, since it’s very challenging to crack the top couple of videos, which is where you need to be in the search results if you want to get great viewership.
The Two Most Important Things in Avoiding YouTube Mistakes
Finally, if you’re focusing on high-yield topics that aren’t in an already overcrowded space, optimizing your thumbnail and title are two of the most important things you can do. Most new creators make the mistake of making their titles and thumbnails too basic. Let’s get into how to create titles and thumbnails that will help you get thousands of views!
Crafting Titles that Convert
The title and thumbnail of your video are two of the most important aspects of getting more viewership on your videos. Go to your YouTube homepage and notice both the titles and thumbnails of the videos you see. Your homepage is full of high-performing videos that YouTube is showing you, that is catered to each individual differently. If you want to capture massive viewership that leads to more subscribers, you need your video to appear on this page for as many people as possible.
If you looked at the videos on your homepage and saw the titles “How to Shoot in Manual Mode for Photographers” and “The Pro Secret for Perfect Exposure”, you would be more likely to click on the latter. This is because it creates curiosity that you must know what the pro secret is. With the first title, you know exactly what the video is going to cover, but you aren’t left feeling like you have to know what it is. The second title, especially when paired with an effective thumbnail, almost forces you to watch the video because it piques your curiosity.
YouTube Mistakes in Real Time
Trust me, this isn’t just my opinion. You can see the results in real time with videos on my own channel. Two of my most popular videos are titled “The Best Export Settings for Lightroom Classic” and “The RIGHT Way to Organize Photos in Lightroom Classic”. These two topics are not only things people may be searching for in my niche, but also they generate interest because you feel like you have to know what the best export settings are and what the right way to organize your photos is. Alternatively, two of my worst-performing videos are titled “3 Winter Photography Tips” and “Essential Waterfall Tips and Tricks”. If I could go back, I would change these titles to “The Pro Secret to Stunning Winter Images” and “This Trick Changed my Waterfall Images Forever”. These two titles are much better and would result in more clicks.
Creating Thumbnails that Convert
The thumbnail you use for your video is even more important than the title. While the title generates interest and can work together with the description to help you appear when someone searches, the thumbnail is what really generates clicks. The biggest mistake I made when first starting was using the same text on my thumbnail as I used in the title. If possible, allow your thumbnail to show something other than the title of the video. Research also shows that thumbnails including a person in them can help lead to more clicks, so while it isn’t necessary to show your face every time, I highly recommend you do so occasionally. This can also help viewers to recognize your videos quickly when put beside numerous other videos.
In this example, I released a video covering some of Lightroom Classic’s best tips for using masking tools. I titled the video “The Lightroom Masking SECRET You Aren’t Using” and then used this thumbnail. Both the thumbnail and the title of the video cause you to be curious about what that secret is, so it helped to generate more traffic to my video. Your thumbnail never lives on its own, so don’t feel like you have to describe the topic of the video in complete clarity in the thumbnail. Instead, use it as a hook to get viewers interested.
Final Thoughts
There is definitely a lot to think about when it comes to growing your YouTube Channel, and there are numerous ways to increase your viewership. After five years of content creation, adjusting my strategy on titles and thumbnails was the single most important change that led to instantly more views and subscribers, and it’s a change that costs you nothing and can be implemented overnight. Give it a try, see how it works for you, and best of luck on your content creation journey!
