How to Get More YouTube Views: 8 Steps with Examples

Marketers who use YouTube are usually keen to reach the widest audience possible. After all, the more YouTube views you get, the more exposure.

While they’re not the only metric that determines the success of your YouTube marketing, generating a decent number of views for your videos is something that you should definitely try to achieve. After all, there’s no point uploading a video if nobody is going to watch it, especially your target audience, right?

Perhaps you’ve got doubts about YouTube, and I understand that. I mean, who wants another platform to master creating content for? However, it makes absolute sense for your business to get on YouTube if you haven’t already.

YouTube attracts 2.6 billion global monthly users. Now, I can’t guarantee your success, but with such a vast audience from all walks of life, it’s likely that some of your target market will visit the platform. You might as well meet them there.

If you need some more convincing, what about this research? Google found that 40 percent of consumers bought a product they found on YouTube.

However, just posting content isn’t enough; if you’re not getting YouTube views, you’re wasting your time. Without views, you’re missing fresh opportunities to engage with your audience (incidentally, this article has some tips if you want some quick wins to increase engagement).

In this post, we’re going to take a look at tactics that you can use to get more views on YouTube.

We’ll cover some of the fundamentals to help you over the long term and some unique tactics that you can implement to generate quicker results with your target audience.

By the end of this post, you’ll have a high level of confidence in knowing what needs to be done to generate more YouTube views.

What Counts as YouTube Views?

Before moving on, there’s something I must clarify: what counts as a YouTube view?

Here’s what you need to know: YouTube views depend on someone watching a video for at least 30 seconds.

Another key note is that the viewer needs to have intentionally initiated the video viewing. For example, they’ve clicked through to it.

Rewatching a video also counts towards YouTube views, provided the video is watched for 30 seconds.

Now that you’re clear on that, let’s move on to some tips to start attracting viewers.

Great Video Content Gets More YouTube Views

It’s the golden rule on any platform, and applies here too. If you want more YouTube views, then you must publish great content.

Sure, you could just upload a video that doesn’t offer any major takeaways and press ‘publish’. That would get your content out there, but it wouldn’t be share-worthy, so why bother?

What makes excellent content?

• First, you need engaging and exciting visuals, like high-quality footage or creative animations. Whatever you choose, make sure it’s eye-catching and holds viewers’ attention. For help with creating professional-looking videos, there are plenty of tools available, like InVideo.
• Second, consider your audio quality. No one wants to listen to a video with muffled or distorted sound. Make sure your voice is clear and easy to understand and that any background noise is kept to a minimum.
• Finally, think about the overall story you’re trying to tell with your video. Is it informative? Entertaining? Inspiring? What do you want to convey? Whatever it is, make sure your video is well-organized and flows smoothly from beginning to end.

If you can do that, generating more views for your videos becomes a heck of a lot easier. For one thing, the better your videos are, the more likely people are to share your videos on social media.

Since I don’t know your business or your audience, I can’t tell you precisely what you should be doing to create amazing videos, and I can’t promise you thousands of YouTube views.

I can tell you this: awesome content provides exceptional levels of value.

It’s important that you don’t get caught up in the wrong things when looking to create great content to get more YouTube views.

People often worry about content length and production quality.

Sure, the content length might matter to a certain extent. However, are you really going to stop watching a 1-hour video if it’s providing immense value? Probably not.

In fact, it’s worth remembering that the average length of a YouTube session of 29 minutes and 37 seconds.

Value trumps everything for search results, especially high production quality, and if you offer quality, people keep watching. Here’s an example:

The video below ranks near the top in YouTube search results for ‘how to build a website,’ runs for over two hours and has attracted 2.5 million views and counting.

So remember, content length isn’t something that you should obsess over on this social network.

Step 1: YouTube Views Don’t Depend on Video Production

An increasing number of companies are investing in YouTube. Often, these businesses create highly produced, glossy videos, but you don’t necessarily have to take the approach.

You see, if you’re publishing quality content, YouTube is generally pretty forgiving: your videos don’t need to be perfect. When your videos start to get some traction, that’s the time to think about investing in fancy production and camera equipment to help you get more YouTube views.

However, to begin with, just make sure that you cover the basics. For example, if you’re creating a:

• ‘talking head’ video, ensure everything is well-lit and the audio is clear.
• screen capture video, ensure that the resolution is high and the audio is easy to hear.
• slideshow, create something simple and visually engaging. Use strong images and minimal text on your slides. You can use a tool, like Haiku Deck, for this. A custom thumbnail also helps people remember your brand.

Step 2: For More YouTube Views, Focus on Value Above All Else

Remember, providing value should be your guiding principle when it comes to getting YouTube views.

If you want to learn how to provide value, you have to learn more about your audience and, more specifically, what they like. You may be wondering how you find the type of content that appeals to your target market. It’s simple: Just look at content in your niche.

There are a few approaches you can take.

The first is to take a look at blog posts that have done well in your niche. Then, create incredibly informative videos based on those blog post topics.

You can find such blog posts using Buzzsumo. Just enter your keyword, press search, and you’ll get a wealth of ideas.

Alternatively, you can look at other YouTube videos that have done well in your niche and create better videos. If your competitors have a YouTube channel, look at the type and frequency of content they are putting out.

If you’re an expert in your niche, then it shouldn’t be hard to create high-quality videos when using other videos as inspiration.

However, if you find yourself struggling, take a moment to assess what could have been done to improve the other video. For example:

• Did it ignore something that was actually important?
• Did the video fail to explain certain sections fully?
• Did the video fail to provide actual results/case study information?
• Was the pace too slow or too fast?
• Was there too much information on the screen, or not enough?
• Could diagrams have been used to illustrate a point better?
• Maybe you could’ve included some data?

Check out the comments section, too. Other viewers’ opinions are often extremely revealing, and they’ll say if they felt the video was lacking something and could have been better in some way.

Finally, why not use the YouTube Search engine to help you come up with content ideas?

Say I’m in the business of teaching people ‘how to build a pond’ or building it for them, and I’m looking to do some content marketing.

I can just type ‘how to build a pond’ into the ‘YouTube Search box,’ and let the YouTube algorithm and Autosuggest do the rest.

Not all of the ideas are relevant, so I might select the first option and see what else comes up as a result of ‘Autosuggest.’

If I go with the option of ‘how to build a pond in your backyard,’ I’m presented with some helpful ideas.

I can then repeat that process, using other keywords, if I want to come up with even more video ideas.

It might also be a good idea to cycle through the alphabet after having chosen a ‘base’ keyword.

This time, I type in ‘how to build a pond a’

As you can see, plenty of video ideas here look relevant. I can use those to create super niche video content that resonates with a certain demographic in the social media platform.

If you have an existing audience on YouTube, consider asking your audience what they’d like you to cover next.

More often than not, your audience provides you with ideas that you can use.

The great thing about these video ideas is that by acting on them, you can be sure that there is an audience for them.

If you have done a good job of creating great content that meets people’s needs, you’ll find that organic views will be easier to come by. This is because a recent change to YouTube’s algorithm means authoritative content, viewer satisfaction, personalization, and the video’s performance are all important ranking signals.

Therefore if your videos produce a great user experience, there’s a good chance that they perform better in the rankings, too.

Step 3: Optimize Your Videos to Get More YouTube Views

Optimizing your video can help ensure it appears when and where it should; this includes the search listings and the ‘related video’ suggestions.

If you want to optimize your video, there are four things that you must take care of.

• Title
• Tags
• Description
• Thumbnail

It’s easy to over-complicate this and over-analyze everything, but keep it simple and focus on the four areas above.

Step 4: Write Better YouTube Titles

For the title, it’s essential that you don’t use clickbait-style headings. Inevitably, if the content of the video doesn’t reflect the title, you’ll get a ton of disappointed viewers.

If you’ve created your video around a keyword, ensure that your title clearly explains that your video covers the subject in question.

For example, if I created a video based on the key phrase ‘how to bake a chocolate cake for beginners,’ my title might be…

How to Bake a Chocolate Cake for Beginners – Spent $5 and 5 Minutes cleanup

Note: If you want to write great titles, you might want to work out what your audience doesn’t like or its fears about the topic.

In the example above, people might worry that it costs a lot to bake a cake and that cleaning up is a pain. The video becomes much more enticing if I address that in the title.

Step 5: Use YouTube Tags

For the tags, provide some keywords related to your video’s topic. If we continue with the ‘chocolate cake’ example above, our YouTube tags might look something like this:

Try not to use more than 10-12 tags per video. You’ll lose your target audience and dilute search results data.

Picking the right tags helps your video appear in the ‘suggested videos’ section when someone is watching a related video.

Now, let’s take a look at the description.

Step 6: Create an Accurate, Optimized YouTube Description

When writing the description, it’s vital that you don’t try to ‘outsmart’ Google. In other words, don’t stuff keywords, and don’t rely on any ‘tricks,’ that you might come across.

You could end up over-optimizing your video, which can have the opposite effect.

Your aim with the description is to clearly detail what the video is about and what people learn from watching it.

If you look at the top results returned for a YouTube video search, you can see that there is a wide variation in terms of what the descriptions look like.

That’s because, as mentioned above, user experience also plays a big role in ranking the video; While your description is important, don’t get too stressed out about getting it ‘right.’

That being said, key areas to focus on include putting your link at the top of the video, getting a keyword in the first 25 words, including it 3-4 times, and trying to stick to that 250 word count range.

Here’s what an example description looks like.

However, as I said, the top-ranking videos all tend to have varying styles that they use for their description. You don’t necessarily have to follow what is above.

Just provide the story behind your video, what it covers, and what people will learn as a result of watching.

Note: If you want to do something that will improve user experience, consider providing ‘timestamps’ in your description so that people can quickly get to interesting sections of a video.

Step 7: YouTube Thumbnail Optimization

For the thumbnail, there are a number of approaches that you can take. I’ve covered how you can create engaging YouTube thumbnails in this post. A custom thumbnail becomes part of your media platform branding.

For the most part, you can experiment with the following.

1. Use images of people in your custom thumbnail
2. Edit your thumbnail to include text overlay using a keyword based on the topic your video covers
3. Include an image that reveals an interesting section of the video – for example, the end result of a ‘how-to video.’

You will tend to find that you’re able to generate the best results when you combine some of the above.

Here’s an example of how you can use an interesting image and relevant text overlay.

As you can see, the custom thumbnail isn’t overly dramatic. It includes some text, related to the video keyword and an image of an interesting section of the video.

Here’s an example of using the image of a person, with text overlay and even possibly the ‘end result’ that is to be achieved, too.

You’ll want to experiment here, of course. But those two examples and the tips provided should be enough to let you know what tends to work well.

Step 8: Experiment With Ads to Drive YouTube Views

Ads might sound like a little bit of a cop-out here. I get it; you might not want to pay to play the YouTube views game.

However, running YouTube Ads is one of the best ways to generate the right views for your videos.

YouTube Ads let you target your ideal audience and make sure they find out about your video.

It takes a lot of the guesswork out of the whole process on this social media platform.

Running ads allows you to get real-time feedback on how good your video is, speeding the process of working out whether or not you have an engaging video on your hands.

If you find that people are watching your video to the end and sharing it a lot, then you know you’re on the right track in terms of the strategy that you’re using to actually create videos.

Where to begin?

Note: I’ve covered, in detail here, how you can create YouTube Ads.

When it comes to YouTube, there are essentially two kinds of ads that you can run.

1. Ads that appear before or while people are watching YouTube videos, or ’Instream Ads.’
2. Ads that appear in the YouTube Search listings or Search Listing Ads.

I recommend that you experiment with both.

Using YouTube Search, find videos in your niche that are related to your specific video topic and jot down their URLs.

Then, target those videos using the placements option.

Let’s say that I was starting a business that taught people how to bake, and I’ve just created a video based on ‘how to bake a cake.’

I head over to YouTube and type in ‘how to bake a cake.’

I then note down the URLs of these videos in a Google doc.

I then enter these URLs when setting up the targeting for my ads.

Of course, not all of the videos listed have ‘monetization’ enabled, meaning that you can’t show ads on all of them.

However, if you start with a list of 10-15 videos, you should have good delivery to your target audience.

If you want to target within the YouTube Search listings, then you obviously need some keywords to target.

To find relevant keywords, use the YouTube search box, then:

• Enter a keyword that explains what your video covers. Then, write down other relevant keywords that are provided by ‘autosuggest.’
• As you can see below, if I enter ‘how to bake a cake,’ I’m presented with relevant keywords worth targeting.

I’ve highlighted some that are potentially worth my while.

Note: The assumption here is that I’m teaching people how to bake a simple cake. That is why I’ve chosen those somewhat basic keywords.

If I want even more relevant keywords to target, I just select one of the ideal keywords and then press the ‘spacebar.’

And I’m presented with even more keywords to target.

As I mentioned above, you can also cycle through the alphabet to find other relevant keywords.

Then, I just need to note these keywords in a Google Doc and input them when setting up my ad targeting.

Step 9: Promote Your YouTube Video Everywhere

Just because you’ve created a YouTube video doesn’t mean that you can now only promote it on YouTube.

Post links for your YouTube content to your other digital assets, including your email list, your Facebook page, and other social media sites.

If you know of some influencers who might find your video useful, you may even want to let them know via email that you’ve created something they might enjoy.

Consider posting a link or snippet in your Instagram stories.

Don’t be afraid to let the world know that you’ve got something new to offer.

Step 10: Increase YouTube Views By Building a Subscriber Base

You’ll also want to focus on building a subscriber base to get more YouTube views on future content.

If you can get subscribers, your videos will automatically get a good chunk of views as soon as you post them. If these views represent a good user experience, your video might also do a better job at ranking, too.

Here, I’ve covered how you can get more YouTube subscribers.

Aside from creating good content, there are some key steps that you can take to get more subscribers.

At the beginning and end of your video, mention that subscribing helps get the video out to more people in your social network.

By actually saying it, people may be more inclined to take action.

You can also make an effort to create content consistently.

Creating more videos will ensure there are more ways for your content to be found. This, of course, can help improve your subscriber count.

It also gives people a reason to become subscribers, as they’ll want to know when you publish new content.

Note: If you can create ‘Evergreen content,’ then the content you create will pay dividends for a long time, as it will still be relevant for people in the future.

This means that the video will drive YouTube views and subscribers, long after its creation.

FAQs

Conclusion

For many, getting more YouTube views sounds complex and obscure.

Hopefully, you now have a better sense of how to get more viewers to your videos.

There are many avenues that you can go down. The most important step is to create good quality content about topics important to your viewers.

If you can take care of that, everything else you do to get more YouTube views will be much more effective.

Do you have any tips when it comes to generating more YouTube views? Share what works for you in the comments section.

How do you promote your channel to get more YouTube views?

Frequently Asked Questions

What are some of the benefits of an entrepreneurial mindset

Being entrepreneurial has many benefits. The first is your ability to be self-reliant. You can stop relying upon others.

This allows you to be your own boss and can allow you to follow your dreams. You can also build relationships with other entrepreneurs, as you share the same challenges and interests.

You gain confidence. You learn new things as an entrepreneur. This gives you the ability adapt quickly and to be flexible. Think outside the box to avoid getting stuck in a routine.

Our freedom to create our businesses is free from the restrictions imposed by society. We're free and able to decide what we do and how much we live.

You can choose to either follow the crowd or be against it. You can choose to succeed or fail. We can choose either to fail, or win.

It is exhilarating. This freedom comes with a lot of responsibility. Because you will be responsible for all that happens within your company when you assume this role.

So if you want to succeed, you must learn to manage risk. Don't be afraid to try new things. Your goal will be achieved if you are open to learning from your mistakes.

Keep these points in mind as you begin your journey.

Remember:

• Entrepreneurship is a lifestyle choice.
• If you own your own business, then you're the boss.
• Be careful of following fashion trends.
• Success isn't measured in money but rather in freedom.
• Your personal and professional lives must be balanced.
• Set clear expectations.
• Always be sincere with your team.
• It is important to remember that if something is to happen, it must be done.

What are the five essential factors of motivation for entrepreneurs?

Motivation is the key ingredient to success. Without it, nothing would happen. We wouldn't exist without it.

Motivational psychology studies the behavior of people when they are motivated. When motivated, we do amazing things. But it's also clear that there are limits to our motivation.

The five most important motivating factors are:

1. Autonomy - the freedom to choose
2. Mastery is the ability or capability to master certain skills
3. Purpose: The feeling of purpose
4. A feeling of belonging through the concept of relatedness
5. Reciprocity - the desire to give back

These motivators may be able to be applied to your company. In reality, however, each provides a slightly different perspective on why people act as they do.

A person may desire autonomy because he wants freedom and control over his life. Or perhaps he seeks mastery because he wants to become more skilled at his job.

So on. These are only a few examples of motivations. There are many more. What are the most appropriate for your particular situation? It all depends on you.

I would recommend writing down three words that describe your ideal job environment to help you determine this. Next, take these words and apply them in your current work environment.

If you're having difficulty coming up with ideas then ask yourself, "Why do I do this?" If you can't think of any ideas, ask yourself: "Why am I doing this?" This will help identify your goals.

Once you know what you want, you can begin to figure out where you stand right now. This knowledge will help you decide if you should make any changes.

If you don't want to change anything, then it's time to evaluate your options.

If you want to make changes, you need to think of ways to motivate you.

Which one of the above motivators will prove most effective? It is difficult to know. Instead of focusing solely on one factor instead, you should focus on all five.

This will help achieve your ultimate goal of being an entrepreneur.

What motivations are there for entrepreneurs?

Entrepreneurs can choose from three types of motivation. Each type has its unique set of strengths as well as weaknesses.

External motivation is the most popular form of motivation. This motivates people to earn more. This motivation often stems from financial concerns.

External motivation can be driven by personal passion, ambition, or desire. This type of motivation leads to people who are extremely goal-oriented.

The rarest form of internal motivation is the one that's more common. Internal motivation is far more rare than wealth. Individuals with it do not seek to be wealthy. Instead, these individuals pursue other goals, like self-development, fulfillment and service.

People with internal motivation often call themselves "passionate" because it is easy to find satisfaction in their work.

Finally, intrinsic motivation is the least popular type of motivation. Individuals who find enjoyment and satisfaction in working towards a specific goal are called intrinsic motivation.

Motivation from within is stronger than external motivation.

The inner motivation is intrinsic. It is based upon the belief that certain talents and abilities are inherent in people. They have the ability to do things no one else can.

It is satisfying and fulfilling to realize our potential and talents. We feel important.

We are happy when we have intrinsic motivation. That happiness comes from knowing that we can accomplish anything we put our minds to.

It is this feeling of accomplishment that keeps us going even when the going gets tough.

It's a fact that if you don’t love what you’re doing, then it's not worth doing.

Click here to find out more about entrepreneurial motivation.

How to motivate yourself as an entrepreneurial leader?

It is important to find someone who motivates you to do the things that you want to do. Ask someone who's working hard to reach his goals for how he achieved them.

Ask for help, listen, learn, and most importantly, keep it coming. Follow the example of someone who is successful.

Be the person you want to be. Learn from them. Take their lead. Follow their lead.

But above all keep pushing forward. Keep moving. Never stop learning. Never give up.

Never listen to anyone telling you that you're not capable. Do not let anyone tell your that you aren't capable of following a specific path.

Even though you may fail, that doesn't make it any less valuable. Failure can make you stronger. To learn more. To push harder.

Failure is just another step along the road to success.

Get started today! Get started today and you will be closer to your goals.

What are you waiting to do?

What is your biggest motivation in life and why?

So you're curious about my best motivation in life? Let me tell ya. It is the best motivator in my life to make people feel better. To make them realize that they are amazing, because they are. They are worthy love, for they are.

They are worthy of happiness.

I am here to remind everyone that it is more important to feel good about yourself. Nothing. And I'm going to do whatever it takes to find out how we can change our world for the better.

Feeling good about yourself makes us more open-minded, compassionate and kind to others. We stop judging one another based on superficiality. Instead we see the person as they are.

Showing someone that you already have everything you need is the best way for them to be motivated.

It may be something they didn't realize, but it's why they've been struggling for so long with something. They knew deep within that they were able to heal.

All they required was the right environment, the correct support system, and a positive mindset. However, they forgot to see that.

It's not hard to see why they lost it. Because they were too busy trying figure out what the problem was. Trying desperately to fix it, without realizing that they actually had all the tools they needed to solve it.

They didn't realize they were the ones who had the answer.

You have the power to create a new reality. To tap into your inner genius, all you need is to learn.

Everything will come together once you do this. You'll be amazed by how easy it is to manifest your dreams.

You see, I believe that every single human being has access to their own unique superpower.

Only we have to know how to use it.

What motivates entrepreneurs?

Passion drives us. We also have a natural desire to make a difference and create something meaningful. To make a difference for our loved ones as well as ourselves.

To give back. To help others. To leave a mark.

But most importantly, we do this because we love doing it. Because we feel compelled by God to live our lives fully and succeed in things that matter.

We are motivated by a sense if purpose and mission that cannot be achieved through money alone.

This is where the key lies in combining business with pleasure. Entrepreneurship becomes more than a job.

This is why I am passionate about helping entrepreneurs become successful. My goal is to help them achieve financial freedom, and leave a lasting impression on the world.

My life is proof that creating value is the best thing. It's sharing your knowledge with the rest.

It's more than enough to make a product or service great. You must first understand what drives your customers, and what they need. What they want.

This will ensure that you always improve your offering. You will always be able to provide more value.

You will attract more customers if your products and services are more valuable. Customers will buy more of your products and services, so you'll have more customers. More customers will mean more revenue. You will eventually be financially independent if you have more revenue.

You see, money does not always equal everything. It's the means to an end. Not the end in itself.

So, if you truly want to live a rich life, you cannot focus only on money. Focusing on positive change is also important. Contributing. Leaving a legacy. It is creating something of value. You create something unique. You can add meaning to others' lives and your own.

Entrepreneurship requires risk-taking. However, it does not mean following any set of rules. It is about being flexible. Adapting. Adjusting. Improving.

You can succeed as long as you remain true to yourself, uphold your values, and keep your integrity.

Entrepreneurship is a calling. A vocation. The chance to give back. To create wealth. To shape history.

These are the things that will make you the best version you can be.

You will never stop.

Statistics

• According to analysts, Johnson has high appeal in all four quadrants tracked at the multiplex: male, female, over-25 and under-25. (forbes.com)
• That means for $150,000, you could have bought 10 percent of Airbnb." (entrepreneur.com)
• “Effective communication is 20% what you know and 80% how you feel about what you know. (americanexpress.com)
• "If you improve by just 1% every single day, in several months, you will have improved by 100%. (carolroth.com)
• "Most of the time when people ask me about motivation, 80 percent of the time, I attribute it to gratitude. (entrepreneur.com)

External Links

cnbc.com

• This is Jeff Bezos's inspirational quote that he keeps on his fridge


• Billionaire Richard Branson: These are my top 10 tips for success

twitter.com

• Twitter


• Melanie Curtin (@MelanieBCurtin / Twitter

businessinsider.com

• 101 Best Inspirational Quotes For Entrepreneurs


• SpaceX employees face almost impossible goals from Elon Musk

inc.com

• How to turn your passion into your everyday dream job

How To

What are 3 things entrepreneurs need to stay motivated?

Entrepreneurs should be motivated. Motivation is essential for any entrepreneur. Without it, there's no motivation to succeed. But what motivates?

These are the three main reasons that we stay motivated.

1. We love our business
2. Our vision/mission is larger than ourselves
3. We love to help others.

Find ways to tap these motivations to stay motivated. We feel great pride and satisfaction when our business succeeds. If we have a great vision, we feel more fulfilled knowing that our efforts are making a positive difference in the world. When we feel fulfilled when we help others, it is because we are giving back to society.

According to a University of Chicago study, the best way for you to motivate yourself is to be focused on the things that matter to you. In his book "Loneliness", Dr. John Cacioppo stated that "the best source to motivate yourself is to care about something." It's a way to be more engaged and energetic. It's obvious that passion is more powerful when it comes to something we care about.