YouTube is an excellent platform for reaching a large audience and generating revenue. Everyone aspires to be a YouTuber, and who wouldn’t? What’s not to like about fame, money, fun, and fans? With over 23 million YouTube channels and adding up, “making it” on YouTube is difficult.
However, a lot of new YouTubers make serious mistakes that stop them from getting YouTube views. Mistakes can always teach you something and help you grow. However, there are numerous things that can be done better, and you would wish you had known about them earlier. In this article, I’ll discuss the most common YouTube mistakes that you should avoid.
Whether you’re a newbie or an experienced pro, you’ve probably made one of the following mistakes on YouTube. And that’s perfectly fine! You gain knowledge by doing things, determining what’s best for you, and exploring as you go. So, here are 11 common mistakes that newbies make along with some tips on how to avoid them.
Having a long-term vision from the beginning is something that many aspiring YouTubers lack. I’m sorry to say it, but you are going to get nothing until you prove your worth to your viewers and then to YouTube. Keep in mind that YouTube is a free platform. You have to connect to a large audience and have an impact on their lives before you can expect any recognition.
The main reason why people don’t get to the 1,000 subscribers mark is that they’ve never really committed to doing so. They experiment with YouTube. However, as with any marketing strategy, dabbling here and there will give you subpar results. And those poor results may lead you to believe that people don’t like your content or that you’re not good enough for YouTube.
If you can develop a long-term strategy for the content, you’ll want to consistently post and share, and you’ll be able to connect deeply with your viewers and never run out of new content ideas.
When viewers come across your content on YouTube, the thumbnail is what they see first. As a result, every time you publish a new video, you must create an appealing custom thumbnail.
Although Youtube Studio can generate thumbnails automatically and easily, many new YouTubers overlook thumbnails as much as they do videos. This is a big mistake, as a thumbnail is what a potential audience sees first, and an appealing and engaging thumbnail is what prompts the viewer to click on your video.
You must capture people’s attention by designing an appealing thumbnail and title. If they don’t click it today, they are unlikely to watch your video in future. You can create an eye-catching thumbnail for your YouTube videos using websites like Canva or PicMonkey.
YouTube ranks videos using an algorithm. Furthermore, the algorithm tracks user behavior. The more people who watch your video, the higher your YouTube ranking. You need people to click on your videos if you want them to watch it. And to do so, you must catch their eyes with a clever title.
Newcomers to YouTube have no idea how to create titles for their videos in a proper manner. Rather than using the most commonly searched words, they create titles that summarize the entire video or make titles which are similar to famous YouTubers.
Big YouTubers, on the other hand, can use non-searched titles like “No way this happened with me!” to catch people’s attention. They already have a huge fan base. They never expect to be found through search. However, you may have to. One of the key ranking elements on YouTube is your title. You must therefore ensure that your titles are properly optimized.
Of course, the opportunity to earn money is a big reason why so many individuals want to be YouTubers. But the process is never easy or quick. Ads are disliked by the majority of viewers. Prior to monetising, you should increase your influence if you don’t want to divert their attention. When you have a large number of subscribers, you can steadily increase the number of adverts in your videos.
However, remember that this will take time. Don’t expect to just jump on earning money and putting a bunch of ads on your videos. If you have just started ads on your videos and are putting a lot of them, there is a high chance that viewers are just going to skip your video. Remember, slow and steady wins the race.
This type of mistake does not necessarily require the purchase of an expensive camera or perhaps new studio lights. The truth is that your videos will do better if you simply prepare your recording environment rather than making content without thinking.
You can record in a quiet location to ensure that the audio quality is good. And you can simply choose a day with nice weather and shoot a video on the balcony or near the window for good lighting. It’s not the equipment that matters; it’s the techniques.
You can get away with gently shaky visuals or off-kilter lighting, but once the audio quality is bad, it is so bothersome and frustrating to the viewer that they will skip your video for sure.
It’s easy to get stuck chasing views. After all, you need to increase those viewer numbers if you really want to monetise your Channel and generate income as a content creator. But proceed with caution. Your ranking on YouTube may suffer if you bombard viewers with keywords, and when they click on your video, it isn’t about what they are interested in.
Viewers look out for valuable content. By focusing on the algorithm rather than what viewers actually want, you’ll find it difficult to meet their needs. The algorithm is a reflection of how people actually behave, but it’s not a real human. Remember that you are making content for real humans and not computers.
One way to accomplish this is to create ‘personas’ for your audiences. What is their demographic? Age, location, preferences, and dislikes – be as precise as possible, like you’re trying to pitch an investor on shark tank. Who is your content aimed at, and also why should they pick you?
This is an intriguing one because it is frequently a sign of a YouTube channel that lacks focus or indulges in excessive self-indulgence. You’re making a series of YouTube videos for a specific audience and you suddenly decide to try something a little different. And your channel takes off thanks to that unique video. And you must decide whether to try to capitalize on that impactful video or to keep targeting the audience you have been trying to connect to in the first place.
You go from being a travel channel to a makeup channel or from an accounting channel to a gadget review channel all of a sudden. We found an instance where a channel was offering all of this financial and business advice while at random reviewing a budget laptop. And compared to other videos on the channel, this one received a lot more views. Well, now it depends on what you think is best for your channel.
If you have just started your journey, it’s good to experiment with different categories but we don’t recommend doing this after you have built a fan base. If you would still like to pursue a different niche, you can start a new channel and in that way, you don’t have to upset your current viewers.
The majority of the time, viewers who watch content on YouTube and subscribe to a channel do so because they are connected to the creator in some way and because it is unique content. Therefore, if your goal is to imitate an already popular channel, the viewer will likely ask why they should follow you. Why should they care about your content if they can get it elsewhere from a more established channel if you are just trying to copy them?
Now, I’m not just going to stand there and point at you and say, “Be natural,” because, at least for me, the moment I hit the record button, a distinctive kind of pressure sets in as if I were performing on stage. You can’t really help but alter your identity because you believe you must satisfy the people watching you through the camera.
It is extremely challenging for some people to be themselves in front of the camera.
It is essential to boost the retention rate of your videos on YouTube. The retention rate refers to the percentage of people who watch your video all the way through. You must also pay attention to timestamps and video chapters, among other things.
On YouTube, timestamps are clickable shortcuts to particular parts of your video. You can include them in the YouTube video’s description. The sections of your YouTube video are known as chapters. To add them, select “add chapters” from the menu that appears after clicking the “more” button next to your video.
By including timestamps in your YouTube videos, you are increasing the value of your users’ time. It allows users to quickly skip to the section of the video that interests them without having to watch the entire thing.
A song has the power to make or break your content; after all, awful music kills a good video. It’s difficult to find the perfect background music and even more difficult to get the proper rights and licensing to use it in your videos legally. With Hoopr, you can say goodbye to bogus copyright claims, take-down strikes, and other legal headaches.
It’s also critical to choose appropriate music to portray the tone and feel you want to express. Hoopr also offers a wide range of playlists based on emotions, genre, and use cases to assist you in finding the perfect track for your video.
The inconsistent nature of video output is a problem for many creators. This is why it is a good idea to keep a schedule in mind. Regardless of whether you adhere to it religiously by uploading on the same day of every week or by informing your viewers that you will post a few videos a week, it is important to set a schedule.
The lines between how much time you should spend on YouTube and how much time you should spend on other things in your life are frequently blurred for many creators. If you manage to produce four videos in a week, that’s fantastic. You can publish three of them now and save one to publish next week when you really need a break.
There are various mistakes that new YouTubers make that stifle their growth on the platform. I’ve covered the most typical YouTube mistakes in this blog article, which you should avoid if you want to grow your YouTube channel.
Another thing to remember is that there are no shortcuts to success, whether on YouTube or in life. So, just keep striving and trying different things with time to become an improved version of yourself.