10 Ways to Make Your YouTube Channel Stand Out from the Crowd [Infographic]

Do you know YouTube is the second most popular, widely used and largest search engine after Google? This world’s top online video service is generally considered as a great resource for sharing and viewing personal videos, but it can also be a valuable tool for your business to reach out and engage with your customers. Nowadays, more and more businesses and marketers are delving into this extremely powerful tool to increase their brand awareness and presence on the web.

According to YouTube Statistics, YouTube is now getting over 1 billion unique visits per month, and more than 6 billion hours of video are watched on YouTube each month. Besides, YouTube users upload over 100 hours of video every minute. For anyone, these all facts may quite astonishing, but no one can deny that YouTube is now something that is bigger than almost everything on the internet – whether it’s Facebook, Yahoo, or Bing – except Google.

If you want to increase your brand awareness on YouTube, then it’s time to work on optimizing your YouTube channel. To help you in the process of YouTube channel optimization, we’ve designed an infographic that will show you 10 of the best YouTube channel optimization practices, including YouTube keyword, tag and URL optimization.

Let’s have a look at our infographic.

#Channel Design:

Create a visually-compelling channel art to give your YouTube channel page a unique look and feel. Use YouTube’s specific dimensions (2560 x 1440) px to ensure that it'll look great on multiple devices. For channel icon, use a square image of (800 x 800) px resolution that is recognizable at all resolutions. Your channel should create a cohesive and appealing visual experience for users.

#Keyword Research:

Keywords you're using for a specific video play a vital role in getting found easily in search results. Focus on incorporating relevant keywords in the video title and description, and keeping tags search-friendly. You should use the YouTube keyword suggestion tool to know keyword search volume and generate potential keywords accordingly.

#Channel Name & Description:

Choose a short, relevant and memorable channel name, giving your audience an idea about what your channel is. Include keyword rich tags, but avoid keyword stuffing. Write a catchy, detailed and well-optimized description, including relevant keywords, links, upload schedule and other pertinent information about your brand.

#Thumbnail Optimization:

The thumbnail is possibly the best way to attract viewers to your videos and win their clicks. It acts as a miniature marketing poster for your YouTube video. Therefore, it's advisable to create high-quality, entertaining and stand out thumbnails for increasing search engine clicks. In order to make a thumbnail work great, make sure it accurately represents the content of a video.

#Use Annotations:

Annotations are a great way to boost YouTube viewership, increase user engagement, and attract new subscribers. They let you make your videos look sharp by allowing you to add interactive commentary to them. After uploading all your videos, add relevant annotations to them. For example, you can provide links to your other videos, playlists, channels, or websites.

#Playlists Optimization:

Playlists are a great method to organize your video content by topic. They don’t only allow you to highlight specific videos, but also make it easy for you to keep your audiences engaged. While creating playlists make sure to keep the playlist title short, descriptive, and keyword focused. Also, don't forget to attach a search friendly description to it.

#Calls to Action:

Always have a soft and strong call-to-action at the end of your video or in the video description. This way, you'll be able to appeal your viewers to connect with your brand, and encourage them to hit like & share buttons and subscribe to your channel. It'll not only boost your YouTube viewership, but also increase your credibility on YouTube.

#Cross-Promotion:

YouTube allows you to cross-promote your social media profiles including Facebook & Twitter. To gain new visitors, views and subscribes, connect your social media accounts to your YouTube channel. If possible, offer your users Embed codes for your YouTube videos, so they can easily share them on Facebook, Twitter and their websites.

#Engage With Your Viewers:

YouTube allows your viewers to comment on your channel and your videos as well. Reply to these comments in a timely manner to get more reach and access to a larger audience on YouTube. Also, build a genuine community around your channel to turn your ordinary fans into a loyal and engaged audience, and promote your content.

#Keep Track on Your Performance:

YouTube gives you the ability to keep track on what your audience like and don't like. Use YouTube Analytics regularly to keep an eye on your channel’s performance and better understand your audience. Use actionable insights, provided by Analytics, to make your videos better and refine your video marketing strategy for better results.