How to Start Your Own YouTube Channel
I believe that every business should have a YouTube channel. Video is becoming more and more important in our ever-changing digital landscape. The Huffington Posts reports that YouTube receives 1 billionĀ visitors a month. That's half of the people that use the internet. People are clearly hungry for video, so why aren't you making video content? In this episode, I guide you through some fears and some common roadblocks that stop people from getting started on YouTube!
Subscribe on YouTube
Just Get Started!
This is where most people get stuck. Producing quality video content is hard and it takes some practice. To get to the point where you feel comfortable in front of the camera and comfortable with some video editing techniques, you need to make some videos! It's really that simple. You don't need to buy expensive video equipment and you don't need to have the perfect lighting. Just bust out your smartphone, hit the record button and start speaking to the camera. After you have recorded some content, PUBLISH YOUR CONTENT! I've seen many examples of people recording videos but not having the courage to publish it and possibly look dumb. It will take some practice to get comfortable and to get better, but you will never get better if you don't put yourself out there. There is no technique or skill required for this step. Most people fail on YouTube before they ever start! Let's not let that happen to you!
Share and Promote Your Content
Your videos will not watch themselves. When you publish content on YouTube, there is a decent chance that people naturally come across your video and watch them. Over time this will happen, but it is not a good way to get your brand out there.Ā You will never grow your channel unless you are willing to share and promote your content. This is so huge. You should be spending more time promoting your content then you spend creating it.
Text the video link to your friends and ask them to subscribe.
Publish your videos on a Facebook page. If you don't have a page then publish them on your personal profile.
Embed your YouTube video into blog posts orĀ Medium posts.
DON'T BE SHY! You need to be passionate about your content. In the beginning, your videos will certainly be raw, but you will get better with time and people will enjoy watching you improve.
Use iMovie to Edit Your Videos
iMovie is a video editing app that allows you to perform basic edits right on your iPhone. iMove is great. This basic editing will add another level of professionalism to your videos. With iMovie you can edit around the "likes" and "ums" that naturally slip out. Also, it gives you the ability to mess up. Everyone messes up, but if you have this app you don't need to start all over and get everything right in one take. If you mess up, you can stop and begin again where you left off. iMovie also gives you the ability to edit pictures into your video. You can edit in sounds or even drop a track underneath your videos. It is a perfect editing app for beginners. The app will cost you $6 and you can learn how to use it by searching YouTube videos. There are plenty of instructional videos to teach you the basics and even more advanced editing techniques on iMovie.
Optimize Your Videos
Often times we forget that YouTube is a search engine. It is actually the second biggest search engine in the world, second only to Google. A large portion of YouTube traffic is people performing searches. So want to make sure we optimize our videos to show in search results for certain search queries. Since YouTube can't actually index what you are saying in the video itself, it relies on the title and the description to understand what your video is about. Be sure that you are putting keywords in the title. Let YouTube know exactly what the video is about so that it can display the video in front of people who are searching for that topic. Also, be sure to write a lengthy description. At least 300 words. Put links in the description. Tag the video. Fill out as much detailed information as possible to get your video ranking organically. This is a slow process but over the long haul, your videos will get more and more and traction and your channel will continue to grow.