Wish You Knew The Right Way To Track Your Youtube Channel Progress?
Everyone I chat with about their YouTube Channel talks about “views and subscriber counts” – and I really wish they would stop. Those are like “vanity metrics” which give you a Dopamine shot of “feel good”.
In reality there are far better metrics to pay attention to – here are my top 3.
STEP 1
STOP counting YouTube video Views and Subscribers day after day after day.
STEP 2
INSTEAD, pay close attention to these 3 metrics in the YouTube Studio Anlytics:
- watchtime
- clickthrough rate (CTR)
- traffic sources
1 – Watchtime
How long did someone watch your video? YouTube wants to know, and also likes it if someone binge-watches your videos.
YouTube’s goal: 50-60% Watchtime
- someone must watch your video for at least 30 seconds to be counted as ‘watch time.’
The great thing about these analytics is that it’s easy to see exactly when and where someone stopped watching.
It’s up to you to then go check the video and pay attention to the exact moment someone stopped :
- was their question or search answered by that point?
- were they bored?
- were you rambling on and not getting to the point?
- did you suggest they go look at something else – a website, Insta post, video etc – before you got the main point of the video mentioned?
If you can work out the WHY they stopped watching, don’t repeat that mistake.
If you can tell they watched for quite a while, do more of THAT :-)
2 – CTR
CTR stands for Click-Through Rate
The simplest definition is:
- someone sees something online AND CLICKS.
The Click-Through Rate (CTR) measures the number of times an advert, an organic search result, or an email is clicked – as opposed to the number of times it has been viewed (known as impressions).
An impression is counted when:
- your video is seen by someone who is
- scrolling through YouTube, Facebook, email etc
- or scrolling through other platforms
- someone is scrolling through YouTube and they click a video thumbnail – this is called the click-through rate.
What’s a good CTR?
A good CTR will be 10% or higher – this lets you know your video title and thumbnail are working well.
A low CTR of around 3-4% means:
- the thumbnail image is not interesting enough to be clicked on
- or the video Title isn’t interesting enough.
The higher a video’s CTR is, the more your audience must be very interested in the content and watch for longer because they like what you’re sharing on YouTube.
3 – TRAFFIC SOURCES
Do you pay attention to where your video traffic comes from?
- Was it from Suggested Videos on YouTube?
- An external source like a search engine – and which one?
- Maybe it was Pinterest, Facebook or Instagram?
Paying attention to Traffic Sources can help us work out the best marketing techniques we are using (which are bringing people to the YouTube Channel).
It’s also excellent information to help us plan YouTube marketing for the future.
Summary
The longer people watch your video, the more likely it is that YouTube will suggest your video to others.
As your YouTube videos’ watchtime increases, so will the impressions.
Poor watchtime means that YouTube will be far less likely to suggest it to more viewers because it has not been performing well.
If you have any questions, please do reach out – let’s have a chat.
Cheerio for now
Teena Hughes