Author: Andrew Moore-Crispin

How to Mine YouTube Analytics to Understand Your Audience and Grow Your Channel

YouTube Analytics can feel intimidating, especially if you’re inspired by the art of content creation more than the science of data analysis. But understanding these powerful metrics is essential if you dream of turning your YouTube passion into a sustainable income. Don’t worry – you don’t need to become a data scientist. You just need to know where to look and how to extract actionable insights from YouTube analytics.  Today, we’re breaking down YouTube Analytics step-by-step.  Your YouTube Analytics Control Center To access YouTube Analytics, you’ll need to be in YouTube Studio: Now, let’s dive into the most important sections: 1. Overview Tab: Your Channel’s Vital Signs Consider this your performance dashboard. Key metrics here include: Insight Power:  The Overview tab gives you a bird’s-eye view of your channel’s trajectory. Look for trends – is your channel growing steadily? Are there sudden surges or dips in viewership? This is where you’ll start to identify areas where you should take a closer look. 2. Reach Tab: How Are People Finding You? The Reach tab reveals the journey viewers take before clicking on your videos.  Key metrics include: Insight Power: This data is marketing gold! Learn where your videos are being seen… Continue reading How to Mine YouTube Analytics to Understand Your Audience and Grow Your Channel

Is TubeBuddy Worth It? Let’s Look at the Data

Is TubeBuddy worth it? It’s a fair question. TubeBuddy is a set of YouTube video and channel optimization tools that helps YouTube creators grow. Over 14 million creators use the free TubeBuddy Chrome extension. Our own obvious bias aside, TubeBuddy is worth it: YouTube creators who use TubeBuddy grow their channels faster than those who don’t. The free version of TubeBuddy does a lot. To access all the tools TubeBuddy offers, including advanced A/B testing, YouTube title generation, SEO and other optimization, thumbnail analysis and more, creators can step up to a TubeBuddy Pro or TubeBuddy Legend license. Let’s dig into the data to see how TubeBuddy helps YouTube creators grow their views and subscribers faster. Actually, no. Let’s start with a question: why are you considering TubeBuddy? What led you to search for “is TubeBuddy worth it” or the ever-popular “is TubeBuddy safe” (it is) in the first place? Boil it down, you probably want to grow your channel. You want more views and more subscribers, which translates to more clout and more money. Maybe you’re enticed by Keyword Explorer and upping your SEO game both on and outside YouTube. Maybe you’re looking to keep a closer eye on… Continue reading Is TubeBuddy Worth It? Let’s Look at the Data

YouTube AI Content Policy: What Creators and Brands Need to Know

If there’s one constant in online content creation it’s change. And the pace of change has only increased with the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) tools.  AI can be a boon for creators, automating and improving on content creation processes. But at the same time, spammers, scammers, and other internet bad guys also have access to AI tools.  It’s a cat-and-mouse game, but YouTube’s latest updates take aim at AI-generated content on YouTube. These new rules try to strike a balance between killing off junk content and allowing creators to take advantage of the many benefits of AI in their creative process.  As creators, it’s important to understand these new YouTube AI content policies that take particular aim at voice cloning, deep fakes, misinformation, and copyright concerns.  The Rising Challenges of AI on YouTube AI technology has been a double-edged sword in the world of content creation. On one hand, it offers incredible tools to enhance creativity and efficiency. On the other, it presents unique challenges like deep fakes and voice cloning. Clearly, these have raised serious concerns about authenticity and misinformation. YouTube’s recent move to introduce AI-specific policies is a response to these growing challenges. Understanding the new YouTube… Continue reading YouTube AI Content Policy: What Creators and Brands Need to Know

How To Use TubeBuddy: Five Things Every TubeBuddy User Should Do Right Now

So you want to blow up on YouTube? A worthy goal. Creating content and building a community is a lot of work. But if you do the work and use TubeBuddy to optimize your videos and your YouTube workflows, you will get better results.  But don’t just take it from us. Take it from… ok, fine us, but with data from nearly 60,000 YouTube creators over a three-month period to back it up.  TubeBuddy users saw a 86% improvement in views (+170.85%) and a 55% improvement in subs (+89.40%) compared with other YouTube creators who are doing the work but not using TubeBuddy. With that in mind, here are five things every TubeBuddy user should do… and five things every new TubeBuddy user should start with. 1. How to use TubeBuddy Keyword Explorer TubeBuddy Keyword Explorer can be a YouTube creator’s best friend. It takes the guesswork out of your video creation process and helps you tailor your content to match what audiences are searching for. This tool is particularly valuable for researching video ideas. When you input a keyword related to your niche, TubeBuddy’s Keyword Explorer offers an overall score, analysis, and related searches. It allows you to delve… Continue reading How To Use TubeBuddy: Five Things Every TubeBuddy User Should Do Right Now

12 Free YouTube Tools and Sites for Content Creators

Are you a small content creator eager to boost your YouTube channel’s growth? You’re in the right place! These are our top picks for 12 free YouTube sites and tools that can help you on your journey to content creation success.  Some of these tools operate on a “freemium” model but to make our list of the top 12 free YouTube tools and sites for creators, they are useful whether or not you decide to whip out your credit card. ThumbnailCheck ThumbnailCheck is your go-to tool for optimizing your YouTube thumbnails and titles. It allows you to preview how your titles and thumbnails will appear on both desktop and mobile, in light and dark mode, and even where longer titles will be cut off. Ensure your thumbnails and titles stand out before hitting that publish button. Why it’s great ThumbnailCheck helps you make a strong first impression, increasing the chances of viewers clicking on your content. VocalRemover VocalRemover is perfect for removing vocals from audio or video files, separating them from the music. This is a lifesaver when dealing with copyrighted background music or accidental audio issues in your videos. Just replace the audio with royalty-free music, and you’re good… Continue reading 12 Free YouTube Tools and Sites for Content Creators

Extract Tags from YouTube Videos with View and Copy Video Tags

When you extract tags from YouTube videos, you can build out your own highly targeted tag list.  Maybe you want to use some of the same video tags as your main competitor on YouTube, or maybe you’re looking to mine your own videos to ensure you’re using tags consistently. Whatever the case, TubeBuddy View and Copy Video Tags is the best way to extract tags from YouTube videos.  With TubeBuddy View and Copy Video Tags, creators can easily optimize their YouTube video tags, extract video tags from YouTube videos and save them to a list, and even see which tags competitors are using and ranking for.  Why YouTube Video Tags are Important Tags are an important part of SEO; optimizing your YouTube videos to be found by The Algorithm. Tags are not the most important factor; YouTube looks at title, then description, then tags in that order. Still, top three. Tags are key to how videos are categorized on YouTube and optimizing YouTube video tags for your content is important. Tagged videos are more likely to be recommended to viewers when they watch a video with similar tags. Whether you’re creating #makeup tutorials, #speedruns of your favorite game, or spending… Continue reading Extract Tags from YouTube Videos with View and Copy Video Tags

Announcing TubeBuddy Suggested Shorts

YouTube is serious about Shorts, and with the latest update to the YouTube Partner Program (YPP), YouTube creators can get a cut of ad revenue. Before this update, it was possible to make money with Shorts, but growing your channel was the primary reason for long-form creators to consider short-form video too. Growing your channel with Shorts remains a solid strategic reason. Direct monetization of Shorts for creators in the YPP may well be the tipping point. As more creators look to add Shorts to their strategy, TubeBuddy has just the thing to help. Announcing TubeBuddy Suggested Shorts If you’re already saying, “I’m in!” skip ahead and sign up for the Suggested Shorts beta. Still with us? Great. Let’s look at how TubeBuddy Suggested Shorts works and how it can help creators — especially long-form creators — get serious about Shorts. How Suggested Shorts Works for Your YouTube Channel Cutting stand-alone chunks out of long-form videos is the easiest way to create Shorts.  With that in mind, TubeBuddy Suggested Shorts highlights exactly where audiences have engaged your most successful long-form videos, complete with timecodes. This simple insight makes it easy to cut a video to share as a Short, which… Continue reading Announcing TubeBuddy Suggested Shorts

How Creators Can Cash in on New YouTube Shorts Monetization

Cash in on New YouTube Shorts

As of right (checks watch) now, YouTube Shorts monetization is here. With this update, creators in the YouTube Partner Program can get a cut of the revenue for ads played alongside their short videos. Competing for attention with TikTok, Instagram et. al., YouTube has been pushing hard on short-form video. Shorts monetization is the latest, most impactful YouTube Shorts effort to date.  So how does YouTube Shorts monetization work for YouTube creators? Let’s take a look. YouTube Shorts ad revenue sharing Direct ad revenue sharing sets YouTube Shorts monetization apart from creator funds and other payment schemes. With this update, YouTube is the only platform that gives creators a well-deserved cut of the action. This simplifies monetization for YouTube Shorts creators and makes getting paid a bit more predictable. Shorts monetization is available to anyone in the YouTube Partner Program. See the YouTube Partner Program help article YouTube Partner Program Eligibility for the full rundown. Nothing has changed since we first shared that YouTube Shorts monetization was coming. YouTube Shorts monetization requirements Shorts watch time does not count toward overall channel watch time. That has been frustrating, especially for smaller scale creators on the platform. The monetization update doesn’t change… Continue reading How Creators Can Cash in on New YouTube Shorts Monetization