A meme went viral on social media a few days ago. A boy was showing how to get one million YouTube views within one week. The video itself got only 7 views, and it's been posted two years ago!
Well, jokes apart. The irony is, that click-bait videos do generate a certain amount of hits. But like anything else, no one can be fooling around for a long time.
If you analyze all the top trending YouTube videos and channels, they all have two things in common.
One, they always deliver promises and values. Two, they are strategically consistent.
You can't become a YouTube success overnight. It takes time and continuous effort.
However, in this blog, we will show you some best ways to get more views on YouTube without paying. They are proven tips, as we've conducted thorough research on industry leaders and marketers before selecting them for you.
13 Effective Ways to Get More YouTube Views Without Advertising
Ways we have described to increase your YouTube views-
- Use a Custom and ‘BOGY' Thumbnail to Get More Views on YouTube
- Use Both Descriptive and Keyword Driven Title
- Write Down the Most Helpful and Keyword-rich YouTube Video Description
- Creating More Videos in Your Niche
- Apply Tags to Get More YouTube Views
- Embed Your Videos in Your Top Blog Post
- Make Videos that People are Searching Most to Get More YouTube Views
- Rank Your YouTube Videos on Google
- Getting More Suggested YouTube Views
- Increase the Session Time of Your Channel
- Share Your Videos on Social Media, Reddit, Forums, and Quora
- Create Short Clips of Your Videos and Share Them on Social Platforms
- Collaborate with Other Content Creators and Brands
Now let's get started with the details for each of the above-mentioned ways!
1. Use a Custom and ‘BOGY' Thumbnail to Get More Views on YouTube
According to YouTube, 9 out of 10 of the most-viewed YouTube videos use a custom thumbnail. Thumbnails are the first impressions of your YouTube videos. It engages viewers instantly and tells them what your video is about. The good news is you can customize and optimize the thumbnails.
Thumbnails and titles act like billboards to help viewers decide to watch your videos.
YouTube Academy
Here are some guidelines you can apply while creating the most connecting thumbnails-
Put something in it that can boost discovery. Which means you need to create excitement. For example, you can use an image that represents your subject clearly. Then put the most unique thumbnail copy.
The next thing is, you should use a highly compelling image that can easily describe your content. Misleading video thumbnails may get you some instant hits, but they will be the reason for a stream of dislikes and bad comments. You don't want to go that way which leads to your fall.
Furthermore, you can apply the “BOGY” technique. It is one of the best thumbnail hacks. Well, what does it even mean?
- B = Black
- O = Orange
- G = Green
- Y = Yellow
You can see now, it's all about choosing a color amongst these four. Because they attract more attention than the other combination. Choose a color for your thumbnails, and use it consistently, thus it can make your theme color.
If you examine the major YouTube channels, most of them have such BOGY themes in their thumbnails.
Related Resource: 7 Effective Tips To Choose Best Color For Website That Increase Sales.
2. Use Both Descriptive and Keyword Driven Title
Titles are the second catch after someone gets attracted to your video thumbnails. However, you should use a title based directly upon your content. If you create and upload high-quality videos but don't have compelling titles, no one is going to click on them.
As with text web pages, from an SEO standpoint, the title of your YouTube video is the most important piece of content on the page.
Search Engine Land
Therefore, a great title always increases your click-through rate. Let's get some essential matters done when you compose the title copy for one of your YouTube videos.
- Use keywords in your video title in a smart way.
- Try to write something that describes your promise and shows benefits
- Keep it precise or to the point.
- Add the word “Video”. It works excellently. If you run a check over your YouTube feed, you will find this word working with many hit titles.
However, to get more views on YouTube, your title should need special care, you should always keep this in mind.
Related Resource: 15 Best Ecommerce Growth Hacks to Lift Sales of Your Online Business.
3. Write Down the Most Helpful and Keyword-rich YouTube Video Description
The goal of the video description is to give people a precise account of your videos. Furthermore, the description helps YouTube search engines to pick your content for relevant search.
Writing descriptions with keywords can help viewers to find your videos more easily through search.
Bailey Rosser, Audience Development Strategist
Experts suggest using keywords that match your content, then also adding tags so that the search engines and people both can find you in the first place. According to YouTube Creator Academy, the following steps can make your video titles engaging and get you more YouTube views.
Write a description that is searchable. Well, how to do that? Give an overview of your video in the simplest manner possible. Then try to include the top matching keyword at the beginning of the description.
To do this, you can use free tools like Google Trends and Google Keywords Planner.
Avoid extra words or bubbling. Say only what you need to say. No more, no less.
Use some unique words that well describe your content. Then use those words also in your titles. It means, finding some meaningful words that connect your content and showing them both in your video titles and description.
Turn your description section into fun. Don't bother only by telling people how great your video is. You can include related video links and clickable web addresses too. Hence, using timestamps can help viewers to jump into a certain section of your content.
Therefore, you should add a CTA under your description. It helps people to take action.
Also Read: Elevate Your eCommerce Growth with Powerful Video Marketing Strategies
4. Creating More Videos in Your Niche
Whenever you watch a video on YouTube, you see a lot of similar suggestions in the sidebar. YouTube wants you to click and watch more videos. This approach has two side stories.
Initially, YouTube wants to help you by sourcing related videos to add to your entertainment value and learning process. Secondly, these video platforms earn money from advertisements. Therefore, more video watching increases ad times.
But, you can turn this story into your court and get more YouTube views. Well, how to do it? You need to niche down your videos. Try to create more than one video, even several based on particular categories.
Look at the example above. When you click on Wes McDowell's video, youtube autosuggest some of his other videos. Try to analyze the suggestions following the current topic you are watching. They are different videos, but the parent category is the same.
It means when you want to watch a video on “Tips for Highly Converting Facebook Ads”, the search engine thing you may also love to watch Facebook Ad Funnel Formula or increase your site's traffic.
So here's the deal: if you want to make a chocolate pie recipe, make some videos on a vanilla milkshake or black forest recipes too.
5. Apply Tags to Get More YouTube Views
No one going to watch your superb video until they find it, right? On the other hand, competition is fierce. More than 500 hours of videos are being uploaded every minute on YouTube.
In this gigantic flood of old and new content, how are you going to make a place for yourself? According to WonderShare, using highly relevant tags helps the YouTube search algorithm to crawl your video faster than others.
Tags are descriptive keywords you can add to your video to help viewers find your content.
YouTube Help
Focus on this again: Relevant tags. The more relevancy you add to it, the more help comes from it to get more views on YouTube. The good news is, there are no restrictions on the number of tags you may like to use.
There are several parts you can find in your uploading process to add tags. Most likely in the separate tag box, in the description, and in the video title. We've written down some key findings that can help you add the most engaging video tags.
- Try to merge high-traffic keywords with your video tag.
- Use multiple tags since there are no restrictions. However, don't overuse this feature.
- Use the same tags to your playlist videos.
- Use the most valid tags in the first place.
Furthermore, there are two more hacks we want to share with you. One, use some common tags in all of your videos that represent your brand. Two, follow the auto-suggested videos.
After you've watched a video, youtube automatically suggests some content. When these types of suggestions come up next to your videos, Analyze the tags they are using. Then apply them to your content.
6. Embed Your Videos in Your Top Blog Post
This tip has a huge impact on both your content marketing and increasing YouTube views. A well-paced quality video in your blog can increase your customer engagement by up to 13%. On the other hand, a marketing content reader can also become one of your YouTube subscribers.
For example, whenever we want to show something about our popular WooCommerce Multivendor in the weDevs blog, we always try to include a guiding video tutorial.
Look at this video on an easy setup guide on two Dokan modules. Besides the step-by-step guide, we include a video like this from our official channel.
However, you can choose video types following your passion. But using these top trending video categories as a starter can bring you some instant subscribers and viewers alike.
8. You Can Rank Your YouTube Videos on Google
Let's do a Google search for “Top Fashion Trends”. As we've done earlier, Google showed these results. It's not like Google shows the videos at the top of the page. It can take place anywhere in the first place.
However, all the keywords don't show videos in search results. But most popular keywords do. So, if you are able to rank in Google search, it can boost your YouTube views superbly.
To rank your YouTube videos in Google search, you need to maintain some SEO process you follow for blog content or website. They are similar if not the same.
Take a look at the overview of the process below –
At first, you need to know which keywords are relevant to the video rather than a website. Suppose, you want to know “how to learn yoga.” Rather than reading a blog post on it, surely you prefer to watch a video tutorial, right?
With about 96 million search results, Google shows a video at the top. The same thing happens to any kind of tutorial, review, or how-to video. Are you getting the ideas now? We believe so.
So, after you target a video niche that has more possibilities to rank, you need to use suitable keywords.
The next phase is common technical makeup like setting the preferable thumbnail size, using a logo, and fixing color contrast. And last but not least, optimize your video description and title with proper guidelines which we've mentioned above.
However, it's a long process. You must keep patience and do whatever research you need to rank your videos in Google search.
You May Also Like to Check: Best Elementor YouTube Channels & Video Marketers You Should Follow Today!
9. Getting More Suggested YouTube Views
However, we have already discussed a point on how to get more YouTube views through suggestions in the sidebar. Niche video increases your chances nonetheless.
But there is another big secret that can even boost your chances of making it to the “Up Next” list. Look what we are doing for one of our product channels WP ERP.
Besides this video, all of our series videos make it to the “Up Next” suggestion in the sidebar. Because we have created a series of videos on all the ERP modules and necessary tutorials. That makes a playlist. So it helps the YouTube search engine to select our playlist as the most relevant one.
So, you can follow the same techniques. Try to create a series of videos, so that every single content can call upon the next one. This trick works potentially.
10. Increase the Session Time of Your Channel
The success measures are different in YouTube rather than Facebook or Vimeo. Rather than the number of views, YouTube emphasizes the time a viewer spent while watching your video. The more time a viewer spends with your videos, they will be considered more successful.
However, to increase session time, you need to meet up all the basic qualities of great YouTube content. Then you should do the following-
Build a structured playlist. Create a series of videos and upload them consistently.
Use the most relevant and attractive video thumbnails following your topic. Avoid clickbait or misleading thumbnails.
Find a title that reflects your subject matter clearly. Therefore, you should make it appealing.
Also, you can use YoutTube cards in your videos that can engage people more in your channels. This type of card interlinked the current video with other related videos of your channels. Hence, if you have a series of videos, this way you can grab more viewers' attention.
The last here, but not the least way creating YouTube content following long-tail keywords.
If you search for a keyword like Email Marketing, you will see a lot of other tails add to this one. So, when choosing a video type, make sure you create your video and cover all the tails the core keywords have. If it seems hard to cover each one, at least go for the top five.
11. Share Your Videos on Social Media, Reddit, Forums, and Quora
This is a clever hack to get a consistent view if utilized in a proper way. Including videos in your blog content is just the beginning. Whenever you publish a video, make sure you share them on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter.
Then there is Reddit, Forums, and Quora. Each of these platforms attracts millions of interested people searching for answers. After you have posted a video on your channel, you can spread it through these channels.
Related Resource: How Businesses Should Survive In Tough Times Through Social Media Marketing.
12. Create Short Clips of Your Videos and Share Them on Social Platforms
This is a very useful strategy if you can utilize it the right way. You can create short clips of your videos that will act as a trailer of the actual video. Then you can share them on social platforms with catchy headlines. This will create interest in the audience's mind and it will certainly help increase views.
This hack is generally used by movies. They release a trailer or a short version of the film to generate audience engagement and if they play their cards right, they get a huge engagement. So, you can also try it.
13. Collaborate with Other Content Creators and Brands
It's become a popular practice nowadays. When you collaborate with other contributors or brands, each time your videos will get a new audience. Gradually this act will help you to reach more people. However, collaboration brings good results but it is not that easy. So, here's what you need to do –
- Finding the right people for collaboration
- Reaching them out
- Let them understand and give them fair points on why should they collaborate
- Create videos together
- Share
Before you reach out, you can even create a video about your targeted channels or content creators, or about a product they are selling. You can use this as leverage.
Final Thoughts on Getting More YouTube Views
YouTube is covering 95% of the total internet population. The highest-earning YouTuber in 2018 earned a stupendous $22 million bucks.
More and more are getting involved every day. As all of them try to best over others, you should be consistent with your effort and innovate all the hacks to gain success.
Besides these proven tips we have mentioned, there are tons of other methods too. Furthermore, you can reinvent your own personal secret techniques.
However, here's a shortlist of some more tips you can apply to get more YouTube views. They are-
- Publishing videos by following the “best time to post” strategy
- Optimize videos for comments, likes, and subscribers
- Create video transcripts
- Invite guest YouTubers to your channels
- Promote marquee videos
- Get help from YouTube search ads
So that's all for today. Which tips seem more useful to you? If you have any questions, let us know in the comments section.