How to grow a YouTube channel (plus tips and importance)

Updated 7 December 2022

YouTube is one of the more effective channels where you can grow an online audience. Social media marketers typically look to build a large following on YouTube, as it can lead to more customers and greater brand awareness. If you work in a social media or business development role, you could benefit from learning about the different strategies that can help to promote growth on YouTube. In this article, we discuss how to grow a YouTube channel and some tips that you can consider when looking to grow your channel.

What is the importance of growing a YouTube channel?

Before learning how to grow a YouTube channel, it's helpful to look at what this growth looks like and why this is important. Growth on a YouTube channel can include increased views, more subscribers, regular comments and mentions by other channels. From a business perspective, growing a YouTube channel is an effective marketing tool. Here are a few reasons growing a channel is important:

Increased brand awareness

A high level of growth on a YouTube channel can help you to broaden your reach. It also helps you to diversify your audience. This can lead to greater brand recognition that you can use to grow other areas of the business.

More profit

The more a YouTube channel grows, the more profitable it becomes. A larger viewership can make the channel more appealing for brand sponsorships and paid collaborations. Reaching a larger audience can also lead to an increase in sales of the company's products or services.

Increased website traffic

Growing a YouTube channel involves reaching a larger group of viewers. You can then utilise this large YouTube following to drive traffic to a website or company store. This traffic can then lead to more potential sales.

New audiences

By growing a YouTube channel, you may find that you can reach a new audience. It's also possible that this audience was one that you couldn't access previously. This is because a large YouTube following represents credibility that's appealing to customers of all ages and backgrounds.

How to grow a YouTube channel and expand your audience

Below, you can find out how to grow a YouTube channel and expand your audience:

1. Engage with your audience

One of the best to grow a YouTube channel and gain an increased viewership is by developing a personal connection with those watching the channel. Developing trust and having genuine interactions can be the key difference between gaining and losing a customer. When doing this, it's important that you take the time to listen to viewer feedback and reply to the comments on the videos to create a community feel.

2. Optimise your videos

To grow a YouTube channel, it's important that people see your videos. As YouTube is a hugely popular digital marketing tool, feeds can at times feel a little over-saturated. This means that it's important to ensure that your videos rank highly in searches so that they can gain maximum exposure. Here are a few things you can consider to optimise your videos:

use video hashtags
select a category for your videos
add subtitles and closed captions
include keywords in the title of your video

3. Create unique content

Another way to grow your YouTube following is by creating unique content. This can be challenging as there's so much different content available. So, when creating content, try to focus on the brand's USP and what you can bring to a video that customers can't find anywhere else.

4. Focus on quality

A channel's viewership is likely to increase if your videos are high-quality, as this adds credibility to the brand. Consider investing in professional video equipment, lighting, set designs and even editors and music producers. It's also important that your content is insightful, with interesting topics and well-written material. To help give your videos a sense of direction, try to create a loose script for each video.

5. Provide a valuable experience

To grow and expand your audience, it's important to provide a valuable watching experience. Try to identify your target audience and what it is that they want from your videos. It may be knowledge, advice, humour or perhaps a visually pleasing video. Catering to your audience's needs is a key part of developing successful content that helps to grow a YouTube channel.

6. Utilise other social media platforms

To achieve optimum growth, consider using other social media platforms. To do this, ensure that you promote your YouTube videos on all your social media channels to engage a wide range of audiences. For example, you could post a clip of a recent video from your YouTube channel to one of your social media feeds to encourage your followers to view your channel.

7. Upload often

YouTube's algorithm favours channels with regular uploads. This means that it's important to post a video at least once a week. By doing this, YouTube is more likely to recommend your channel to viewers and viewers are more likely to subscribe to the channel if it contains a catalogue of consistent content.

8. Be consistent

Another tip on how to grow your Youtube channel is to consider scheduling posts. This is because it helps to keep your subscribers engaged, as they know when to expect future content. For instance, you could decide to post on Monday and Friday at the same time each week.

9. Plan in advance

Producing quality YouTube videos involves a lot of time and effort. But, with proper planning, you can produce quality content and meet your scheduling deadlines. One way of doing this is by filming multiple videos at the same time. You could allocate a day or two where you can focus on shooting several videos for upcoming weeks. It's also good practice to create a content calendar, as this can help you to keep track of the videos you want to post and the preparation needed for them.

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Tips for how to grow your YouTube channel

Below, you can find some tips for how to grow your YouTube channel:

Push for subscriptions

The primary way to grow your YouTube channel is by encouraging viewers to subscribe to your channel. This is important because when a person subscribes to a YouTube channel, they receive notifications when that channel uploads a new video. Try to allocate some time within your videos to remind your viewers to subscribe to the channel so they don't miss out on your content.

Target a single keyword or subject

Focusing your video on a singular keyword or topic is one of the most effective ways to reach a wider viewership. This is a simple SEO-optimising practice that can help you gain immediate growth for your channel. Try to identify your niche and use a keyword search tool to find out the most searched-for keywords within that niche. Then, use this keyword naturally throughout your video and remember to include it in closed captions.

Study other channels

Looking at other YouTube channels for inspiration is another way that can help you grow your channel. Try to study some of your favourite channels or channels that are similar to the brand. This helps you to identify strategies they may be using that you could implement to aid the growth of your YouTube channel.

Choose your tone

Your subject matter and brand dictate the tone of your videos. When creating videos, aim to generate a specific emotion, mood or action from your viewers. If you're looking to educate your viewers, you could consider using a formal tone. But, if you're looking to give advice, you could take a more conversational or even humorous approach. Whichever tone you choose, it's important to be consistent, as this can help to build a dedicated audience and help to grow your channel.

Collaborate with other YouTube channels

If you're a small YouTube channel that's looking for rapid growth, you could try to collaborate with a larger channel. Consider reaching out to fellow channels to discuss video collaboration opportunities. By teaming up with a fellow content creator, you can expose the brand to the other channel's audience, which can generate new customers.

Identify areas for improvement

To maintain a YouTube channel's growth, it's important to regularly review your strategies. When doing this, try to identify things that are working, but also look at areas where you can improve. For example, you could invest in newer equipment or higher-quality editing software.

Make the first 15 seconds count

The first 15 seconds of a video are crucial in dictating whether a viewer continues watching. Try to avoid too much background information and get straight to the point. You could start by asking your viewers a question or posing an interesting or attention-grabbing idea that relates to the topic.

Use a thumbnail that stands out

The first thing a viewer sees before clicking on a YouTube video is the thumbnail, which is the picture cover of a video that appears on the YouTube feed. It's really important to ensure that your thumbnail stands out and catches the eye to attract new audience members. One way of doing this is by creating customised thumbnails that utilise bold colours to draw the eye. Use this tip and the above to grow your YouTube channel and identify strategies for growth.

Please note that none of the companies, institutions or organisations mentioned in this article are affiliated with Indeed.