How to get started on YouTube

You have finally decided to bet on multimedia content on YouTube for your company or personal brand. However, you don’t know how to start on YouTube.

▶️ Every day, users watch about a billion hours of YouTube videos (Oberlo) ◀️

If your goal is to bring content to YouTube, you must bear in mind that you won’t start growing overnight, you will only reach your goals with daily content and hard work.

If you want to learn how to start on YouTube we have put together this little basic guide to get started.

Grab your notepad and come with us!

Guide about how to start on YouTube

This guide will help you to get started on YouTube for both your personal or company channel.

You can put into practice everything you learn here and start your journey on this platform.

Create your channel

It’s crucial that you don’t put the cart before the horse. So, start from the beginning, that is, creating your YouTube channel.

To do so, follow these steps.

1. Log in on YouTube with your Gmail account 

Since Google bought YouTube, you have to access your channel with your Gmail account.

2. Click your account icon, located in the upper right corner, and then go to YouTube settings.

3. Choose the option to create a new channel and add the name for your YouTube channel.

4. Last, tap ‘Create’.

Voilà! You have already created your YouTube channel.

The first step is already done, now you have to give your personal touch to your new channel.

Customize your channel

What is the use of having a channel with great content if users do not know who you are or what you do or what services your company offers?

It’s up to you to bring out your creative side and complete the profile of your channel:

1. Add a profile picture for your channel.

The first thing that users who search for your channel will see will be the profile photo, if it’s empty that might make them run away.

If you are a company, adding the logo on your channel is a way to be recognized instantly. If, on the other hand, you have a personal channel, you can add a photo of yourself or your personal brand logo.

2. Add a cover photo

This is a banner where you can play with the creativity of your content. If you upload sports videos you can add athletes or a motivating phrase, etc.

You can also put your logo differently and add the social networks where users can also find you. For instance, if you are on Facebook or Instagram.

3. Include a description

Who are you? What does your channel do? In this section you can add a small description about yourself, your company or the channel and the content your channel will provide to the user.

Don’t forget that you can add other links of interest, such as your social profiles or website.

You have everything ready to start your channel, so what now? It’s your opportunity to talk about the content you are going to upload.

Plan the content strategy for your channel

You have reached the key part of your channel, the content you are going to upload.

Your YouTube channel is like a clock, all the pieces must work correctly. If you create a great profile but the content is not attractive, all your efforts will be lost.

Before you start uploading videos without rhyme or reason, creating a content strategy will help you achieve the goals you have set for your channel.

What aspects should you consider for this?

• Establish a target audience

If you create too much content for too broad an audience, you will stay in no man’s land.

For example, if your target audience is athletes, your content should be aimed at that target: information on nutrition, tips for exercising, etc.

In this way you will capture their attention, they will see that you dedicateyour content to that sector and you will get them to subscribe.  

• Create a calendar

The worst thing for a subscriber is to see their favorite YouTube channel starting to offer content carelessly and without prior planning: it causes mistrust and ultimately, your subscriber will hit the unsubscribe button.

To avoid this from happening, having a production calendar will help you plan the content that you will upload to your channel. What you are going to talk about this week, take advantage of themed marketing days and keep a commitment with your subscribers.

With this, you will earn the loyalty of your subscribers and improve the presence of your brand.

So now you have a customized profile and your content strategy is ready. So, what’s next? Uploading your video!

Upload your first video

You have everything ready to upload your first video: you have recorded, edited and revised it so that everything is correct. 

So, how do you upload your first video? Let’s see how!

1. On YouTube, click on the camera icon that you will see at the top right and click on ‘Upload video’.

2. Select upload file from the computer or, if you prefer, drag the item from a folder to that window.

3. Edit the content of your video before you upload it.

✅ Add a title, you have up to 100 characters, which indicate what your video will be about and make sure it is attractive to get a viewer to click and view it.

Our recommendation is that you apply keywords related to the content of your video to the title to optimize its positioning and appear in the first search positions.

✅ Add the description of your video, you have up to 5,000 characters, and describe what your video is about. You can also leave a call to action to invite users to subscribe to your channel or links that are of interest, like other social channels.

✅ Choose a thumbnail for your video with which to attract the viewer’s attention. Keep in mind that it is the first thing they see along with the title of the video. Here you can use a frame of your video or a personalized image.  

4. Complete all the steps before you upload your video.

Before uploading a video, YouTube gives you the option to add plugins to make calls to action at the end and during the video.

With end screens and cards you can create layouts that are posted at the end and during the video for viewers to do one action: visit another video, access a website, etc.

5. Choose the visibility and upload your video

Lastly, you must choose whether you want your video to be private (only you and the users you choose can see it), unlisted (available only through a link) and public (open to everyone).

Then choose if you want to publish it now or schedule it for a specific date and time.

And enjoy your first video on YouTube!

If your personal brand has a website and social profiles, do not forget to share your video: you will generate traffic to your channel and gain those followers from other platforms as YouTube subscribers.

YouTube is a long distance race, not a sprint. It is not about uploading a video and that’s it, you must be constant in uploading content to grow on the platform.

If you think you can run out of content for lack of time, you can try live videos or record several videos and then publish them on different dates.

Build a community on YouTube

One thing you must be clear when starting your YouTube experience, if you do not create a loyal community to your content and your brand, forget about growing on this platform.

So, how to get viewers’ commitment to your channel?

Here are a few tips to build a great YouTube community.

• Interact with your audience.

With your growth on YouTube you will receive comments and opinions, both positive and negative. It is important that you respond to these comments, users will see that you are transparent and that they also feel that their opinion counts for your channel.

• Live stream so your audience can participate.

In addition to uploading videos, YouTube live streams are a great tool to interact ‘live’ with your subscribers and viewers. They will get to know you and you can answer their questions or comment on a topic.

• Listen to their proposals.

You owe it to your viewers, listen to what they think about your channel or the content you are uploading. Sometimes listening to them can help you change your strategy and boost your YouTube channel.

By achieving a faithful community that interacts with your videos, commenting or liking your content, you will be able to settle your channel on the platform and attract other viewers to your profile.

Grow on YouTube

Once you have outlined your channel and are uploading your content, you must think of several ways to grow on YouTube, both in presence and in economic terms.

• Propose collaborations with other ‘YouTubers’.

On YouTube, it is common to collaborate with other content creators to reach a larger audience and increase your number of subscribers.

Of course, keep in mind what type of content the person with whom you are going to collaborate uploads and if it is within your sector.

• Create ad campaigns

As if we were talking about Facebook ads, from Google Ads you can create ad campaigns to promote your videos.

You can pay for views, clicks, etc. You choose the ad format to reach more subscribers.

➡️ Do you want to succeed with your YouTube marketing strategy? ⬅️

Check out this YouTube marketing guide

Analyze your performance

As you upload content to YouTube, you should measure and analyze the performance of your content. This data will tell you if your videos are succeeding or if you need to turn your strategy around.

With Metricool you can see a complete analysis from your control panel:

• Overview.

Here you will find everything related to the growth of your channel, subscribers, video views and uploaded videos.

Also a summary of your subscribers, gained and lost.

• Videos.

In this section, the videos are the protagonists: video views, likes, dislikes and comments.

In the most viewed videos section,  you will see a table with the publication date, video views, watch time, average view duration, likes, dislikes and comments. You can order these columns to your liking and download it in a CSV file.

• Competitors.

A key section. To keep growing on YouTube you should understand what your competition is doing. Here you can add the competitors that interest you and analyze their development compared with your channel: subscribers, views, etc.

• Generate reports.

If you work for a company or external brand as a social media manager,  the option to generate reports will be useful for your work. Here you can download in PDF or PPT all the data obtained each month on the YouTube channel and present it to your client with their logo.

Now you have no excuse to start your own YouTube channel. Whether you are a company or your own personal brand, this guide will help you settle on the platform from the beginning.

Any questions, we’ll read in the comments. 👇🏻

Isabel Romero , 29 July 2020