Do you have a YouTube channel? If yes, you might know that YouTube is more than creating engaging videos and gaining momentum. Millions of creators are launching new YouTube channels, but many struggle to stand out. Why is that so?
This happens because creators can enhance their success by balancing revenue generation with recognizing areas for improvement. Here you need to audit your YouTube channel because the total video watch hours reached up to 1 billion per day. As users are continuously increasing, your strategies should be one step ahead to stand out.
Let’s explore what a YouTube audit is, why your channel needs an audit, and how you can optimize your channel’s performance.
What is YouTube Channel Audit?
Auditing your YouTube channel is basically an in-depth analysis of the pros and cons of your video in order to monitor its performance.
This helps you to analyze the actual watch time, click-through rates, average views on each video, and much more. It’s a comprehensive analysis to determine what’s working and what’s not, demarcating the opportunities to enhance your strategy.
Why Do You Need To Audit Your Channel?
YouTube is the second-most popular search engine in the world after Google. Just like a business reviews its finances, a YouTube channel needs to be upgraded with the passage of time to stand out with an effective search engine optimization or SEO strategy. It helps you to:
- Discover which videos resonate with viewers.
- See if your audience retention is dropping.
- Curate content that appeals more to them.
- Identify trends and audience preferences.
- Get visible in search results.
- Converting users to subscribers.
Using YouTube analytics, you can see specific statistics about each video on your channel. However, there are certain tools available on the market for YouTube audits, like Tuberanker, VidIQ, and many others.
7 Tips To Audit Your YouTube Channel
Before starting the YouTube channel audit, you should list the metrics you need to monitor and evaluate. They will assist you in obtaining a broader overview of the performance of your YouTube channel. Let’s get started:
1. Get an Idea of Basic Stats
A good way to find out basic statistics about your channel is to look at the analytics. Here you will find all the information about your channel, including subscribers, watch time, views, and likes for each video. More than 500+ hours of content are uploaded to YouTube every minute. Examining watch time is just as crucial as looking at views, as a high view count suggests high-quality content that is being viewed by many people.
This ensures that your videos are engaging, relevant, and free of clickbait. The same goes with subscribers as they play an active part in making your content viral. They are the foundation of your growth that makes your account sustainable and gives you a more competitive edge over others. They are likely to share your videos among their network which will indicate the algorithm that your content is worth watching.
2. Learn About Your YouTube Audience
Understanding your audience and getting to know their interests should be the core essence of your channel. Your audience is the one that can make or break you, however, hooking them with you is completely your responsibility. Regardless of what you post or how creative you are, targeting the right audience is essential.
YouTube analytics keep you informed about your users’ activities on your channel, you must have updates in order to know them. Check your analytics, which offers demographics like age, gender, interests, geographical location, subscribers, preferred language, watch time, etc. You can also find out the time frame when your audience is most active on YouTube. If your videos are not reaching the right audience, you must look for ways to target the right audience.
3. Optimize Video Titles and Descriptions
A compelling keyword-rich title can attract viewers by clearly conveying the video’s content summary and enticing them to click. Descriptions should be equally engaging, providing a concise summary that includes relevant keywords and hashtags to improve searchability. Adding timestamps, links to related content, and calls to action can further enhance the users’ experience and encourage interaction. Additionally, well-crafted descriptions can provide content for search engines, improving your video’s ranking in search results and making it more discoverable.
Titles should be shorter, concise, and easier to read both on search result pages and mobile devices. While uploading your new video, don’t forget to add timestamps for key points within the video, making it easier for viewers to navigate the longer content. Analyzing these key points can help you increase your video’s reach, visibility, and engagement.
4. Review Your YouTube Graphics
One of the most valuable elements is YouTube graphics, which narrates the whole story, or the crux of the video, with visuals. Graphics include high-quality YouTube thumbnails and banner designs according to the image size and resolution recommended by Google. The more people click on your videos, the more reach you will gain, because the more eye-catching your visuals are, the more attention they will grab. If you have low-quality graphics, you will lose the spark which results in fewer views.
If viewers leave after a few seconds, the YouTube algorithm may reduce your content ranking as it prioritizes videos that retain viewers on the platform. For this case, you should have a YouTube video editor that may resolve your editing concerns and let you focus on creating high-quality content.
5. Analyze YouTube SEO
According to Semrush, YouTube videos now show up on search engine results pages (SERPs) for more than 791.3 million queries in the US alone as of February 2024. Look for keywords and place them in your meta titles and descriptions because they describe the actual content within your videos including the most relevant hashtags. Whenever users search for a specific query, your videos will appear in the top search results if that includes content relevant to the search.
It is important to stay updated with the current trends to make you perform better and help your video become more relevant. You can also look into the viewer retention report which is only available at YouTube Analytics. Check out your competitors' content and determine where your videos stand. If you are not close enough to your competitors, you need to optimize your videos right away.
6. YouTube Analytics
Optimizing your channel for growth and understanding your audience is the main crux of YouTube Analytics. The click-through rate is an important aspect of your YouTube channel evaluation that reveals how effective your titles and thumbnails are at grabbing viewers’ attention. You need to visit YouTube Studio, and tap on the “Content” or “Reach” tab in analytics to view impression and click-through rate data. High CTR indicates visuals and titles that spark curiosity but avoid clickbait. Titles or thumbnails that don't match the content might get clicks, but low watch time can impact your channel's performance.
Analytics also empowers you to learn from the best performance. YouTube’s key moments for audience retention report will uncover the average view duration and total watch time to understand what keeps viewers engaged. You can refine your approach for future content and identify the areas of improvement.
7. Competitor Analysis
Conducting a competitor analysis is a vital step in auditing your YouTube channel. Examining successful channels within your niche can help you gain insights into what will work and what not. Analyze the type of video they produce, their upload frequency, and their video formats (vlogs, interviews, tutorials, etc.). Moreover, see how they structure their titles, descriptions, and thumbnails, and if they use any rich keywords.
Deeply assess their audience engagement such as likes, comments, and shares, by looking at their comment sections and community features. You can also find “other channels your audience watches” and “other videos your audience watched” in YouTube Analytics. Their knowledge empowers you to refine your approach and strategies, experiment with new formats, and tailor your content according to your target audience. This comparative approach helps you uncover opportunities for improvement, and differentiate your channel from the competition.
How Often Should I Audit My YouTube Channel?
Well, we suggest you audit your channel at least quarterly to stay updated with your performance, trends, and timely improvements. Regular audits help you track changes in viewer behavior, assess the effectiveness of your content strategy, and adjust to shifts in YouTube algorithms.
Additionally, frequent audits allow you to identify and resolve issues quickly, optimize SEO, and refine your video titles and thumbnails for better engagement. If you are identifying problems make sure to come up with solutions and fix them. If you keep an active eye on your major fixes most of the work will be done in the initial stages.
In The End
YouTube offers huge opportunities for creators, you just have to use them with the right strategy. We understand that YouTube audits can be frustrating but they will create a huge impact on your channel’s performance. Collect the in-depth information, curate your strategy, surpass your competitors, identify your audience’s preferences, and deliver your best. Remember, hard work requires effort but the results are worth all your worries.
Writer's Bio
Hafsa Shahzad
SEO Content Writer-Blogger
Hafsa has been working as a writer and blogger for over 3 years now. She's got a knack for writing engaging content that hits the sweet spot, especially in Digital Marketing, Big Tech Industry, and AI. When she's not glued to her writing desk, you might find her sketching beautiful portraits or preparing her favorite coffee in the kitchen.