Ask any YouTuber and they will tell you that generating significant views and subscribers isn't easy. But with the right strategy and tools, any video creator can build an engaged subscriber base when they understand what those subscribers want to watch.

Appealing to an audience to watch content you are passionate about making is just the first step, you need to know how to reach them and get your videos discovered. Our guides to how to guide more views on YouTube will give you the best tips to succeed on the platform.

Getting Views

How To Get More Views on YouTube

Getting thousands or even millions of YouTube subscribers is a dream for most creators. In the articles below, we'll show you how to turn casual viewers into long-term fans. 

Subscribers

YouTube Subscribers

Do you want to make money on YouTube? Millions of creators are earning a very good living from monetizing the platform and uploading content that drives huge views and engagements. Whether that YouTube income is from advertising revenue, merchandise sales, or brand deals, or subscriptions, we keep you updated with best practices and ideas.

Monetization

How To Make Money on YouTube

Want to see how your channel is performing? Read these YouTube analytics articles to discover what's working and what isn't. You'll learn how to identify which videos have the most Watch Time, clicks, audience retention, revenue, and more.

Analytics

YouTube Analytics

Watch Time is arguably THE most important metric on YouTube right now, and creators won’t be able to monetize their content without 4000 hours of it. But what is it and how can creators increase the amount of Watch Time their videos attract? We keep you updated on the best practices around Watch Time, and how you can increase how much your video content generates.

Watch Time

YouTube Watch Time

YouTube Shorts content is set to explode! 

All the latest tips, tricks, and rock-solid advice you need for this new feature.

YouTube Shorts

Do you know how to do keyword research so you understand what videos people are actually searching for on YouTube? Do you know how to create a custom YouTube thumbnail? Do you know how to create a Playlist on YouTube?

vidIQ has a ton of tips that will help every creator maximise their video content. We publish content every week to keep you up to date with all the best practices.

Tips & Tricks

YouTube Tips & Tricks

At vidIQ we have incredible insights into what viewers are searching for on YouTube. Not only can we confirm the top keywords being searched for, we can also show you how you can leverage that interest to create content around trending topics and tentpole events. That's going to give you a clear edge over other creators!

Insights

YouTube Insights

Your In-Depth Guide to Building a Successful YouTube Channel

average video length on YouTube still hovers around 11.7 minutes

, even after the meteoric rise of YouTube Shorts and other forms of short-form content. The need for longer content is still quite high, and one of the best ways to capitalize on it is through video essays.

YouTube video essays have exploded in popularity over the past few years, with creators building massive audiences, diving deep into everything from film analysis to social commentary. Yet despite the high interest in becoming a video essayist, there's a surprising lack of real, actionable advice online about how to actually succeed in this space.

So, today, we'll explore how you can go about achieving this successfully as a YouTube creator. Let's get started!

How to Create a YouTube Tutorial Video: Full Guide

A video essay is an essay that is presented in a visual format instead of the conventional written method. It pretty has the same components as a standard essay, consisting of 

an introduction, a main body (which may be divided into sections), and a conclusion.

Walk through YouTube video essays, and you'll find countless videos rehashing the same tired takes. 

"The Last Jedi ruined Star Wars." "Marvel movies are formulaic."

The issue isn't having these opinions—it's presenting them as fresh insights when they're actually echo chamber repetitions. Viewers can sense when you're simply repackaging existing discourse rather than adding something new to the conversation.

But that doesn't mean your takes need to "stand out" just for the sake of it. Instead of trying to be different for the sake of being different, focus on finding a way of creating videos that only you can make. This isn't about being different—it's about being irreplaceably you.

The Secret to Standing Out as a Small YouTube Creator

Before diving into the how-to, let's clarify what we mean by "voice" in video essays. Your voice isn't about:

Copying another creator's presentation format

: Your authentic self coming through the screen

: The unique understanding you bring to topics

To develop your voice, you need to identify three core elements:

: Your areas of expertise or deep knowledge

: The unique perspective only you can provide

: Experiment with various approaches to see what feels natural. Some creators are naturally analytical, while others are more emotional; some are humorous, while others are serious.

: Initially, it's acceptable to incorporate small elements from creators you admire. Notice how they structure arguments, pace their videos, or present information. But avoid wholesale copying.

: After each video, ask yourself: "Did this feel like me? What parts felt forced? What came naturally?"

: Your voice will develop and change as you create more content. Embrace this evolution rather than trying to lock yourself into a rigid style.

Let's get on with the uncomfortable truth that many aspiring video essayists don't want to hear: 

You cannot provide insightful analysis when you have no insight.

Too many creators jump into making video essays about topics they understand only at a surface level. They watch a few other videos, read some Reddit threads, and think they're ready to contribute meaningfully to the discourse.

Before you make your first video essay, ask yourself:

Have I studied beyond surface-level takes?

Can I offer perspectives that aren't already widely available?

If the answer to any of these is "no," you're not ready to make that video yet—and that's okay.

Choosing Your Niche: Become a Student First

The path to becoming a respected video essayist starts with becoming a dedicated student. Here's how:

Choose a topic you're either deeply passionate about or willing to dedicate yourself to learning inside and out. This could be:

Film analysis (specific genres, directors, or eras)

Once you've chosen your focus, immerse yourself completely:

Take online courses from reputable institutions

Join communities of serious students and practitioners

Becoming truly knowledgeable enough to offer valuable insights takes time—often years. This isn't a shortcut to YouTube fame; it's a commitment to expertise.

The goal is to become someone with significantly more insight than the average person interested in your topic. Only then can you offer something genuinely valuable.

Your voice isn't something you can pick off a shelf or decide on in advance. As the saying goes about wands at Ollivander's, "the voice chooses the creator." Finding yours requires experimentation and patience.

The 54 Best YouTube Niches, According to Viewers

Step-by-Step: How to Make a Great Video Essay

If you've followed along so far, you now know the headspace needed to become a YouTube video essay creator. Now, let's get you ready for your first video upload!

Look at what’s already been said—and ask how you can go further

Clear structure (intro, body, conclusion)

Read it out loud—does it sound like you?

YouTube Skills: How to Become a Pro at Speaking on Camera

Get a decent mic (USB condenser mics are a good start)

Use visuals to support your points, not distract

Add transitions only where they make sense

4 Editing Hacks to Make Any YouTube Video Go Viral

What makes a good YouTube video essay? Here's everything you need to know about voice, research, scripting, editing, and building a lasting channel.

How to Create a YouTube Video Essay: Full Guide

1 Studio Beta Individual video impressions and CTR

In the new YouTube Studio Beta click on Analytics then click on top videos.

A list will pull up where you can sort by highest CTR

Click on reach viewers and you will see unique viewers on the right.

This allows you to understand how many views you get per viewer. You can see this metric under build an audience.

This metric shows how your latest has done compared to other content.

With compare metrics you can compare lots of metrics together to get a visual feel for how you are doing.

If you want to take your YouTube channel to the next level then make sure to download vidIQ. It will help you research YouTube, analyze videos, audit your own channel, and take actionable steps 

Man surprised by YouTube video impressions and click-through rate analytics chart.

Do you need to know your YouTube analytics to grow your channel right? Well here's 10 you might be missing and where to find them!

10 YouTube Data Secrets You Didn't Know!

The upload process can be a daunting process. You've got thumbnails, titles, tags, hashtags, cards, endscreens, translations, description and a whole lot more to consider.

Every day we all watch videos and think, well this video is missing this or that, no wonder it isn't doing well. We've come up with a list of 15 video upload tips to follow to help your YouTube video off to a flying start.

Smiling man giving thumbs up with video camera icon and text "Crunch Time" for vidIQ.

The upload process can be a daunting process in this video we show you how to properly upload videos to YouTube.

How to Properly Upload Videos to YouTube

Need ideas on making your next video, here are 30:

Start talking to camera and see what happens

Try to add a cliff hanger at the end or beginning

Double your video length and see what happens

Or shorten your video and see if that changes the pace and tone of the video

Man pointing at glowing light bulb next to YouTube icon and text "Video Ideas"

Struggling to come up with content? Here are 30 YouTube ideas for ANY channel!

Want More YouTube Views? 30 YouTube Video Ideas To Kickstart ANY Channel

So you're a big fan of Fortnite, PUBG, Clash Royal, WWE 2K 18 or GTA V? And now you want to start a gaming YouTube channel? Awesome! Guess what? So does everyone else! There are millions of channels now about gaming, all competing for those same views and watchtime minutes.

What you want to know is why some channels stand out more than others? A lot of it has to do with channel personality, what the channel can offer that others can't and how enticing the content is. We explore this and a lot more with challenges, subtle gaming references and you'll discover what my favourite game of all time is.

How to Start a Gaming Channel on YouTube: Research is Everything!

How to Start a Gaming Channel on YouTube: The Creator is the Star

How to Start a Gaming Channel on YouTube: Focus on Your Target Audience

How to Start a Gaming Channel on YouTube: Double Down on Successful Content

YouTube tutorial start guide with Xbox controller and vidIQ logo on blue background

How to start a gaming channel on YouTube in 2018? It's one of the most competitive video spaces on the platform. Here are 10 great tips to get you started!

How to Start a YouTube Gaming Channel: Tips and Tricks

How do you get your first 100 subscribers? We've got more than 10 tips and suggestions to help you get there. Getting started on YouTube and grinding up to 100 subscribers can feel like the hardest hurdle to overcome. Where do you start with so much to think about? We've come up with some awesome suggestions to help kick-start your channel and think more like a YouTuber and less like someone chucking videos randomly onto the internet!

Man pointing at YouTube subscribe button with 100 subscribers and vidIQ logo background

Getting started on YouTube and grinding up to 100 subscribers can feel like the hardest hurdle to overcome.

How to Get 100 YouTube Subscribers FAST: Creator Tips for Success

Can you guess what question we get asked the most? It’s pretty obvious: How do I get more views on YouTube?

The answer, however, is far from obvious; unless you break it down into a hundred jigsaw pieces. And what jigsaw pieces do you look for first? The corners of course.

So let’s look at four crucial pieces of the YouTube puzzle What Do YOU Love to Talk About? YouTube knows what its audience wants, so you need to think like YouTube. Let’s say your passion is videogames. Be specific. If you love Fortnite or Call of Duty or Fifa 18, make sure to focus on that topic.

The more passionate you are about something, the more you know about it and the more confident you will be creating and sharing content about it.

Passion is an invisible vibe, energy and presence that your audience can always see.

Who Should Be Watching and Why? Don’t stop at just your favourite game, film, beauty product or superhero either. Dive deeper. Popular topics attract thousands of video creators, so you need to provide the audience with something they can’t get anywhere else.

Ask yourself this question: who should be watching and why? If you can’t answer that question then your audience won’t understand or (worst still) won’t care about your content. If someone else can answer those two questions better that’s where the audience will go.

This is your target audience and your value proposition and you should be able to sum it up in a sentence. For example: Helping Video Creators Get More Views In Less Time.

A ‘niche’ is an interest that appeals to a small, specialized section of the audience. Let’s say you buy the latest iPhone and you want to do a general video review on it. OK great, but the chances are there is a tech channel with millions of subscribers that has more resources to produce something in a shorter time frame to a wider audience.

But is that massive tech channel interested in EVERY aspect of the iPhone? Probably not, they will have another big phone release to worry about. But you? You could have a special interest in how the camera works or the best apps for productivity or how to record the screen. The chances are, if you are interested in something, there will be an audience out there who is also interested in the same thing.

This is your niche. While there may be millions of people interested in an iPhone, there may only be a few thousand interested in recording the iPhone screen, yet still passionate enough about it to create guides and tutorials that spread a message of value better than anyone else.

Dominate Your Niche and Become the Authority With passion, a target audience, a value proposition and a niche you know better than anyone else, you will start to build an audience.

Usually, there comes a point where one video outperforms everything else you’ve published before: 2x, 5x, 10x, it becomes your viral moment.

When this happens, go all in on follow up content. YouTube is telling you: you have something of value and we want to share it with more people. Your stock rising, your authority is gaining momentum, we ALL want to see more from you about something you are passionate about and can trust you with.

Try this: search for ‘Record iPhone Screen’ and you may see a very familiar vidIQ face appearing over and over again. Who knew such a niche could bring in so many views?

Channel success stories usually start with a niche that builds trust between the YouTuber and their audience. They then take that audience on a journey through more topics that stretch that authority into new, larger audiences.

Try this: do a YouTube search for ‘How Big Is’. This search term is dominated by a YouTuber called ColdFusion. The channel was already successful with tech videos that got 10,000s views. The ‘How Big Is’ video brought in millions of views and now ColdFusion is the authority on the phrase.

Person holding a sparkling red heart decoration against a red door background

Youtube Always Starts With Something You Love and Ends with Something Your Audience Trusts You With.

How to Get More YouTube Views? Passion and Authority

Here are 10 ways to reach the largest audience with the most impact:

Promote in the first 24 hours to get velocity or what we like to call View Per Hour

Share a playlist link, not a video link so that people can watch more of your videos

Share on other social media platforms like Linkedin and Facebook groups

Upload videos to Facebook directly using our vidIQ tool

Use your email list to push your YouTube channel

Use Incase you missed it posts on social platforms to remind people to watch

Man with social media icons for YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, and email on blue background

You've made a great YouTube video, now you need to share it.

10 Awesome Ways to Promote Your YouTube Videos for FREE

So you can monetize your content. That's a question being asked by many video creators. So here's 10 practical tips you can start using today to help grow your channel!

Be visual and exciting when asking people to subscribe

Use the branding watermark using a red subscribe button

Put the subscribe button in the endscreen

When sharing your channel use the auto subscribe URL

Pin a subscribe link to the top of your comments

Add vaule to other channels to increase your audience

Make sure your channel page is optimized with a great banner, trailer and sections

Man thinking with hand on chin, YouTube subscribe button, and vidIQ logo in corner

How to get 1000 Subscribers on YouTube so you can monetize your content: that's a question being asked by many video creators. So here are 10 practical tips you can start using today to help grow your channel!

How to Get 1000 Subscribers on YouTube: Creator Tips

This video breaks down how to get 4000 hours of watch time on YouTube:

Breakdown this into 20,000 minutes a month

Accpet that it takes a long time to grow on YouTube

Use the vidIQ real time stats bar to see how your doing

Man pointing at clock showing 4000 hours for YouTube monetization with dollar sign icon

You now need 4,000 hours of Watch Time and 1,000 subscribers to qualify for monetization on YouTube. Keep reading for tips to achieve those feats.

How to Get 4000 Hours Watch Time on YouTube So You Can Monetize Your Videos

Here's 10 tips on how to use playlists to get more views on YouTube!

Use keywords and phrases like you would with a title

Use exact phrase keywords on your playlist

Always share a playlist URL not a video URL

You can add videos from other channels in your playlist

Man in vidIQ shirt points to "PLAYLISTS" text with YouTube and growth arrow icons.

YouTube Playlists: you probably use them but do you know just how powerful they are?

Get More Views With 10 Playlists Tips

Build a better community, save time responding to comments and use YouTube's secret comment weapon! All of which is part of growing your channel to gain my subscribers and better serve your audience with the message you want to spread.

Here are 10 YouTube Tips to improve engagement:

React to comments by giving a thumbnails up and heart button

Use the pin comment for content you want people to see

Go through the spam tab to make sure real comments were not put in there

Man whispering tips with text comment tips, YouTube, like, and heart icons on blue background

Here are 10 YouTube Tips to improve engagement, build a better community, save time responding to comments and use YouTube's secret comment weapon! All of which is part of growing your channel to gain more subscribers and better serve your audience with the message you want to spread.

How to Get MORE YouTube Views by Building a Community Around Your Content

We created a quick video to help describe how you can take advantage of the Pokemon Go phenomenon:

Install the vidIQ Chrome Extension to Get These Stats.

Pokémon Go logo surrounded by related keywords like gym, battle, Pikachu, and gameplay.

Pokemon Go is a worldwide sensation right now, and if you are a YouTube creator or marketer, you must be on this.