Your Do’s and Don’ts Checklist to Running a YouTube Campaign
how to become a youtuber,
What are the do’s and don’ts when running a YouTube campaign?
- Do’s:
- Do know what you are doing, and what it is for.
- Do something unique , though don’t overdo it.
- Do tell a story.
- Do optimize your video for SEO.
- Do organize your YouTube channel.
- Don’ts:
- Do not aim for all your videos to go viral.
- Do not rely solely on views to measure the campaign’s success.
- Do not leave the video description section blank.
- Do not overuse annotations on your videos.
- Do not upload for the sake of having a video published for the day.
If you’re one of the many video production companies in the Philippines or abroad who are looking to up the ante when it comes to Youtube campaigning, then you ought to know that basic do’s or don’ts when setting one up.
Now, creating a campaign in the world’s second largest search engine may seem like a cakewalk for some, after all, isn’t it just about creating a video and then waiting for the views to come rolling in? And while that’s an integral part of the process, that’s not the whole of it.
In order to help you build on that fundamental step better, we have listed 5 do’s and 5 don’ts that will definitely give you an edge.
The Do’s
Do know what you are doing, and what it is for.
As someone who owns a business, it’s important to understand the nature of the move you are doing before you even proceed with performing it. This goes in the form of:
- What you are marketing
- Who your target market is
- What you want to happen with it
In order to see these principles in action, let’s use an example. Take the popular skin and hair care brand Dove and their #ChooseBeautiful campaign. In order to bolster their brand’s focus on empowering women and making them feel more beautiful, they conducted an international social experiment and turned its results into an ad that pulled at the heartstrings (which ensured engagement).
In San Francisco, Shanghai, Delhi, London, and Sao Paulo, Dove created a simple yet effective setup. 2 doors, adjacent to each other, were each labelled “average” and “beautiful”. A small division was placed between the two doors, herding people to pick a path in order to enter a building.
At the beginning of the video, most girls were shown to pick the “average” door. But by the end, many picked the “beautiful” door instead, and an emphasis was placed on one woman who had always picked the average door the past few days but had one day decided to go through the beautiful door instead.
It sent Dove’s message loud and clear: beauty is a choice. Choose beautiful.
As you can see, when creating a video for a YouTube campaign, it’s not just about the product. Rather, it’s about the effect that your campaign creates, and how it impacts your viewers. Now you see why planning for your campaign is so important. It has to have meaning, it has to have a goal, and it has to evoke a reaction – whether emotional or otherwise.
Do something unique, though don’t overdo it.
Another factor that could contribute to your video’s success has to do with your originality. No one wants to watch something that’s exactly the same as the others in its niche, so it’s important that you’re able to set yourself apart from your competitors. Being a copycat will not only hurt your views, but your potential ranking in the results pages as well.
A perfect example of this is the Running Man Challenge. It’s a ‘minimal’ dance routine that went viral because of two University basketball players who tried to make their own version of the original duo’s dance. This very instance can only prove that unless you have performed a fresh, entertaining version of something that already is popular, people wouldn’t take time to view it.
Do tell a story.
To ensure that people resonate with you and your channel, make sure that you’re telling a story. Don’t upload random videos that have no central theme. You’re better off staying within your niche and engaging a certain audience than trying to get everyone to watch your videos.
To do so, try creating a timeline, making each post relevant to each other so that people will find themselves looking forward to whatever you have planned next. Then, always remind yourself that the video has to connect with people, otherwise, they won’t come back.
Do optimize your video for SEO.
If you’re already familiar with SEO, it shouldn’t be too hard to do this part.
- First and foremost, incorporate your target keyword into the video title. This will boost your SEO and will help your video appear in the upper part of the search results.
- Secondly, do not forget the target and relevant keywords as you write your video’s description along with the full URL.
- Lastly, add all those keywords that you aim to hit in the tags field.
However, as you include keywords on every part of this section, avoid keyword/tag stuffing as this can harm your channel and your business as well.
Do organize your YouTube channel.
One way to keep your viewers from coming is to organize your brand’s YouTube channel. This is best practiced when your channel’s still at its infancy, and most important when you have already posted a number of videos with varying categories.
For example, you may sort related videos according to a particular category and create a playlist. This is due to the fact that there are viewers who love to scan through channels to look for a specific video. Even more, it will help people from determining which video is for the customers and which is for corporate purposes, depending on the type of viewer who visited your channel.
The Don’ts
Do not aim for all your videos to go viral.
There’s always a time and place for a particular video to go viral, however, it’s not always. After all, a wrong move (i.e. extra efforts such as posting on other sites like Vimeo) or video (i.e. irrelevant content) can put your channel at risk and will have people leaving or ignoring your videos in your next posts.
Do not rely solely on views to measure the campaign’s success.
As marketers always say, “quality over quantity”. Views by its own don’t count too much, unless all of them turn into staunch followers of your channel. That said, focus your efforts on gaining new, relevant subscribers who are more likely to be converted into paying customers.
Do not leave the video description section blank.
Much like leaving your meta descriptions empty, leaving your video description section blank is a missed opportunity in SEO. As mentioned in the fourth ‘do’ above, you have to make your description target and relevant keyword rich in order for search engines to find you and increase your SEO rankings. Once you get to the first page of search results, this will help people find your content and discover your channel.
Do not overuse annotations on your videos.
Annotations are the little bits of text floating in YouTube videos that encourages viewers to visit the actual site of the uploader or to see more of the details relevant to the video itself. While this may be a good strategy in increasing traffic to your website, you should use them only when they’re appropriate. Otherwise, you may end up just annoying your viewer.
Do not upload for the sake of having a video published for the day.
While there are mumblings that your upload schedule plays a large role in how YouTube sees your channel and how it gauges your performance, never forget that you also have to please your audience. By uploading every day, you may end up sacrificing the quality of your content, thus making you lose subscribers.
Even if you do publish on a daily basis, (which is possible for some creators though they’re the exception and not the rule), just make sure that you never run out of things to offer your viewers.
Key Takeaway
With this checklist, you’ll definitely be able to pick up the right strategy when running your YouTube campaign. Just remember to put content on top of the plan and make it as interactive/informative/entertaining as possible. Who knows? You may even go viral.
