17 Smart Tactics to Boost your Brand Following and Sales on YouTube
Table of Contents
Introduction to YouTube
Familiar with the iconic red play button, YouTube yet? If not quite, you’re going to want to get with the program because it certainly yields great results that you can’t afford to miss.
It’s a video sharing platform where people can stream, post videos free of charge, and potentially get rich from it!
With a total number of 2 billion monthly active users worldwide and a total number of 30 million daily active users, this creates urgency for marketers and businesses to promote their products or services on YouTube.
According to statistics, as of May 2019, more than 500 hours of video are uploaded into YouTube every minute which equates to approximately 30,000 hours of newly uploaded content per hour. Check out the stats!
SOURCE: Hours of video uploaded into YouTube every minute.
Also, people watch a billion hours of video and generate billions of views! YouTube is officially the 2nd largest search engine in the world, after Google.
Today, it is proven that marketers or businesses that use videos boost their revenue 49% faster than those who don’t.
This insane amount of content on YouTube has increased drastically to meet the consumer’s demand for video content.
Who doesn’t want a piece of the pie? Marketers and business owners can’t afford to NOT take advantage of YouTube.
But of course, your brand’s success requires a solid marketing strategy to create brand awareness, boost sales, and improve your ROI of your YouTube and overall marketing strategy.
This is why many marketers and businesses must master this platform to stay ahead of their digital marketing game. There’s no better time than NOW.
To help your brand make an impact on YouTube, we managed to gather a list of effective tactics to apply to boost your brand following and sales on YouTube. Ready for it? Let’s begin!
17 Tactics to Boost your Brand Following & Sales on YouTube
The tactics will be segmented into two: How to Boost Brand Following & How to Boost Sales.
Let’s start with “How to boost your brand following” first.
1. Video descriptions are key
Not including any video description or caption is a big no-no as your viewers (every single one of them) deserve to be guided from initial contact with your video until it ends and also it helps the YouTube algorithms to decipher the context of your video, which can result in higher rankings for your brand. The descriptions are usually kept short, direct, and concise and capped at about 250 words. Make sure to include your main keyword in the first 25 words and to avoid it looking congested, use only about 3-4 keywords in the description.
Your video description should inform your viewers what they can expect from your video by highlighting the main points that will be covered throughout the video.
You should also include a timestamp if your video is a little long. To conclude your description, include your website link or any important social media links you want to connect your audience to for wider reach.
2. All about metadata
Metadata is just a fancy term to describe the titles, descriptions, captions, tags, cards, and thumbnails of your videos. They can be added when you’re uploading videos and can be edited anytime after.
The metadata is used to help YouTube understand what your video is about so the algorithm can detect it and suggests it to an appropriate audience. Any form of content is considered important on YouTube, so it’s always best to take even the tags and category of your video by doing your research and add relevant keywords and select the category of your video to reach your rightful audience.
3. Set up your YouTube
This is a step that needs to be prioritized by every marketer or brand that wants to succeed on any social media platform — especially YouTube!
Completing your information is an essential step to make a great first impression of your brand, as it will be the first piece of content the audience is understanding about your brand.
This is also a great way to optimize your YouTube channel. Make sure you’ve got the following covered:
- Channel description:
It should be short and direct enough to tell your audience what your content is going to be about and boosts higher in search. Always include some relevant keywords in your channel description.
For example, if you provide recipes or “How-to” cooking tutorials. Mention it and slide it into your hall of main keywords.
- Connect to other social sites
If your brand is present in more than one social media channel, make sure you include links to your channel from other sites too. This will encourage your viewers to follow your brand on more than one platform to create a community or a valuable following.
4. Add a touch of channel art
The channel art on YouTube is the background image you use in your profile and channel icon. It is what makes your channel stand out from most of the YouTube channels. Bright and bold colors are highly recommended and give your brand a memorable touch.
Don’t have the creative touch or eye for design? Let’s paint the town red!
Here’s an example of channel art.
SOURCE: Adobe Creative Cloud
5. Titles must be catchy!
Titles are the first thing a viewer will see before they decide if they want to click on your video or not, so it has to be well crafted to grab your audience’s attention. A title that packs a punch!
For your channel to be successful on YouTube, content is one of the most important factors that will make or break your brand, so take your time to churn out relevant content that intrigues your audience and sparks curiosity. If it isn’t catchy enough, there’s a chance they will skip your video and watch the next one. And that’s an ouch for you.
Here are some essential tips for writing effective titles for your YouTube videos:
- Short & Snappy
Nobody has time or space to read a lengthy title, everyone’s busy scrolling for the next catchy title that captures their attention. Keep your titles short and punchy and limit them to 60 characters or it will get cut off.
- Include keywords & be human
Are you a robot? If not, then it shouldn’t be a problem sounding human enough and keeping it conversational. Make sure the keyword research is relevant too.
- Clear description
Tell your viewers what your video is all about in less than a sentence if possible. It’s not easy to sound human sometimes but make sure it packs a punch!
- Avoid click baits
It does mean what it means and brings more clicks to your video. However, it’s not a good option because if your viewers do click on your video and don’t find the information they expected, they will just leave immediately. The YouTube algorithm is able to detect that your video is not as engaging, and it will decrease your rankings.
Here are some examples of catchy video titles on YouTube about cooking steak. Drool!
6. Customize thumbnails
One thing to always take into consideration is that YouTube is a visual platform. Your job as a marketer or brand is to make sure that the video that will pop up in search, suggestions, or Google is highly enticing and click-worthy. Thumbnails are important because users look at the thumbnail before they even read your title sometimes. In fact, according to the stats, 90% of top-performing videos on YouTube use custom thumbnails and that’s contributing to their performance too.
Here’s an example of YouTube videos with attractive thumbnails by Vogue.
Here are some tips to consider for your YouTube thumbnails:
- Image formats: JPG, GIF, BMP, or PNG.
- Thumbnail resolution: 1280x720px
- Aspect ratio: 16:9
- File size: 2MB
- Close-up shots (recommended)
- Readable text with large fonts and nice background.
- Include brand logo to your thumbnail
7. Strategize your playlist
This is a great way to get views and optimize your channel at the same time. Think of playlists like an album of related videos.
Here are the benefits of playlists:
- Easier channel navigation
Brands that bother to group related videos into playlists make life easier for the viewers to locate the videos they are looking for without searching high and low.
By doing this, you’re giving your viewer the power of choice as they’re choosing what they want to choose. This is very useful when it comes to a video series your brand has created so once they’re all situated in the playlist section, viewers can easily go there to indulge and binge-watch without the hassle of finding the next episode which can be frustrating at times.
- Generate more views
In the playlist section, the videos play after one another as it does on Netflix when it eases off to the next episode. And this is minus the distractions. It’s a good way for your brands to include their less popular videos in the playlist so there’s a high chance of viewers will watch it and this increases the watch time in your YouTube channel. It’s an important factor when it comes to YouTube rankings.
Here’s an example of a Playlist section on Vogue YouTube.
8. Create contests and giveaways
Just like on any other social media platform such as Facebook, Instagram, and more, contests or giveaways always create hype and generate interaction — hence engagement.
If executed well, a contest can grow a large organic following on your channel, attract more subscribers to your channel, and boost your engagement rates.
Here are some tips on how to create a great contest:
- List your goals and objectives and how you will achieve them.
- The prize of the contest must be relevant and aligned to your brand or industry. For instance, if your channel is about beauty, it would be appropriate to giveaway attractive make-up related or skincare treatment goodies to the winners so they will be interested to even participate in the first place.
- Streamline your contest mechanic and make it as simple as possible to join your contest because people don’t like the hassle and want things almost instantly. Don’t give them more homework on top of a challenge.
- Cross-promote your contest on other social media platforms to broaden your reach and chances of it going viral.
- Your contest should be free of charge, according to the YouTube Contest guidelines.
Creativity is the most important of any contest! Your brand should come up with a fun video encouraging the audience to participate in your contest, how it works in terms of rules, and how to win it!
Remember you’re not limited to one social media channel to make this announcement so it would be good for your brand awareness to build the suspense on other social media platforms too to increase the hype, interaction, momentum, and energy of your upcoming contest.
Give your audience a reason to look forward to your contest, with your brand in their minds.
SOURCE: My Protein Pro box Giveaway Contest sample of a cool contest giveaway
9. Expand with Subtitles
Understand that the world is bigger than it seems and when it comes to your brand presence and information, it is highly recommended you grow your audience with subtitles available in other languages because you want to maximize reach.
YouTube is currently available in 100 countries, 80 languages, and it’s definitely an advantage of gaining access to this audience for the growth of your YouTube channel and brand awareness.
Adding subtitles to your videos is the most effective way to get your brand message across. You can go with auto-generated captions, upload a document with the transcript of the video, and adjust it manually. When it comes to languages, you’re tapping into a worldwide audience with this extra step. It makes all the difference for your brand.
SOURCE: Subtitle options in other languages.
10. Involve your audience
This might be surprising and direct, but always remember the audience loves to express their opinions and are always curious. It’s a human thing. after all.
Create a video by asking your audience what type of topics they would like to see more of or what issues need solving, or if you have a video series, ask them for their feedback on what the next episode should cover?
Approach them casually and encourage them to answer you in the comment section below or hold polls to create engagement and hype. But, it doesn’t necessarily always have to be the brand reaching out to the audience, sometimes it’s more fun when it’s the other way round.
This method has been proven to be effective when generating relevant content because it comes directly from the source. Plus, everyone wants to feel involved!
Here’s a sneak peek at Vogue’s video featuring Editor-in-Chief of Vogue Magazine, big-time fashion influencer, and is said that the 2006 film, “The Devil Wears Prada” is actually based on Anna Wintour. Let’s take a look as she answers questions from intimidated strangers being interviewed on the streets.
SOURCE: Anna Wintour Q&A session with random strangers.
11. Festive posts
Holidays or festive seasons just apply to everyone! You can be the smartest marketer in town, yet still, fall for the festive gimmicks. It’s more than just a gimmick, it’s the memorable experience people are yearning for.
Festive can mean any season from Chinese New Year, Halloween costume ideas, Christmas gift ideas, and more. It all depends on your creativity and imagination.
Start by understanding your audience more and see what they could potentially need during the holiday season. Festive video posts always have high exposure and generate views because it is time relevant.
Mark your calendar for every festive season and plan a strategy around it to create more value than your brand being just another festive post. What do you have to offer?
Check out this Holiday post from Bark Box, in collaboration with YouTube influencer, Julia k crist, promoting their Christmas Holiday Peanuts edition. She even uses links to direct users to the Barkbox website and mentions their hashtag in the description below to drive the users to Barkbox and also create awareness.
The number of views is already quite promising and it’s not even Christmas yet! You can do something similar by partnering with an influencer and allowing them to create content the way they do best! It adds a personal touch and gives it an authentic vibe rather than just a brand video that is scripted and well-prepared. Every brand needs to find the right balance sometimes.
SOURCE: BarkBox collaboration with Julia K Crist YouTube influencer.
12. Include videos in emails
If you have an existing mailing list of visitors to your website, you can always include your YouTube videos in your emailing list and perform an email blast to your visitors.
You can choose to update your audience with a new video via email every time or only when necessary.
First, you must understand your purpose of doing this and always offer a short description of what your video is about. Once again, make it presentable with a compelling title and attractive thumbnail.
Now, let’s move on to tactics on “how to boost sales”.
13. Invest in SEO
Now that we know YouTube is the second largest search engine in the world and that people visit it daily to find solutions to their problems, educate themselves, or are on it for entertainment, the fact is they’re on it because it’s a reliable source. This is when you will need to invest time in your YouTube SEO.
Start by conducting keyword research and see what shows up to understand your audience’s thought process and what they’re searching for, then you can optimize your content according to those specific keywords highlighted.
Keyword research is an important step and aspect in creating a successful SEO strategy and the more thorough and detailed your keyword research is, the more you will understand what your audience is searching for or which topics are trending and in-demand which will prepare you with ideas for your next video.
The most effective, yet simplest way to create a list of keywords is on the YouTube search engine itself. Start with typing a keyword for a specific topic you want to highlight, and the suggested search list will appear and give you an idea of what people are searching for on YouTube. Other alternatives to expand your keyword research would be sites like Buzzsumo, SEMrush, Google Keyword planner, and many more.
Here’s an example of a YouTube search and suggested search list.
If you would like to extend your research further, you can perform more advanced keyword research with a tool called TubeBuddy, which is a great place to start your research. This tool is free and provides insights on your competitor’s videos by the keywords they are targeting and incorporates the same keywords as them. With YouTube search again, you can analyze the highest-ranking videos, view the tags of videos your competitors are using, and even conduct a comparison with your brand videos using TubeBuddy.
Here’s an example of Video analytics from the beauty brand, Sephora if you’re in the beauty industry for instance.
Here’s a meaningful quote that sinks in deep. Every time you do your research, refer to this for inspiration, and embrace it.
“Success leaves clues. Be a better observer of the winners and the losers, those who are doing well and those who are falling behind.”
-Jim Rohn
14. Add Call-To-Action elements
On YouTube, call-to-action buttons are an indispensable tool, especially when you want to get more subscribers to your channel or increase views. A common form of call-to-action among YouTube creators would be “Please hit the like and subscribe button if you like this video” and it usually works for users that find the video helpful.
You would be surprised, you can ask users to like, add a comment, or share your videos to boost your overall engagement.
If you want to direct your viewers to your online store, don’t forget to include a link in the video description and encourage your audience to follow the link too.
Another great tactic is to include call-to-action social media buttons to direct your audience to certain social media sites.
Here’s a brilliant example of how Walt-Disney leveraged the use of social media buttons by situating them at the end of the Moana trailer video on YouTube to direct the audience to follow the movie on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Tumblr, enabling Walt-Disney to consistently reach content about Moana to their new followers to create awareness and hype for the movie.
SOURCE: Moana call-to-action buttons on YouTube.
15.Collaborate with Influencers
A creative strategy to work on a friendly collaboration with influencers or creators on YouTube.
However, on YouTube, it’s best to follow some golden rules when collaborating with a YouTube influencer:
- Define your objectives
What do you intend to achieve out of this collaboration? Do you really need an influencer?
It’s best to clarify your KPIs so you can look for the perfect influencer that can help you achieve it.
- Understand YouTube targets a younger audience from teenagers to young adults.
- Find the right YouTube influencers
Don’t just blindly go for popularity, see if they are suitable for your brand and if you can imagine them creating value out of your brand.
- Do your research
Once your brand collaborates with an influencer, there’s no going back and one tiny mistake could ruin your brand reputation, so it’s best to ask yourself if you’re willing to allow an outsider to communicate your brand for you.
- Brief them then leave them be
You need to be clear with your brief, so they stay aligned with your goals, then you have to let go a little and let them work their magic for your brand.
- Settle for long-term
A long-term plan is more promising with an influencer than one-offs because there are a reputation and trust that needs to be built by your influencer. Good things take time.
- Involve your brand from the start
Whatever you do, always park your brand name there or have your influencer mention it in their videos because it will leave an impression on your audience, and if they find out later that, it will be harder to form trust with your brand.
- Treat them with respect
- Negotiate the terms clearly
This collaboration needs to complement both parties so name your price, negotiate the pricing & payment terms, and come to an agreement with your influencer.
- Measure your brand KPIs and marketing goals to see if the collaboration is helping you reach your desired goal, if not, re-strategize.
Here’s an example of an online consignment store, thredUP partnering with social media influencers, Steph and Matilda of Primrose Makeup channel on YouTube, where they share lifestyle-related content and are known for it. To leverage on their large millennial audience, the idea of “Top 10 weird college lifehacks” was a smart move which not only provided valuable advice but easily described the benefits of thredUP’s brand and services and strategically sliding in their promotional code towards the end of the video to boost sales.
SOURCE: thred UP vid brand collaboration video with an influencer.
16.Cross-promote YouTube channel on other platforms
A great way to attract views and boost your engagement with your videos is to cross-promote your channel online. You can promote your brand via your website, email, social media platforms, community question and answer sites like Quora, and where you think there’s a potential audience.
- If you’re a blogger and want to start YouTube videos, sharing your videos in your blog is a fantastic way to drive traffic to your YouTube channel.
- If your brand has a website, you should embed your videos on the homepage or most popular pages on your site.
- If your brand has existing social media channels such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, and others with a fan base, even better! Share your videos on social media and repurpose your content according to the crowd. The best part is that since your brand has already established a fanbase on these platforms, there’s a high chance your followers will be interested in your content and are likely to engage with your video posts. Having trouble with that? Here are 11 Surefire Ways to Promote your Brand and Boost Sales on Instagram.
The more reach your video has, the higher the chances are of scoring new views and subscribers to your YouTube channel. It’s good to diversify on various promotional platforms, but don’t forget who your core audience is and prioritize those platforms.
Here’s an example of cross-promotion by Vanessa Lau and how she drives traffic to her YouTube channel using Instagram.
SOURCE: Cross-promoting YouTube channel on Instagram by famous social media entrepreneur.
Another example of cross-promotion is another video from Uncle Roger, a famous comedian that became famous for his “haiya” comments on the way the BBC host cooks rice. It’s absolutely hilarious! This is how they cross-promote by directing Instagrammers to the full YouTube link in bio. LOL.
SOURCE: Uncle Roger Video directs users to click the link in bio to watch the full video on YouTube.
Do you wish to cross-promote your YouTube channel the way Uncle Roger but aren’t sure which channel to cross with? Allow our digital wizards to make that happen for you! Let’s get in touch.
17.Build Brand Advocacy
The key to success really depends on building valuable relationships and establishing trust with your audience. The survival of your brand really depends on your audience — building an army of brand advocates is every marketer’s goal.
Whenever you feel lost, just look at how Starbucks has created its loyal army of brand soldiers.
If you manage to establish a loyal fanbase, it is a good start to building brand advocates that are die-hard fans of your brand, they don’t mind promoting your brand voluntarily and spreading the word. As powerful as social media is, word-of-mouth and experience from a customer is the most powerful tool for marketers, but it is the power of content that drives this positively emotional advocacy. Master the art of How to Create killer Social Media Content: 12 Creative Tips that Drive Results!
Here is a prime example of a brand advocate voluntarily spreading the word around for an ethical brand called Patagonia. The world is slowly changing, along with our consumer’s mindsets and how they are slowly becoming aware of ethical and environmentally conscious brands, just like this video of how Mark Kwak thinks it is a fantastic brand as he shows their [products and talks about how it is his preferred brand. He believes Patagonia has really “thought it through” overall for their consumers. Even to the extent of their impeccable customer service!
Conclusion
To wrap this up, it turns out that there’s a lot more to this iconic red play button called YouTube.
With a total number of 2 billion monthly active users worldwide, it is certainly dominating the world you want to be a part of as a marketer or a business owner.
Now that we are in the era of smartphones and mobile phone usage is on the rise, YouTube is ready and highly optimized to satisfy its users and to fill that void — so should your brand.
Want to create a gripping video for your brand but haven’t quite decided on a strategic plan yet? Leave the brainwork to us at Synergy XYZ.
