Episode 387
Why YouTube Shorts Shouldn’t Be Ignored
People in this community have been asking me about YouTube for a long time.
Whether it’s transitioning their blog or podcast content to YouTube or just trying to understand how all of the content ties together, I get lots of questions about it. But most recently, the questions have all been about YouTube Shorts.
Since I recently launched a new YouTube channel and started a brand new channel, I’m sharing with you what I’ve learned about how you can apply those learnings too. Let’s get right to it.
Higher Reach than Regular YouTube Videos
I have two Shorts videos with over 1,200 views. For comparison, the videos similar to what we’ve published have seven & nineteen views.
Same the algorithm is giving preference to Shorts, where so many YouTube subscribers are hanging out and watching content these days.
Create Shorts from Existing Content
The cool thing about YouTube Shorts for those with an existing channel is that you can create Shorts from your current videos.
All you have to do is go to the YouTube mobile app — this doesn’t work from your desktop — and go to a video you want to create a clip from. From there, a ” remix ” button allows you to create a YouTube Shorts from your video.
What’s even cooler about this is that the traffic you reach with these types of Shorts made from existing content will redirect them back to your original long-form content. This is called the “Spider-Web” effect, which I teach in my Radical Repurposing program. (Join the waitlist here for the next time I open the doors.)
YouTube Examples:
Treat Shorts with the Same SEO Love as You Do Longer YouTube Videos
What’s so incredible about YouTube and why I choose it as the place to grow our new brand, Camping with the Fam, is the power of SEO.
With the right touch, you can create a YouTube Short specific to a topic you know your audience wants to hear about, and the reach can be far greater than it would be on another social platform. That’s the power of SEO.
Most Important SEO Features for Shorts
- Title
- Description
- Hashtags
- Tags
Can Create and Schedule Videos (Unlike Other Platforms)
One of my biggest gripes about doing Instagram Reels for a long time was that you needed to create them and then schedule them to be published later within the app. You have to make a bunch of drafts and hope you don’t lose them all in some phone update or weird tech glitch.
But with YouTube Shorts, you can create videos and schedule them to publish later.
Coming Soon: Monetization in February 2023
If you’re not already part of the YouTuber Partner Program, where you can earn money with your content, here are a few things you need to know. When you’re logged into your account, you can head over to the “Earn” tab (it used to be called “monetize” or “monetization”) and see what is required from your channel before it can start earning money from ads.
You can scroll down to the “How do I join?” section on the page and find the requirements your channel needs to meet to start making money.
We’re currently at 23 subscribers for Camping with the Fam, and we need 1,000 in total before we can apply. So, long way to go – but I know we’ll get there.
Then, and this is newer to the game, you have to either have 4,000 public watch hours (which is what I had when I started monetizing my Krystal Proffitt channel in Dec 2020. Or you have to have 10 million public views on shorts) So far, we’re at 3.4K and still a lot to go, but I do think we could get there faster with YouTube Shorts than regular videos.
If you’re going to do YouTube, you have to be open to both types of content. I heard someone in a group say they grew their channel up to 20,000 in one year just by doing YouTube Shorts for 12 months. We, as creators, can recognize short-form content, and its impact can be huge for the rest of your content.
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