Creators on YouTube often have to contend with the notion that they are being controlled by forces that they don’t fully understand, with one of the most prominent of these forces being the YouTube recommendation engine. Most creators know that if they want to make it big on the platform ,they are going to have to do so by catering to its recommendation engine. The only problem with this is that it can often be somewhat difficult to understand how this recommendation engine actually works, but YouTube is trying to answer questions that various creators might have in this regard in a recent video on their Creator Insider channel.
The first question that was addressed in a video by product manager Rachel involved bad performing videos and how this might hurt a channel’s ability to be recommended in the future. According to the YouTube employee, the only factor that is taken into consideration in this regard is how users tend to respond to various recommended videos. Hence, the underperformance of one video should ostensibly have no impact on a channel’s potential to take advantage of the recommendation algorithm.
The second question regarded thumbnails and how changing them might influence one’s rankings in the recommendation engine. While the previous point was reiterated here, namely that only user response is factored into determining a video’s recommendation potential, there does seem to be a bit of correlation in this regard. The type of thumbnail that you put up can increase or decrease the likelihood that a user would be willing to interact with your video, so making a few changes here does have the potential to impact whether or not your video is recommended.
The third question addressed content creators taking breaks since many of them worry about how this might impact future video views. Most creators are wary of the thought of taking a break since they assume that they would lose their audience if they don’t keep posting at a high enough frequency, but YouTube has done research in this regard and has found that taking breaks does not seem to have all that much of an impact on their end. In fact, the video streaming platform often emphasizes the importance of taking breaks for creators in order to prevent burnout which is something that a lot of creators seem to be struggling with.
The fourth question had to do with click through rates and their impact on recommendation engine performance. Many creators have excellent click through and engagement rates, yet in spite of the fact that this is the case they don’t really get recommended as often as they would like and this has a negative impact on their overall view statistics. According to YouTube, this is likely because of the fact that some other video is performing even better, which is something that you might not be able to understand if you look at analytics since this only tells you the performance of your own content.
The fifth question surrounded monetization and the impact this might have on recommendations. The vast majority of new content creators are not able to get monetization until they establish a better following on the platform. However, it doesn’t appear that monetization has all that much of an impact on a video’s ability to get recommended, since the recommendation engine does not possess any data on which videos are monetized and which are not. This is important since new creators need the recommendation engine a lot more than older and better established ones.
Creators will hopefully be able to get some answers to their queries thanks to this session, and it seems likely that they would want more videos like this from YouTube in the future in order to ensure transparency.
Take a peek at below video more insights:
Read next: YouTube Starts Showing Creators Significantly More Analytics
The first question that was addressed in a video by product manager Rachel involved bad performing videos and how this might hurt a channel’s ability to be recommended in the future. According to the YouTube employee, the only factor that is taken into consideration in this regard is how users tend to respond to various recommended videos. Hence, the underperformance of one video should ostensibly have no impact on a channel’s potential to take advantage of the recommendation algorithm.
The second question regarded thumbnails and how changing them might influence one’s rankings in the recommendation engine. While the previous point was reiterated here, namely that only user response is factored into determining a video’s recommendation potential, there does seem to be a bit of correlation in this regard. The type of thumbnail that you put up can increase or decrease the likelihood that a user would be willing to interact with your video, so making a few changes here does have the potential to impact whether or not your video is recommended.
The third question addressed content creators taking breaks since many of them worry about how this might impact future video views. Most creators are wary of the thought of taking a break since they assume that they would lose their audience if they don’t keep posting at a high enough frequency, but YouTube has done research in this regard and has found that taking breaks does not seem to have all that much of an impact on their end. In fact, the video streaming platform often emphasizes the importance of taking breaks for creators in order to prevent burnout which is something that a lot of creators seem to be struggling with.
The fourth question had to do with click through rates and their impact on recommendation engine performance. Many creators have excellent click through and engagement rates, yet in spite of the fact that this is the case they don’t really get recommended as often as they would like and this has a negative impact on their overall view statistics. According to YouTube, this is likely because of the fact that some other video is performing even better, which is something that you might not be able to understand if you look at analytics since this only tells you the performance of your own content.
The fifth question surrounded monetization and the impact this might have on recommendations. The vast majority of new content creators are not able to get monetization until they establish a better following on the platform. However, it doesn’t appear that monetization has all that much of an impact on a video’s ability to get recommended, since the recommendation engine does not possess any data on which videos are monetized and which are not. This is important since new creators need the recommendation engine a lot more than older and better established ones.
Creators will hopefully be able to get some answers to their queries thanks to this session, and it seems likely that they would want more videos like this from YouTube in the future in order to ensure transparency.
Take a peek at below video more insights:
Read next: YouTube Starts Showing Creators Significantly More Analytics
