Grow your YouTube podcast by feeding the algorithm
Understand why the recommendations system works - and use it to grow your show.
Honestly, when we started the New Statesman’s YouTube channel, growth was slow.
I was frustrated.
I’d grown another channel very successfully, and thought I could apply the same tactics again.
It didn’t work.
So I had to go back to basics and re-learn things I thought I knew.
Turns out, there’s a lot I didn’t know.
After watching countless hours of videos, listening to podcasts and learning from others in the YouTube podcast space, I started to employ some tactics that others suggested, and experiment with more of my own.
And traffic started to tick upwards.
Now the New Statesman YouTube channel is a second home for our podcasts, has 150,000 subscribers and counting, and reaches over a million views every month.
As more and more podcasters are incorporating video into their publishing strategy, I thought it would be a good time to share some of the things I’ve learned along the way. So in the next few issues of Podcast Strategy Weekly I’ll dive deep into specific tactics you can use to accelerate the growth of your podcast on YouTube.
To start with - how you can help the YouTube algorithm to help your videos reach an audience.
Read on…
How the YouTube algorithm works
The YouTube algorithm exists to help YouTube users discover videos that they will enjoy.
Note I didn’t say ‘to find an audience for your video’
YouTube’s first priority is to the user.
Understanding that means you can work with the algorithm to achieve the mutually beneficial goal of serving your audience with video that will delight them.
To do this, YouTube needs to understand two things:
What each user wants
What your video is about
If it knows these two things, it can get to work serving each user with videos they will enjoy.
The algorithm doesn’t think, but if it did, its thoughts might sound like this:
“Oh look, Jacob’s logged in again. Hi Jacob! Now what shall I serve him today. Hmmm… I have this video about eggs, another one about motorbikes and this third one about surfing.
The last three times he was here Jacob liked videos about motorbikes, so maybe I’ll try that one.
Oh, hang on, this one’s about a cartoon rabbit riding motorbikes. Jacob hasn’t watched cartoons very much. What else have I got?
Aha! Here’s a motorbike video featuring crazy stunts. He’s watched a couple of stunt videos in the past. He might like this one.
Here you go Jacob, try this…”
Obviously extremely reductive, but hopefully illustrates the point!
Again, two things at play: what the user wants based on their viewing history, and what your video is about.
In a previous email I explained how to help the algorithm understand the user you are aiming for. That’s quite a deep dive, so I recommend you read that email alongside this one.
The other piece of the puzzle is to help YouTube understand what your video is about.
So how do we do that?
Read on…
Use YouTube metadata to your advantage
The primary way YouTube understands the content of a video is in the information you provide in the video metadata.
There are three main places you can enter information about your video:
Title
Description
Tags
Each of these is a prime piece of real estate where you can load information to describe your video to the youtube algorithm.
While I can't find any evidence from YouTube itself that there is a priority order for how these are assessed by the algorithm (let me know if you have anything that proves this), you can think of these in priority order for the user:
The title is the first thing the user sees.
Next, the first line of the description, followed by the rest of the description if they click 'show more...'
The tags are hidden from the user, and only assessed by the algorithm.
With this in mind you can decide how you structure the information you include in each section.
My general approach is this:
The title includes the focus keyword or key phrase for the video, clearly describing what the viewer will see, arranged in an enticing sentence.
The description includes the focus key word or key phrase, as well as a number of related key words or key phrases.
The tags include the focus key word or key phrase, related key words or key phrases plus common mis-spellings of the key word (for search) and additional related key words or phrases.
Finding your keywords
There are a number of tools available to help you find the most useful keywords to describe your video content.
VidIQ or TubeBuddy are third party services which provide keyword searching tools. They allow you to enter a key word or phrase, and give you a rating of how easy it will be to rank in search for that keyword. They also provide suggestions of alternative or related keywords and a rating for each of those.
Semrush provides a similar service as an add-on to its paid SEO tools.
I've tried both VidIQ and TubeBuddy as paid services and they were useful while our channel was small. But now I normally use a free alternative: good old faithful Google Trends.
For the uninitiated: Google Trends provides a straightforward ranking of what people are searching for.
Set the timeframe and geography you're interested in, and make sure you select 'YouTube search'.
Enter up to five key phrases to compare.
The results give you a list of the 'rising' search terms related to your keyword, and the 'top' - most commonly searched - words or phrases.
It then allows you to see which are most popular relative to each other. Trends does not give absolute search volumes, but is useful for comparing terms against each other.
Example
Let's say we have a podcast video focusing on the reveal of the first week of the new Trump presidency. Your metadata might look something like this:
Title:
Trump week one: "it's like he never left"
Description:
Donald Trump has erased Joe Biden's legacy with the stroke of a sharpie. (short hook to appear before the 'see more...' fold)
From a flurry of executive orders to impromptu press huddles, the first week of Donald Trump's second term as president has cemented a new era in the White House - which is startlingly similar to his first.
[Guest name] and [Guest name] join [host name] to discuss how Trump 2.0 has all but erased the key achievements of the Joe Biden administration. They examine the impact of the second Trump era around the world - including whether the Gaza ceasefire can really be attributed to president 47, and if Elon Musk's "salute" spells trouble for the Trump regime.
Tags:
Trump, Donald Trump, Trump news, Trump latest, Trump latest news, Trump inauguration, Donald trump executive orders, Trump signing executive orders, trump signing, president trump executive orders, president trump, Joe Biden, Joe, Trump Biden, Trump Gaza, Gaza, Israel, president, Musk, Elon Musk, Elon Musk salute, Elon Musk nazi salute, Elon Musk saute, Elon Musk hitler salute, elon, elon salute, elon nazi
Also make sure you include your guest and host names, and the name of your show, in the tags.
See how, in the example above, the focus key word appears in the title, with repeated appearances in the description and tags, as well as related keywords and other phrases relevant to the discussion in both description and tags.
The tags here are taken directly from the trending search terms in Google Trends, to help the algorithm understand that this video is relevant to any or all of those terms.
Next week: advanced mode
So, that's the basics of how to use metadata to give the algorithm information to help categorise your video.
Next week I'll go into more detail on one specific advanced technique which helps you to group your videos to drive even more favourability with the YouTube algorithm. Subscribe to Podcast Strategy Weekly to get that first.
Actions you can take right now
Have a look at one of the YouTube SEO tools recommended above
Experiment with keywords relevant to your video subject matter
Make sure all your YouTube podcast videos have focus keywords and related keywords in the title, description and tags.
Worth your time
BBC narrative podcast producer Emma Weatherill has shared a fantastic article detailing how she goes about structuring long-form narrative series. It’s well worth a read.
I particularly enjoyed this section about finding cliffhangers to finish your episodes on:
What are the juiciest, most exciting parts of your story? Write those down in chronological order. See if you can put one of these at the end of each of your episodes. You're looking for moments where your hero:
is in danger
has a choice
discovers something that alters their perception/action
If your story is an investigation, your cliffhanger could be around what you've discovered e.g.
Finally going to hear from the person you've been trying to track down
New bit of data/research
These are going to be the ends of your episodes. So now work backwards. What needs to happen in the episode before this cliffhanger to build up to this point? What does the audience need to know?
As ever, thanks so much for reading. I hope you found this useful. If you did, would you consider sharing the article in one of the following ways?
Share an excerpt on social media (I’m @chrisstonetv in most places)
Forward the email to a friend
Tell someone you know about Podcast Strategy Weekly
Every new subscriber will get immediate access to my exclusive custom-designed Google Sheets template that helps podcasters understand their true top podcast episodes using data from Spotify and Apple Podcasts.
Until next time, happy podcasting!
Chris