How to Improve Your YouTube CTR ─ 6 Best Practices and Strategies

Source: searchenginejournal.com

Are you searching for a way to improve your YouTube channel? According to the data which claim that today’s modern people view more than 1.5 billion videos per day, it shouldn’t be that hard, right? But somehow you just can’t seem to get there.

To create your viewer’s base and keep them interested in what you post, in other words, handle audience retention. Audience retention means the percentage of views a certain video has on YouTube, and videos with a high percentage usually rank well.

A few years ago, the number of views was one of the most important ranking factors, so videos with more views ranked better.

However, the platform realized over time that more views do not necessarily mean a better video, and today the focus is on quality. If the video percentage is not watched much, and if it is not interesting for users, it will be much more difficult to rank in a better place in the search.

There’s so much to have in mind when dealing with this platform, but today, we’re going to concentrate on CTR and strategies you can utilize to increase it.

1. Create a Meaningful and High-Quality Video Description

Source: businessinsider.com

In the description of the video, keywords are also of great importance. The description of the video is a space used to better convey the idea of the video to the viewers. It is also there to provide additional information as well as to inform search engines what the video is about. Read more about this in the following lines.

If you engage in writing high-quality descriptions under the videos that you market to your audience, you will immediately notice a CTR (click-through rate) and therefore an increase in the number of views. It is very logical. If you make it easy for your audience and search engines to understand what the video is about, they will know what to expect in the video. Consequently, the number of clicks will increase.

2. Work to Increase Subscribers

Most YouTubers struggle with followers on their channels. It often happens that they have views, clicks, and even comments, but people just don’t want to subscribe to the channel.

Ask yourself – how many channels do you subscribe to?

One of probably the easiest ways to increase the number of subscribers to a channel is to simply tell people to subscribe. We know it sounds ridiculous and too simple, but sometimes people need to be reminded to take a certain action.

If you vlog, don’t forget to tell people to subscribe if they liked the content. You will see that this tactic works.

3. Use Cookies and Fore From SEO Optimization for Google

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The good news for all those familiar with SEO optimization for Google is that YouTube optimization is largely similar. After all, one bought the other, so their algorithm is quite similar.

Some basic things you can start with are a keyword in the title of the video, as well as in the description of the video. If you’ve been following digital tricks carefully, you probably already know what that description should look like.

Video tags should also contain keywords. All these will help your video to rank better to some extent, but what is still of key importance is the quality of the video itself.

We know it sounds like an overused phrase, but the content is always king, both in the form of text and video. If your content is interesting enough and provides value to the user, the video has a high chance of ranking well and being clicked on.

4. Use Auto-Play for Embedded Clips

Autoplay allows the video to play automatically, without the user clicking on it. This option has both good and bad sides because if you enable it, you should know that many users find it irritating.

If some clips are closely related or are from several episodes, then it is a great idea to enable automatic playback. However, try not to overdo this option.

5. Create Playlists

Source: sguru.org

Create playlists for closely related clips, so viewers can easily follow the whole topic. In this way, you will surely reduce the outflow of users from your channel. After the first video ends, subsequent clips will automatically play in sequence. This will surely ensure more views for each video watched because the user has to leave the player to stop the continuation.

You can create lists and post them to a channel, or just create them for social sharing purposes. Whatever you decide, it’s useful to make them, because they certainly ensure more clicks than if the clips are off the list.

Make sure you group them together meaningfully and that increase in clicks and views isn’t the only reason you’re doing it. Think about how you will make it easier for the viewer and what you would like to see after one of your clips. Put yourself in the role of a spectator. Lists are very useful for singers if they want to group songs by albums. Also, for educational content, as well as for shows and other similar content.

6. Share Links on Your Social Networks

Cross-respect on different platforms can be extremely useful if done in moderation. This is especially effective for YouTube videos, as it is one of the most effective ways to drive traffic. You can reach your entire target group if you share the link on your social media accounts. You can share the link in a new post, put it in your profile description (bio) or just run a paid advertisement.

It’s important to know that by driving traffic from social media to YouTube, you’re doing yourself a favor. This happens because the algorithm registers that YOU are the reason users come to the YouTube platform and will reward you for that with clicks.

As far as the CTR goes, this is more or less it. It may seem like a lot, but once you get into it, it will become a routine, and you’ll enjoy the rise in CTR percentage.