YouTube Analytics: Track the Right Metrics to Get More Subscribers

How do you know whether your YouTube videos are performing? Are they reaching the right audience? What are the necessary strategies required to grow your YouTube channel? The answer to all these questions is loud and clear — YouTube Analytics!

YouTube Analytics, yes probably you know it, as a matter of fact must have seen it. But are you the creator who knows which are key YouTube metrics you should be keeping a close watch on?

Video creators often make the mistake of not looking into the analytics frequently. This practice can hamper the video views and engagement on many levels.

Thus, understanding YouTube analytics is important for every video creator!

We know that it is important to rely on your creative side while making videos, but it is also important to know what your target audience is interested in. Following your YouTube video analytics can help you decode what your viewers actually want. Moreover, with brands focusing on video content, it is imperative to know metrics such as your YouTube channel demographics . Better, you can also opt for a YouTube analytics tool so you can get advanced analytics and leverage them to grow your channel.

Following is what you will learn:

• What is YouTube analytics?
• Why is YouTube analytics helpful?
• How can you leverage data from YouTube analytics?
• Unbox Social — YouTube Analytics Tool
• Growing Importance of Having YouTube Analytics Tool in 2020

What is YouTube Analytics?

YouTube Analytics measures your overall video content performance with regards to likes, dislikes, number of views, audience demographics, subscribers, top videos, traffic sources and other metrics. These YouTube analytics metrics help you understand how your audience is reacting to your videos and whether they are engaging with your content or not.

Now that you know how important YouTube analytics metrics are, here is a simple step guide to view the YouTube analytics dashboard.

1. Log in to your YouTube account
2. Once you login, click on the top-right corner where you will see your profile picture
3. Head to the YouTube Studio and you shall see your dashboard
4. On the YouTube analytics dashboard, you will see all the metrics with their data like views, subscribers, etc.
5. To go to the analytics section, go on the left-hand side of the screen and you shall see an option for Analytics
6. Once you land on the analytics select the duration you want insights for and get started!

Why is YouTube Analytics helpful?

Even though you have a YouTube channel that’s buzzing with engagements, there is no harm in increasing those numbers. The larger your subscriber base, the more you have a hold over your niche!

Having your YouTube analytics reports along with YouTube subscriber analytics will help you create high-quality content that matters to your viewers.

Your channel performance no longer solely depends on your video content, it also relies on a lot of other factors like title, thumbnails, watch time, and video quality. Getting to know where you are falling short in terms of viewership and engagement can help you detect the problem easily. We are sure by now you are convinced that YouTube statistics and data are more than just random figures floating around on the YouTube analytics dashboard .

Metrics To Track From YouTube Channel Analytics

When you go to Channel analytics, you’ll see the following options:

• Overview
• Reach
• Engagement
• Audience
• Revenue

You can play around and see what YouTube has to offer from their tracking dashboard. Just for you to know below is a snapshot of what more you can track from YouTube Studio.

Now you are aware about the the many YouTube metrics you can track for your YouTube channel. It is overwhelming!

While many of us now know about YouTube insights , how do you use them for video creation is the question that goes unanswered. For most people, YouTube channel analytics only means the number of views their videos are getting. However, there is more to it than just that. Let’s look at some of the important YouTube metrics that have the power to change your channel scores.

Tracking the Right YouTube Metrics

Watch time

The more number of minutes viewers spend on your video the more is its engagement level. This metric takes into account the total number of minutes viewers have spent watching your videos. This will help you understand whether people are actually watching your content or not! See which videos have garnered the most number of minutes and decode what is your audience interested in!

Views

You can track the number of views with YouTube analytics. You can look at your overall YouTube channel views as well as the views for every video that you put out. YouTube video and channel views are vanity metrics. Looking at just your YouTube views is not the right way to measure your YouTube channel’s success. But, it is important to closely watch the dips and jumps in your views. This way you can catch onto the trends and make changes to your YouTube strategy.

Average percentage viewed

This category measures how much percent of each of your video is seen by an average viewer. If the percentage is too low it means your videos are not connecting with your viewers and subscribers. This will help you create videos that actually get you views and engagements. Having a low percentage of views can also affect your ranking.

Audience Retention

Not many video creators want to know if their viewers stopped watching their videos midway! Well, having this information can help you curate better videos. Audience Retention will tell you the point where your viewers stopped watching the video! This says a lot about how much attention your videos are able to garner and the points in the video that are drawing them away.

Sadly, you are not alone in this race to grab the audience’s attention; you are bound to have competitors too.
YouTube will tell you all about your own videos but YouTube analytics for other channels is still tricky to get. But with the help of a YouTube video analytics tool like Unbox Social , you can see what your competitors are up to.

Audience Demographics

YouTube Analytics also provides you with basic insights about your audience. This metric helps you understand where your audience is located geographically. You can also explore the gender and age demographics for your audience here. Since you are creating content for your target audience, these insights definitely help in shaping your strategy according to audience interests and aspirations.

Playback Locations

People can share your YouTube videos by embedding them on websites or blogs. When people share your videos, it shows that they found your content worthy enough to be circulated. This is vital intelligence you can use to get a sense of where your content is getting shared.

Further, this report shows the estimated number of minutes watched as well as average view duration, for a given playback location.

Traffic Sources

Tracking the sources of traffic is equally important when it comes to creating your YouTube strategy. Here, you get to know where your video viewers are coming from. Your YouTube video traffic sources can be from YouTube suggested videos, YouTube search, YouTube playlist and YouTube channel page.

Devices

YouTube Analytics also allows you to explore which devices your YouTube videos are being played on. The native YouTube Analytics dashboard breaks down the devices into viewers on mobile, desktop/laptop, game console, and tablet. Adapt your content strategy according to these insights.

Subscribers

Know the total number of subscribers for your channel. You can monitor the number of accounts that subscribed to your channel and those that unsubscribed. With the help of these insights, you can decipher the kind of content that is drawing more audience. At the same time, you can understand what kind of content is pushing people away and causing viewers to unsubscribe.

Likes, Dislikes and Comments

Likes, dislikes, and comments are also important metrics that you can explore on YouTube Analytics. These insights also give you an overview of what’s working for your YouTube channel and what isn’t. Look at video content that drew a positive response, in terms of likes and positive comments. Now, you know what kind of videos will draw audience attention.

Shares

Lastly, YouTube Analytics allows you to view where your videos have been shared- which social media platforms are your videos being shared on. Apart from that, you can look at the number of times a given video was shared, along with the date on which it was shared. You can also use this data to plan out productive YouTube marketing campaigns.

Let’s take a look at the unique features our YouTube analytics tool has to offer-

Dashboard

The dashboard will give you a detailed picture of your YouTube channel. Right from the number of views your videos got to the likes and comments, everything will be detailed on the dashboard to gauge your own presence on the video-sharing platform. Check the audience retention rate on your videos which will help you modify and change your video content strategy. The dashboard in a YouTube analytics tool gives you a data-driven overview of your channel.

Competition Tracking

YouTube analytics for other channels and videos is as crucial as evaluating your own channel. Right from influencers to brands, everyone wants to know what their competitors are doing on the platform. Your YouTube analytics tool should have Competition Tracking . This feature is of utmost importance because it tells you what is working for you and what is not in comparison to your competitors. Moreover, it helps you make effective decisions in terms of content creation and strategies. Want to know why your videos are not fetching views and your competitor is eating all the pie? Track your channel and get all the answers

Analytics

Apart from knowing the number of views and subscribers, it is necessary to know what your audience is looking for. YouTube channel analytics is incomplete without audience demographics. The YouTube video analytics tool you opt for must provide you with audience data. Fortunately, Unbox Social has got you covered there too, just saying!!! The analytics will tell you the best time to post your videos, the number of subscribers gained and lost, audience age, audience gender, audience location and much more. All these YouTube insights can make a huge difference in your video curation.

Reports

YouTube analytics reports are the best part of a YouTube video analytics tool . These reports will help you build all your video content with a concoction of creativity and practicality. Evaluating competitors through these reports will tell you where your channel stands and what improvements it needs to be on par with the competitors.

Growing Importance of having YouTube Analytics in 2020

The popularity of YouTube has never been down and the video platform is set to create a new benchmark with a fresh rush of content creators. Moreover, with most brands opting for influencer marketing , YouTube is set to become a highly significant platform. Well, this certainly means that YouTube video analytics are going to become more important than ever.

Having said that, creating unique content and gaining the attention of the audiences is set to become challenging too which means creators will have to focus on the YouTube insights . Let’s look at some of the stats to understand why YouTube analytics is going to be inevitable starting this year along with real YouTube views .

Now that you are aware of the importance of YouTube video analytics , it is time to track your YouTube channel and get a YouTube analytics report . This report is necessary to scale up not only your real YouTube views but also your video content quality. Having this YouTube insight will surely take you a step ahead of your competitors!

Bonus Tips — How To Get More Subscribers On YouTube

1. Listen to your audience: Dig deeper and try to figure out your target audience . You will know what kind of content they want to see. Are they leaving questions that you can answer? Are they loving one content topic more than another? You can even start asking them as to what kind of content they would like to see on your channel — directly or indirectly, in your videos or on social media platforms.
2. Ask your viewers to hit the bell icon: Asking your viewers to hit the bell icon, means asking them to get notified whenever you post a video. This ensures you get more views and watch time, which boosts your video’s ranking.
3. Have a compelling hook: Your hook has to be compelling so that people actually stay to watch your video till the end. The longer the watch time on your video, the more likely you are to land on suggested or recommended videos. Which means higher YouTube subscribers’ growth rate.
4. Interviews and Reviews: A great YouTube tactic to get more subscribers is by getting Influencers/YouTubers to review your brand’s products and services. You can take their interviews and get positive opinions about the content you provide. Influencer marketing campaigns can help you boost your brand presence to a great extent.
5. Host giveaways: If you are close to getting your subscriber goals, you can give your viewers a little incentive to subscribe to your channel by hosting a giveaway.

YouTube has a Partner Program, where creators can earn money from advertising. Earlier, all you needed to join the program was 10,000 views, now you need over 4,000 hours of watch time in the past 12 months and have more than 1,000 subscribers.
In September 2019, YouTube changed the name for the “YouTube Partner Program Policies” to “ YouTube Channel Monetization Policies “ to inculcate Community Guidelines, Terms of Service, and Google AdSense Program Policies as a part of this.

YouTube is one of the most amazing platforms, and here every content creator has an equal chance at success.

However, changes to the monetization policy are bound to affect a large number of content creators. Predicting the impact of this announcement, YouTube is hoping that Creator Academy and Creator Site will continue to be helpful in maintaining the subscriber’s growth rate on YouTube.

Every channel that has made it big on YouTube, started out with 0 subscribers. So you know nothing is impossible, but it will definitely require commitment and patience on your part. Good luck!

Want to know the Best Tools for YouTube and other platforms? Just click the links below!

1. Best YouTube Analytics Tools
2. Best Twitter Analytics Tools
3. Best Instagram Analytics Tools
4. Best Facebook Analytics Tools
5. Best Influencer Marketing Platforms

Originally published at https://www.unboxsocial.com on August 27, 2018.