Small YouTube Creators Don’t Understand Niches & It’s Killing Their Growth
A fine line between nurturing and ruining your channel.
There will never be a conclusion to the general pro-niche vs. anti-niche debate.
The problem is that in order to exponentially grow your YouTube channel, it isn’t even up for debate.
In this article I’ll prove to you how being decidedly pro-niche with your YouTube channel is going to leapfrog you ahead of the competition.
I’ll be illustrating my point by using a mid-sized channel as an example.
Why Refusing a Clear Niche Will Make the Algorithm Hate You
Experimenting to find what one enjoys making is inquestionably a good move.
The problem comes with never actually picking a content topic/angle.
The YouTube algorithm is complex beyond our imagination. But it has a simple goal:
To provide viewers with what they enjoy watching. And then attempt to do that over and over until it strikes gold (and then keep going still).
This is important because to flag down the algorithm your way, you need to set the table, your channel premise, as decipherably as possible.
The algorithm shouldn’t have to figure out which one of your videos suit a specific audience. Because they should all potentially do.
How?
You post coherent content that all work to make your channel premise clear as day. In other words, you sport some kind of niche. (But the niche doesn’t actually have to be that niched down).
If you don’t do this, the algorithm will struggle to reccommend your videos to the right audiences. You’ll kill your momentum and your views, fast.
I’ll show you an example of a channel killing their growth in action.
This is the YouTube channel of Livakivi.
Despite the initial viewing, Livakivi is mostly a Japanese language/language learning channel (we’ll get more into this disparity in a bit).
Livakivi is the perfect example of the niche struggle as they’ve both succeeded and “failed” in winning the algorithm’s favor.
Take a look at the screenshot below. When looking at the views, is there a trend that stands out to you?
To me, I see it like this:
The algorithm successfully picked up that Livakivi is about language learning AND repeatedly found decent audiences for it. This is DESPITE them muddying their catalog with non-related videos.
The non-related videos might be great in their own right.
But the mix of topics causes the average viewer who subscribed to the language learning content to disregard the miscelleanous videos recommended to them by Livakivi.
If the algorithm repeatedly recommends videos to a viewer they don’t engage with, the algorithm will pick up on their disinterest.
Breeding disinterest around your channel is the quickest way to lose all momentum.
Why should the algorithm put you in your viewers’ suggested tab if their interest isn’t piqued on a consistent basis?
That being said, you can’t always hit a viral or even semi-viral video with the same or a similar topic.
Livakivi impressively hit a 300K view video as their first.
But as their content journey trudged on, they slowly lost language learning as their core topic over time:
As you can see from this screenshot and the previous, it’s often the EXACT keywords hitting it big (“Learning Japanese”, “Language Learning”, etc.)
You can also see an aforementioned example of experimentation circled in yellow.
I’m curious if the video won on the fact that it’s a “learning” video, or that the algorithm just happened to find a brand new audience slice in the tech crowd. (It’s probably the latter).
Back to the topic at hand — what if you absolutely despise having to fit into a niche for views?
The Only Thing That Allows You to Quit Your Niche
If you are sick of being forced into niches. there is hope.
Not only is it healthy to sometimes to try new angles for your channel health, as creators who milk the same concept indefinitely tend to fall off over time. But it’s also something that some creators do nothing but.
How can someone do nothing but what they feel like and still be successful? It’s simple. They’re too big to fail.
As you can see, famous creator PewDiePie can easily get away with doing just about anything he wants and his views will stay healthy.
This freedom from niches stems from trust.
Their audience trusts their consistent quality enough to be willing to watch videos that might not fully align with their tastes.
This is very common in the gaming space on YouTube. Big creators jump from game to game, do video essays or crazy challenges. Their audiences devours it all equally for the most part.
You could be that creator. But it’ll probably take years to build that foundational viewer base and trust.
YouTube Is a Game of Momentum
Whenever the algorithm successfully picks up one of your videos and sends it off to the right crowd, you’ve gained a boost in momentum.
It’s then your #1 priority and job to secure that boost.
You need to make sure you stay on this higher plateau you’ve reached by planting your flag with a video who’s topic/format/style is at least in the ballpark of your momentum boost.
As you can see here, Livakivi didn’t do this.
They lost the algorithm’s “trust” by posting something different that the algorithm cannot easily interest this pool of gathered attention with.
As with any momentum, this trust can be earned back.
But it’ll will be lost as quickly if you don’t have a) a clear content promise or b) massive audience trust built up over time.
Imagine your videos building up a pool of marbles on the floor.
The marbles represent:
- Your viewer base.
- Your (momentum-boosting) videos.
- The interconnected web of impressions and suggested videos that the algorithm has gathered for you.
When you publish a video that doesn’t match your main topics or style, it’s like flicking a giant marble into your group of marbles…
…..and having them spread all over the floor. The algorithm tries to make sense of this new marble (your non-related video) relative to your other videos and viewer base.
It sticks out like a sore thumb. It doesn’t fit inside the web you’ve built.
Do yourself a favor and save yourself from the head- and heartache of putting in effort into your videos only to mess up one of the few things you actually have control over.
Yes, do what makes you happy and satisfied. But recognize that it may come at the cost of the results you’re looking for right now.
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