Baby’s Play Out: Reading between the lines on Youtube’s Top Lists
A glance at my past writing will tell you that I am quite fascinated with the world of entertainment content — movies, TV shows, books, celebs — and have frequently combined it with my love for data in an attempt to make sense of the content deluge that has engulfed our lives.
Nearly two years ago, I joined as a Product Manager in a content product team. Now, it won’t be an overstatement to say that I spend the bulk of my waking hours either thinking of or consuming content.
Especially as a bit of a creator myself, I have endlessly wondered “What makes certain content tick more than the others?”.
This post isn’t about that, though.
Instead, I want to spill some digital ink pondering aloud on what “ticking” really means.
Let’s talk about video aka Youtube
Youtube is the defacto video capital of the internet. Of course, the most watched videos on Youtube must be indicative of popular content.
So, what’s the most watched Youtube video of all time?
The Baby Shark Dance video with a staggering 14B views
It has ~75% more views than the #2 Despacito which has had a miraculous run of its own. Baby Shark, however, isn’t an anomaly. There are four other baby-targeted videos in the top 10.
Well, not surprising. babies rule the roost, right? But a closer look tells us this dominance wasn’t always the case.
What changed?
The pandemic happened.
And as a result, helpless parents played these songs on loop to keep their kids engaged as they labored through the challenges of working-from-home.
This was facilitated by Youtube’s availability on TVs which plays in the background as the kids prance around the house.
4 out of the top 10 subscribed channels on Youtube are also Kids focused (including some run by kids) channels. Except for Cocomelon, however, all the other kids channels featured are different from those who created the top viewed videos!
Cocomelon is indeed the only channel overall to have delivered not one but two Top 10 viewed videos and also feature in the top 10 subscribed channels.
Cocomelon seems to have cracked the code for both virality and loyalty.
The graphs above tell you that in about seven years, nearly the entire top 10 subscribed channel list has been upended.
PewDiePie is the only survivor. The guy has been in the top 10 subscribed channel list for 11 years running now!
The Great Indian Juggernaut
Besides the advent of kids’ channels, the other standout aspect is the dominance of channels from India — this becomes more evident as you go beyond the top 10. In late 2016, there were no Indian channels even in the top 20.
What happened?
The telecom upheaval in India from 2016. A petrochemical company Reliance entered the telecom market with a brand called Jio and brought down data rates, and how. (see chart below)
India has among the lowest data rates in the world despite an upward move in the past 2 years as the industry consolidated.
Fueled by cheap data and cheap smart handsets, India went on a video watching spree. From the urban elite down to the vegetable vendors to taxi drivers, everyone’s new favorite pastime was doomscrolling videos.
What did they watch? Bollywood songs & TV soap highlights. T-Series, the numero uno channel, owns over 70–80% of the Indian movie music titles produced. They play on a flood of Youtube videos (6–7 uploaded per day) with sporadic hits which reach the million view mark. All the Indian channels in this list follow this playbook — this is on-the-go, bite sized consumption that replaces the lack of a television screen or Spotify/ Apple Music subscription.
This is in sharp contrast to Mr. Beast who posts a video a month and is dangerously close to upstaging T-Series (A PewDiePie vs T-series encore, anyone?)
Turns out that while unsuccessful channels are unsuccessful in their own way, successful channels aren’t alike, either.
So, what does this all mean?
It means that there is more to metrics than just the number itself.
Platform & context nuances can impact vastly. Highly viewed baby videos on Youtube might not see similar success elsewhere.
Meanwhile, high follower count is a better indicator of success on another platform (brand value!) but isn’t a guarantee that each of your videos will be a chartbuster.
And offline recognition (T-Series, SET India, Zee Music & WWE) can be translated to digital success, if you play it right.
Happy Watching!
