YouTube is the most popular video-sharing platform, with over 2 billion monthly users. If you are a creator on the platform, you need to understand your analytics to determine if your content is resonating with your audience. This article will show you the importance of YouTube analytics and how to use this data to improve your content.
What is YouTube Analytics?
YouTube analytics is the built-in feature that shows you essential metrics on your YouTube videos and channel. It shows you important data such as video watch time, viewer demographic, impression, traffic source, etc. This data helps you to understand the type of content your audience is interested in and how to use it to improve your content strategy.
How to Find YouTube Analytics
Here are the steps in finding the analytic feature:
- Click on your profile icon at the top right corner of your screen. You will see a list of account options.
- Choose Youtbe studio. This will take you to the studio dashboard.
- Choose either the channel analytics or the analytics on the left-hand side. You will see the metrics for the last 28 days.
- On the analytic dashboard, you can toggle between the Overview Tab, Audience Tab, and Content Tab to find your desired information.
- Check the analytics of the individual videos by clicking on Advanced Mode at the top right of the analytic page of yor channel.
- To download your YouTube analytics, choose Advanced Mode to select the metrics you want to track. At the top right corner, choose download.
On top of the channel metrics, you can also see the individual video metrics. Tap on the video, and all the metrics will be shown.
Important YouTube Analytics Data
The analytics are categorized into:
General Analytics
Here are the main metrics you will see on your General analytics:
- Views
- Subscribers
- Watch time
- Comparison of current and previous videos
- Top-ranked
- Performance of your most recent stories
- Latest content.
Reach
This will show how people find your content, the type of content they are watching, and how they interact with your videos. Some of the data you will see on this tab include:
- Views for videos, content, short titles, and more.
- Impressions. How often your content thumbnail was shown to YouTube users, and how often the users click on it.
- The average duration of views.
- Ways that your viewers find your videos.
- Parts of the videos that maintained your audience’s interest.
- Total view of remixes.
- Post impressions. Number of times your posts have been shown to YouTube users.
Audience
This tab shows you details about your audience, such as:
- Whether the viewers are new or returning.
- When your viewers are on YouTube.
- Number of subscribers getting notifications on your videos.
- The average time a user views your videos.
- Age and gender of your subscribers.
- Other channels you are the audience also watched.
- Geographical locations of your viewers.
- What percentage of your audience uses subtitles?
Research
This tab will show you the following:
- Youtube searches. It shows you the top topics people are searching for
- Viewers search. The words and topics that viewers using similar words were searching for.
How to Analyse YouTube Analytics
Here is our guide to analyzing the key metrics:
Check Subscriber Rate
You should check if there are fluctuations in your subscriber rate. This will provide you with an overall performance of your YouTube videos instead of just one video. It will also show you how each video contributes to your subscribers. Use a call to action to attract more subscribers.
Check Real-time Reports
YouTube verifies the view counts to remove spammy and low-quality views. With real-time reports, you can see the average number of views for the last 48 hours and 60 minutes. If there are spikes in your views, it could be a sign that someone has shared your video.
Check Traffic Source
When analyzing your video, you should check the source of your traffic. You can see this under the traffic source page. By looking at this report, you can determine the traffic source that best benefits your videos.
Remember to dig deeper into the numbers, as not all sources will give you similar quality of views. For instance, when you note that your traffic source is YouTube search, you can start to think of ways to optimize your videos for the platform.
Check Watch Time
While views are an essential metric to track, they dont give much information on your videos. The watch time is a better metric to track than the total views. Create more engaging videos if your videos have a low watch time. You can also invest in more robust video editing software.
Final Thoughts
If you post YouTube videos without checking the analytics, you are like a man shooting in the dark. On the other hand, YouTube analytics will light your content creation path, helping you catch those valued subscribers. You can quickly improve conversion by reading and implementing our guide on using YouTube analytics to improve content creation.
