YouTube optimisation. There’s a system and a science behind it.
A lot of videos just get posted and left. The work around the video, before it goes live and in the week after, is the part people don’t think about.
How I think about a video going up.
Shawn Peach
Founder, InFocus Media Group
The way I work is multi-threaded. A video going up isn’t one job, it’s a run up, a build up and how you handle it after. So I think about the lead-up in the days before, what we can be doing in the hours and minutes before, and what happens once it goes live.
On Lovells Full Travel that meant an 8pm premiere with Boomer and Matt in the live chat talking to people as the episode went out, shorts cut to spark interest without giving the story away, and a pinned comment that pushes people to the full episode. Episode two found 2.7 times the audience the first one got on its own.
I’ve gone through what YouTube and Google publish and what their own people say, fact-checked it, and built it into a playbook that runs on every video, new or already up: how each video is broken out into its title, description, thumbnail, chapters, tags and pinned comment, and what happens around it. I built it, and it gets updated with what we learn. AI helps us get through the numbers faster, and the human element is always the final decider.
The same playbook runs for an Australian furniture brand, through a production partner.
what episode one found on its own. Episode two had no advertising on the episode itself.
How it runs.
The run-up
Key moments pulled from the edit for the days before, the first hour, the first day and the week after.
The launch
A premiere when it makes sense, with the people from the video in the live chat. Everything in the playbook set before it goes live. The pinned comment is not optional.
The title
Search led, so people find it, and engaging enough that they click it, but in line with what’s actually in the video, so the watch time holds up and nobody feels tricked.
The numbers
Day one, day seven and day 28 reports, with the paid and the organic kept separate and labelled, and what to change next.
We have no interest in looking beyond what YouTube and Google say works.
Where to start.
This is for a business that’s already putting video up, or about to, and wants it working after the ads stop. So the first conversation is about what the videos are meant to do for the business, and we go from there.
YouTube optimisation is usually the place to start when
There are videos up already and nobody really knows what they’re doing.
The views stopped when the ads did.
Videos that were paid for are just sitting there.
If the video itself is the problem, no title fixes it. We’ll flag that up front.
Questions we get asked.
What is YouTube optimisation?
Everything around the video that decides whether it gets found and clicked, and what happens in the days before and after it goes live.
Does it work on videos that are already up?
Yes, and that’s usually where it starts. New titles, descriptions and thumbnails get the videos that are already up showing up in search more often. The bigger lift comes with the next video, when the run-up is there from the start.
What is a premiere?
A set time when the video goes live and everyone watches it together, almost like a watch party, with a live chat running. We put the people from the video in that chat. Episode two of Full Travel went live as an 8pm premiere. A normal upload just appears.
Why does the lead-up matter?
So people are there watching it all the way through from the first hour, which is what gives the video its best head start.
Do you have to make the video as well?
No. If the videos already exist, we do the optimisation. If YouTube is where the video is going, we do the full production as well.
What do we get?
Every video set up before it goes live, and the numbers at day one, day seven and day 28, with what to change next.