31 Ways to Promote YouTube Videos & Get More Views

In this new guide, you’re going to learn how to promote your YouTube videos and get more attention to your channel.

If creating video content is close to your heart and you want to succeed on YouTube, then you need to keep reading as some of the promotion methods I cover below are never seen before stuff, hacks unique to this blog post only.

Ready?

Let’s go!

#1 Publish & Promote Extremely High-Quality Videos

Don’t let this “extremely” scare you. High quality is simply the video that helps the user solve the problem they have.

Because each user watching a video isn’t attending to watch but to learn something new, or to be entertained. Or to divert their thoughts from the problems they’re having.!

Just give them what they want, and that’s “extreme quality” enough.

Every now and then a short QnA or GRWM (get ready with me) videos won’t do any harm. But make sure you start promoting the best videos you have and not just all of them.

#2 Make Them Longer

Longer meaning 10+ minutes per video.

A recent YouTube study showed that YouTube likes to rank longer videos.

People watch them like they’re glued to the screen.

Longer videos can be monetized with more ads, too. So when you publish videos that are longer than 10 minutes, you get more engagement as well as more revenue.

#3 Learn the Ropes With YouTube’s Creator’s Academy

YouTube wants you to succeed. They do. They want you to make awesome videos so you can keep people longer on YouTube so they can earn AdSense money.

So they invested their endless resources into researching their audience. What is it that makes them tick?

And all that wealth of info is here, and it’s free.

#4 Add a CTA at the End of Your Videos

CTA is an acronym for “Call to Action,” and they’re simply words that spur action from those lucky folks that made it till the end of your video.

CTAs are powerful stuff because people who watched your entire video are obviously impressed with what they saw, so they’re prime targets for you to get your message across.

And what should that message be?

Well, you could ask them to subscribe, so they don’t miss your future videos.

This is the best CTA because you’re thinking long-term and building up your fan base.

But you could also ask them to share, like, and leave a comment.

This is all engagement, and that will help your channel grow. Plus, you’ll also be taking advantage of a principle called ”The Benjamin Franklin Effect.”

What is it?

It’s a psychological principle that states that when someone does a small favor for you first, they’ll be ready and willing to do a larger one down the line.

So let’s say they “like” your video. That’s a small thing. A click of the mouse.

Next, they might leave a comment, which is typing on a keyboard, so slightly more laborious than that one click of the mouse.

Next, they’ll subscribe, which shows commitment.

And finally, they’ll become your channel’s evangelists and will actively promote your videos without you even asking them.

Yes, like words themselves- CTAs are mightier than swords :)

#5 Use Cards and End Screen Features

Card and end screen features are YouTube’s way of increasing engagement on their platform, and on your videos.

They want to help you out because people watching more of your videos benefit them too.

So what are cards exactly? And the end screen too?

Cards are little pop-up boxes that show up during your current video and point people to another, usually related video.

The idea is that if someone is interested in the topic “A,” they’ll be very interested in related topic A1 and less interested in topic B, which is something very different.

Here’s what it looks like:

And End Screens?

They’re your wordless CTA’s.

The last 15s or so, during which your current video will show many more on the screen, for people to choose freely.

So they click, and they’re transported to another video they can watch.

#6 Use Your Website. Specifically, its Navigation

If you have a website, a property you own, you probably have a menu that’s ever-present across your site.

For example, here’s the menu from our very own BforBloggers:

It’s superbly organized, and everything you need is a click or two away. Also, very good for SEO as shallow sites preserve most of Page Rank, i.e., money juice.

But you can also use your navigation to promote your brand across various channels.

Or better yet, add social links in the ever-present footer:

#7 Promote Your YouTube Videos on Facebook

Of course, you should share your video on your timeline. It’s an essential and most basic way of promoting your videos.

However, a much more effective way is to promote relevant Facebook groups.

Remember, the keyword is “relevant.” It makes no sense to promote your videos here, there, and everywhere. But it makes perfect sense to post it in niche-specific Facebook groups that are chock-full with folks dying to see your video because it solves the very problem they’re having trouble with.

And every week, they have a “promote-your-post day.” I’m sure you could post your videos. Because that’s what the thread is for.

Note: However, you’ll also want to be tactful a bit. Become a member of the group first.

Contribute first and promote others, so you get a chance to promote yourself.

#8 Promote Your Videos, and Then Re-Promote Them

After the first wave of promotion has died down, it’s time to relax, chill out, and then, after sufficient rest and strength renewing, move on to creating more videos.

Right?

Wrong!

I mean, kinda right because you can have the best of both worlds.

I’m talking about promotion automation. You can promote your videos without lifting a finger and all is done for you by relevant software (in our case, Hootsuite).

So, within Hootsuite (free version), upload your video and set it to self-promote on, for example, Twitter.

Take a look:

Note: I’m using Twitter as an example, but you can do the same with Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, etc. as Hootsuite is a very versatile tool.

Bonus tip

If you have a following on Twitter, use it to promote your videos.

For example:

Mistare Fusion works on his enormous Dragon Ball Dissection series, a long-running video playlist that dissects Dragon Ball manga to the minutest of details and which the nerd like me greatly appreciates.

Here’s how he promotes it on Twitter, with success, too.

Twenty-seven retweets, and 113 likes.

Not bad for a single post.

#9 Tell People About Your Channel

• Who are you?
• What do you do?
• And how folks can benefit from your videos.

This and much more, you can get across with a powerful and impactful channel description.

Now, I already wrote about crafting a perfect channel description (click here to read about it) so I won’t dwell too much on it here, but the gist of it is:

• Be descriptive
• Use your target keywords,
• Promise the world and beyond to those who subscribe and watch.

And then?

Then deliver on the promise with your excellent videos and watch your subscriber count grow, and your videos get shared like crazy.

#10 Have a Channel Trailer

A channel trailer is another easy and impressive way to hook people into subscribing and subsequently sharing your video.

What’s a channel trailer?

I call them programmatic videos.

First, they play automatically as soon as someone lands on your channel’s page.

Second, and this depends on you- they’re perfect for conveying your message to potential subscribers.

What’s in it for them if they subscribe?

Here’s how Mozilla Vulpix does it. She says that if you like Anime, Dragon Ball, Yu Yu Hakusho, and Sailor Moon, then you’ll feel at home on her channel.

I’m sure her message resonates well as she has 16 000 subs already and she’s only been doing this YouTube thing part-time, and NOT full-time.

So her growth is decent, to say the least.

You can easily get decent intro trailer work done by hiring someone from Fiverr. Just make sure you don’t hire extremely cheap gigs.

#11 Mix up Your Channel Trailers

Coming right off the previous tip- You don’t have to have one video only as part of the channel trailer. This isn’t an exact science.

Instead, mix it up a bit by having your newest videos as your new, temporary trailer.

Then track your results.

Have you gotten more subs this week than the week before?

Yes?

Good!

Investigate it further.

The more data you’ll collect, the more stats you’ll have to make your next trailer a successful decision.

#12 Create a Consistent Brand

Be a brand, not yet another YouTube channel.

To be taken seriously on YouTube, it’s not enough to just post content and hope for the best. Instead, you must be professional, and the easiest lever here you can pull is using consistent branding across your properties (primarily your website and YouTube channel).

This means using colors that are YOU, for:

• Channel art
• Chanel icon
• Channel logo
• Video thumbnails

#13 Do YouTube SEO

The words on the page matter… a lot.

The main factors to consider in YouTube SEO are:

Video tags– crucial because you use them to show relevancy to YouTube, but also to get laterally connected with all other videos about your video’s topic. This will get you displayed more on the right sidebar, which is a prime space to be.

Keywords in the description– using keywords in your video description is a way to tell both YouTube and Google what your video is about.

Bonus tip- keywords at the beginning of the description are slightly more effective for SEO than further below.

Keyword in the title– Just like with on-page SEO for Google, use your keyword when possible, and at the beginning of the title. This will help you rank higher and faster, but don’t expect miracles.

Other factors

Watch time- more is better as YouTube values videos that contribute the most to higher watch time.

Saying the keyword at the start of your video. This is a huge signal that can sort of nullifying all others.

What I mean is- if your target keyword is “SEO tips,” and you don’t say” SEO tips” at least once, in your video, you won’t rank for it even if all your other metrics are near perfect.

This makes total sense. If you don’t say the keyword at least once,  then how’s your video about that topic?

Luckily, it’s easy to avoid this pitfall- Just Say it!

Pro tip:

Don’t put any link in your video description.

Why?

Because, and this is anecdotal stuff, so there’s no hard proof for it, but YouTube wants to keep people on their platform, so they don’t like videos that link out to external websites.

Of course, they’ll still show you if it’s the best and people rave about it, but when the competition is stiff, they might choose someone else over you, just because that other video keeps people on YouTube.

And that’s that about YouTube SEO for this post. I could write 10,000 words on the topic, but this isn’t the place for it.

Instead, go and read this TubeBuddy review Aayush wrote a while back. I promise I’ll open your eyes to things like YouTube SEO.

#14 Increase CTR of Your Video

Video CTR is important for two reasons.

First, a higher CTR means more clicks and total watch time for your channel. This is always a good thing.

Second, folks preferring your video over someone else’s show’s YouTube algorithm, that there’s something about it and that they need to show you more as recommend the video if they know what’s right for them:)

So they do, and BOOM, you get more views, more subscribers, and overall a host of benefits for your entire channel.

Powerful stuff!

How to increase video  CTR?

I mentioned above that you should use keywords in your video titles because that helps you rank better.

True. But you can also be creating a bit.

• Use power words (best, super, secret, powerful … )
• Ask questions
• Be a bit clickbaity (I said a little)

The point is to try to stand out from the typical SERP results.

Camel Case, your video title.

What is a camel casing?

It’s Writing the First Letter of Every Word With a Capital Letter like in the sentence above.

Test different thumbnails for better results.

Not much to say here. Change and measure.

#15 Reoptimize Older Videos

Most folks post a video, “SEO” it once, and then move on.

This, of course, is wrong because, within YouTube’s algorithm, there’s a decaying factor built-in, the same as Google’s algorithm.

So, your video, no matter how optimized it is, is naturally going to go down, slowly but surely.

And especially if many new videos come out as direct competition to your video.

The answer is to re-optimize those videos and bring them back to life.

Don’t worry- it’s easy.

Especially since you can’t change that much. For starters, you can’t tamper with the video itself. That’s pretty much set in stone.

But you can change the video’s metadata, and you can give it some new code for YouTube to work with.

So, when a video isn’t performing, consider updating:

• Tags
• Title
• Description
• And thumbnails

Changing those will give you decent results, especially since it’s so easy to do.

#16 Create Playlists

The playlist is a wonderful feature that lets you organize your videos around the topics they cover.

They’re perfect for getting new subscribers and increasing total watch time for your channel.

In fact, playlists are such a boon to your channel that I say with confidence that they always work and they help you make the most out of all these tips in this article.

Because having great videos knitted together in a playlist:

• Showy you’re an expert on the topic
• Boosts your channel’s watch time, so YouTube knows you’re an expert.
• Makes it easier to rank in Google (they rank better than individual videos)

If playlists sound lovely to you (they’re), then read this post here. I cover them in great detail, plus you’ll also learn how to get more YouTube subscribers.

Here’s a nice example from the music soundtrack of the cult film, Pulp Fiction:

#17 Promote Your Videos on Quora

Did you know that Quora can be fertile ground for sowing your videos seeds? I know, a cheesy metaphor, so I’ll stop right now. But it’s true.

If you’re in a, for example, coffee niche and you have a video entitled “health benefits of Coffee- 11 facts you didn’t know (guaranteed)”

Then, by all means, go and post it on Quora for some easy video promotion.

Here’s how:

Use Quora’s search to find all relevant videos.

Then find the one that’s most popular (you see this by how many people have answered it and how many are following it).

Then you add in your answer, and it should be a two-parter.

First, you need to add a concise intro — “Here,’s my video that explains the health benefits of coffee” …

Second, embed your video and let it promote itself.

Note: I said to target the most popular questions because that’s where you’re going to get the most views and traction.

You don’t want to make the mistake of adding videos to every question that’s only remotely related. Quora forbids shameless self-promotion, and that’s precisely what you’d be doing if you were posting the same video everywhere.

But doing it once is more than ok.

It’s helpful.

#18 Promote Your Video on Forums

This is a similar spiel to Quora’s promotion. Every niche has its dedicated forums where people gather to converse about their favorite past times.

“Great! So all I need to do is find forums within my space and start posting links to my YouTube’s channel and videos

Great! Again!”

Well, not quite.

Forums are famous for attracting hordes of spammers, and if you go in intending to post self-promoting links, you’ll be deemed a spammer, and you’ll be removed by their moderators.

So before you start posting links, you need to become a member and contribute value, and lots of it.

Note: Offering value should be natural for you as you’re an expert in your niche.

So let’s say you’re in an MMO (make money online) niche, then you’d go to Warrior Forum and start participating. Answer some questions newbie members have and build up your portfolio of right, helpful answers.

For example, Brian Dean, before blowing up with Backlinko, was a helpful Warrior:

And with time, as you’re proven a valuable member, you can start posting links to your article, and your videos and people won’t matter, as long as the links are relevant.

#19 Use Reddit for Some Early Virality

I say you need to be careful because Reddit is full of savvy folks that are on a hunt for spammers.

It’s because Reddit users value quality above all else and hate nothing more than spammy garbage polluting their Reddit feed.

So, as you probably guessed …You’re going to have to become a devoted Redditor, someone that contributes and readily promotes others.

And over time, you’ll be able to start gently promoting yourself, and no one will bat an eye on it.

Pro tips:

Be transparent. Redditors hate spammers, but most appreciate transparency and honesty.

So, if you want to promote yourself, you’re welcome to try, and if you’re upfront with your intentions, you have a higher chance of success.

Here’s how the Ahrefs team does it. They talk to Redditors — and participate — and get feedback, brand building, and visits to their site.

#20 Promote Your Videos to Growth Hackers

GrowthHackers is a community geared towards online marketing and the growth of online businesses. Thus it isn’t suitable for all niches, and you definitely wouldn’t be able to post videos on coffee, tea, or anything that’s not Internet marketing related.

However, if you’re in one of these “chosen” niches, then you can tap into a large pool of targeted niche audiences.

Here’s how:

First– online an account with them.

Second- Be a member. The Growth Hackers community is very lenient towards self-promotion. You can promote yourself just fine, but not right away.

Instead- wait for a month. One month is an arbitrary period, but you should use it to promote others.

Note: submitting a video is very easy. Just fill in the blanks:

#21 Embed Videos in Your Blog Posts

Video is on the rise, and it’ll continue to do so as people are looking for a more visual way of receiving information.

And adding videos to your blog posts is a way to spruce up your content even more and bring in an extra layer of quality and depth.

Also, besides catering to folks who’d rather watch than reading, you’ll be boosting your SEO quite a bit, as parents that watch videos are people that stay — and dwell time is an important metric for Google as it shows them your page is a good fit and people are enjoying it.

#22 Promote Your YouTube Channel in Your Author Bio

Now,  I mean this in two ways.

First, whenever you’re a guest on someone else’s site, make sure you mention your site, of course, but also your YouTube channel.

It doesn’t matter that the second link will probably be no-followed as the host webmaster won’t allow you to self-promote too much.

What’s important is that you’ll have built another connection directly to your YouTube channel. You can bet that as time unfolds, at least, some folks are going to click on it.

The second way is to have an author bio on your site so that every blog post ends with an author box that talks about you and links to your social media profiles and of course, to your YouTube channel as a part of your overarching brand.

This is sort of sending people away from your site, but your overall brand image will improve, and more people will know you operate on YouTube too.

#23 Boost the Strength of Your Channel

I mentioned above that the nofollow link is better than nothing, and I stand by it. But I say here that followed link is better than the no-followed one.

Why?

Because of channel “domain” authority. Namely, excellent domain strength isn’t essential for YouTube Search, as YouTube doesn’t use it. But Google does use it.

Namely, if you shoot some PageRank-laden links to your channel, you’re going to see all your videos ranking higher in organic Google search, and since many searches have become video keywords, that’s an easy way to boost your results.

The bottom line:

Link to your channel and link often. In blog posts, and author bios when possible.

#24 Pick off Video Keywords

I’m a big proponent of targeting keywords on multiple platforms. So, in an ideal scenario, I’d write a blog post about X, and then I’d create a video about it.

That way, if it all goes according to plan, I can take over 2 SERP positions in Google,  plus YouTube Search.

However, sometimes, that’s not needed.

Sometimes a quick video is all you need.

A good example is video keywords.

What are video keywords?

They are when you search for something on Google, and you get a SERP full of videos.

For example, here’s what I get when I search for “ how to tie a tie.”

Tying a tie is a very visual thing, so the SERP is full of images and videos.

So if you were to target the term, you wouldn’t want to write a 3,000-word guide, nor would you want to produce a guide AND a video.

No, simply get in front of that mirror and show us how it’s done!

#25 Go Live

YouTube lets you stream your videos to your audience, and going live is an opportunity to show off your unscripted, passionate, intelligent you.

Going live means, there’s no prep — just charm, niche skill, rhetorical ability, and good looks to boot.

For example, here’s how the very pretty Gaby AKA Mozilla Vulpix, does it.

She recently hosted a live event, a discussion about Dragon Ball GT and how it fits into the grand scheme of Dragon Ball lore.

And you can bet that I watched it. Because I like Dragon Ball and because I want to learn more, and because I know  Gaby knows much more about DB than even me.

And that’s a pretty significant achievement in and of itself:)

#26 Be a Part of the Larger Community

In keeping with Dragon Ball, here’s one of Mistare Fusion’s videos. Look, he’s got a great comment from Geekdom101, a huge Dragon Ball channel and brand.

And Mistare Fusion has just 16,000 subs, while Geekdom 101 is fast approaching 6,00,000 subscribers.

So, why’d Geekdom 101 bother to engage with that smaller channel?

Because MF is part of the community, part of the inner circle of successful DB video creators.

Lance, AKA Mister Fusion has spent years cultivating bonds with other channel owners, commenting, sharing adding, and bringing value.

And it pays off because now it gets promoted by all those huge channels.

And since their audience is mostly the same and nearly everyone has heard of Geekdom 101, Mistare Fusion’s street cred grows exponentially when people see Geekdom’s comment.

It’s not hard to imagine Geekdom’s subscribers joining Lance’s tribe after seeing that comment.

#27 Be a Guest on Someone Else’s Channel

Just like regular guest posting or going to podcasts, you can also be a guest on someone’s videos.

This method is a great way to rapidly boost your followers’ count, especially if you’re a guest on a channel, a huge with and engaged audience.

For example, recently, Geekdom 101 co-hosted a video with Oppai Senpai, about Merus, a new mysterious character in DB Super, being an angel and an above-human-level being.

He was a guest then, and people got to hear him chime in about Merus.

So he got to show off his in-depth knowledge to Geekdom’s audience, and since they’re doing a video together, there’s an association between them.

So, many Geekdom 101 subscribers are going to check out Oppai Senpai’s channel, and some of them will subscribe.

Pro tip:

This can also work in reverse. If you’re a smaller brand but can get a big-shot YouTuber from your niche to join you, then go for it.

For example, Geekdom 101 and Hail Zeon did an awesome video on whether Frieza is a good or poor villain. Hail Zeon’s vlog is a great channel, but tiny compared to Geekdom 101.

So he definitely profited more than Geekdom 101 from that collaboration.

#28 Start With a Bang

Note: the success of this strategy depends on whether you have a large and engaged email list. If not, don’t bother. Instead- build an email list!

Starting with a promotion bang means that, while Google likes to take its sweet time to rank blog posts, YouTube is the opposite. YouTube wants to rank you right away if you can prove your video’s worth, that is.

And how to do it?

Once you publish your video, share it on Twitter, Facebook LinkedIn… but don’t stop there. Also, send it to your email subscribers.

I bet many of them love your brand and written content AND have no clue you also produce videos. They could enjoy your videos too, so let them.

So, shoot them an email. It’ll be well worth the effort.

What! Don’t have an email list whatsoever?. It’s not too late to start building one.

Here are some resources that can help you get going:

• The Only Guide You Need To Start An Email List In 2019

• 5 Best Email Marketing Services For Bloggers in 2019

• Ten Best WordPress Optin Form Plugins in 2019 (Most Are Free)

Also, these folks coming from your newsletter are already your fans, and they trust your expertise. This means they’re likely to watch your videos for a long time and thus accrue some easy but critical watch time for you.

This will further improve your video SEO.

#29 Do a “Video Preview” Hack

Usually, when you publish YouTube videos on LinkedIn, Instagram, or Facebook, you get no traction whatsoever.

That’s because the social media giants are doing everything they can to keep people on their properties, and they don’t want to promote videos that link out to YouTube (their competitor).

So they bury YouTube videos heavily.

But there’s a workaround.

Take a clip of 2m or so of your video and upload it to, for example, LinkedIn as native content. Then LinkedIn’s algorithm will see that its native content and will promote it to their audience.

So more people will see it, but the real gem of a gem is that your first and pinned comment will contain a link to your full YouTube video.

Thus, you still get to sneak in some easy and effective YouTube video promotions.

#30 Transcribe Your Video for Google SEO Benefits

Everything you say in your video can be turned into text.

NO!

Allow me to rephrase.

Everything said in your videos should be transcribed.

Why?

Because of 2 crucial reasons.

First, when you talk about your video’s topic, you’re naturally going to include your keyword and many of its synonyms, which will be transcribed too.

This will help YouTube’s algorithm better understand the topic of your video, and thus, you’ll rank higher and faster in YouTube search results.

Second– Google will treat your transcript as a mini blog post, meaning they can index you for a bunch of queries and then maybe rank you for some long-tail keyword you’ve never even thought about.

Note: Ranking for a broad set of phrases is possible thanks to Google’s Hummingbird algorithm, which brought a revolution in Google’s understanding of language.

It pays to have a transcript under a video.

Here’s how Neil Patel does it. Below his video is a custom introduction followed by a full transcript. So that’s 1000 words of content for Google to eat up.

Note: You don’t have to have a video transcript in the description to get the SEO benefits.

It’s also ok to put in some content related to the channel so Google’s spiders can pick it up and rank you for it.

Remember that anything you put below the video is going to benefit massively from the behemoth YouTube’s domain authority (YouTube is one of the strongest sites in the world in terms of raw link power)

For example:

Here’s a video of one of the songs from the mega-popular anime Cowboy Bebop — [youtube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vcrb6365GsQ]

And below that video, there isn’t a transcript, but there’s information about the show itself. This can get you ranked in Google’s SERPs, and it’s an easy way to promote a YouTube video.

#31 Promote Your Videos on Your Website

You can make further use of your video transcript by republishing it on your website.

If you’re worried about duplicate content, don’t be.

Here’s how to avoid it.

Get the raw transcript and publish it on your site first, along with a small and unique intro (50–100 words). And, of course, embed the video itself.

Get it indexed by fetching it from Google Search Console.

And then upload your transcript to YouTube and under your video like you normally would.

Pro tip

If you want to speed up rankings, shoot some internal links from your other blog posts.

This will give it a jolt of authority. It’ll need to rank higher, and plus, Google will learn to see that version of the text as the canonical version.

That’s why I mentioned you shouldn’t worry about content duplication:

Conclusion

Right at the beginning of this guide, I promised you tactics to promote your YouTube channel and have it grow organically.

Have I kept true to my word? And haven’t I given you a wealth of knowledge you didn’t have before?

Don’t answer! Those were rhetorical questions.

I know I did all of that, but what makes me really proud is that most of these tactics are accessible to total newbies and are free to boot.

That’s what makes them super valuable to you as you don’t have to invest a ton of money in succeeding with your YouTube channel.

No, invest only your time, skill, knowledge, persistence, and patience.

Yes, patience is crucial because everything comes to those who wait (and do things in the meantime).

So before you go and “do” the YouTube video promotion hacks you saw here …Leave me a comment below.

I’ll appreciate it more than you can imagine.

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