---
title: 'YouTube SEO Just Changed: 5 Ways to Rank #1 in 2026'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=T4b3pU6ApPM'
video_id: 'T4b3pU6ApPM'
date: 2026-08-14
duration_sec: 621
---

# YouTube SEO Just Changed: 5 Ways to Rank #1 in 2026

> Source: [YouTube SEO Just Changed: 5 Ways to Rank #1 in 2026](https://youtube.com/watch?v=T4b3pU6ApPM)

## Summary

The video discusses five key strategies for ranking YouTube videos in 2026, emphasizing the growing importance of channel authority over traditional SEO. The creator, who has made over $2 million from faceless channels, shares insights on building authority, avoiding bad audiences, adapting to TV viewing trends, selecting niches, and leveraging YouTube features.

### Key Points

- **Authority is the new SEO** [00:01] — The creator argues that authority, not just SEO, is crucial for ranking. A 2024 Google leak (patent 0004416A1) suggests Google ranks content based on topical authority. Channels that stay on-topic and establish expertise are trusted more.
- **Building authority through cross-platform presence** [01:26] — To build authority, creators should link their YouTube channel to other platforms (Instagram, X) with bios that reinforce their expertise. This creates a pattern that Google recognizes, distinguishing them from random channels.
- **Avoiding a bad audience** [03:02] — A 'bad audience' consists of viewers with no prior history in your niche. This can happen through keyword stuffing (e.g., adding irrelevant tags like 'Mr. Beast' or 'Ford F-150' to a ramen video), which confuses the algorithm and leads to poor CTR and AVD.
- **Never share your videos with friends/family** [04:35] — Sharing your video with people who don't watch content in your niche (e.g., a friend who watches golf) can ruin your channel. The algorithm will try to show your content to similar viewers, who won't click, hurting your performance.
- **TV viewing is surpassing mobile** [05:44] — YouTube revealed that TV viewers have surpassed mobile viewers. This changes editing styles: fast-paced, high-energy editing (like Mr. Beast's) is less effective on TV, where viewers prefer longer, slower-paced content that can be background noise.
- **Niche selection and originality** [07:41] — In the era of AI, YouTube rewards original content. Choosing a niche based solely on RPM (e.g., finance) is a mistake. Creators should be transparent about who they are and build authority, which leads to more impressions.
- **Use YouTube features and community tab** [09:04] — After 20-30 uploads, the algorithm knows your audience. Creators should use playlists, end screens, cards, and especially the community tab, which AI channels don't use, to build authority and engagement.

### Conclusion

The key to ranking high on YouTube in 2026 is building authority by staying on-topic, being transparent with the algorithm, and existing across platforms. Focus on building a portfolio that matches your niche, not on subscriber growth or thumbnail testing.

## Transcript

video. Now, I'm not going to give you the same [ __ ] that all of these guys video tags or it's your titles or it's your description. No [ __ ] right? That's obviously a huge part of ranking high on YouTube. But that's not the only thing
that matters, especially not nowadays in 2026. If you don't know who I am, my Faceless YouTube channels since 2018. And since then, I've made over $2 million across all of these YouTube channels. And in this video, I'm going
one on YouTube. Starting with the most important part, and this is something that nobody talks about. It is called authority. Now, in 2024, there was a Google leak. Hundreds and thousands of Google files were leaked onto the
particular caught my eye. The patent number is 0004416A1. ranks with something called topical authority. Meaning that if you drift too
far away from the main points of either your YouTube channel or your Google website, you lose trust with Google. Now, before I continue, this is they were like, nah, you know, that's in there, but that doesn't mean that that's
how the algorithm works. I call cap because it's not a secret that some others based on branding, right? So it may not be this patent in specific that something similar in my opinion at least. Now to build authority on your
channel and to rank number one on a specific topic in Google's/ YouTube's eyes, you need to come off as an expert, as a professional. For example, let's say I have a YouTube channel where I talk about coffee and I post videos like
the best coffees, how to make coffee, and just random things like that. Now, if I'm only posting these videos on YouTube and I only have a presence on YouTube, Google sees me as another random YouTube channel. But if in my
video description and in the about page of my YouTube channel, I have a link to my Instagram and the bio of my Instagram is coffee expert. And then I also have linked an ex account where the bio of that is coffee specialist. And then I
together. Well, now Google sees a pattern, right? He sees that I'm not coffee. It also sees that I'm everywhere. Not only that, but I'm also That's the difference, right? Because now Google sees me different than those
about coffee and don't have anything in their bio or in their uh video about adding video tags. Anybody can do that, right? And there's free tools or AI softwares that give you video tags to add to your video. And you know, Google
knows this. Again, literally everybody can do it. But not everybody can build authority. With the new Gemini updates, what I've seen, at least on my channels, is that the algorithm is weighing authority more than it is SEO or even
sometimes average vieweration. I think that now that anybody can start a YouTube channel with AI and create, you know, shitty AI scripts, Google is having a hard time, you know, recommending content or ranking it. So,
the only logical solution for that is to go based off of the channel's authority. Moving on to number two, that is having a bad audience. This is when you get a lot of viewers that have no prior history of watching content in your
niche. And there's a few ways that this happens. And one of them is keyword stuffing. Right now, let's say I have a YouTube channel where I talk about ramen. And I post a video that's titled how to cook ramen. And in my video tags,
I have Mr. beast, names of celebrities, names of trucks, irrelevant things that I'm just adding because they are ranking high on Google Trends or they're just trendy. Well, because of those tags, there is now a probability that YouTube
is going to show my video to someone that's looking at trucks. They don't going to scroll past it, right? It's just garbage in their feed. And the reason that happened to begin with is because I put Ford F-150 in the tags of
my video. When you're first starting off, you need to give the algorithm time to find your audience. If you add random tags to your videos, you're essentially the algorithm to understand that I am
100% a ramen creator. Now, if I have a lot of viewers who also watch ramen media links connected to my YouTube channel saying that I'm a ramen expert and all of my content is based on ramen. The algorithm doesn't have to guess
anything. It it is super clear. It is overstated that I'm a ramen creator. Now, it's not only tags where you can [ __ ] up, right? I've said this before. Never share the link of your videos or the link of your YouTube channel to
anybody that you know. I don't give a [ __ ] if it's your grandma, if it's your friend, if it's your Discord friends. Never. Especially if they don't like watched videos about ramen, because the algorithm goes based on what the viewer
watches, not what you post. It doesn't give a [ __ ] what you post until someone link to my video or to my YouTube channel and I send it to a group chat watched a video about ramen before and let's say they do click on it and they
confused. It's like, okay, well this guy, which is my friend, he only watches video about ramen? So, what the algorithm is going to do to try and figure this out, it's going to try and show your content to similar viewers
like my friend who watches golf. That audience is not going to click my video on purpose. Not unless if they know me, right? And they're a friend trying to support. So because of that, your CTR is going to dip, your ABD is going to dip,
and essentially it's going to ruin your channel. Not only with how the algorithm video. But anyways, moving on to the next one, and that is the style of your video and editing. Now, this one may sound a little bit random, but it is
going to change your mentality because a few weeks ago, YouTube revealed that TV viewers have surpassed mobile viewers, meaning that more people watch YouTube on TV than they do on their phones, which personally, I think that's weird,
but that's because of editing styles, right? There is multiple different is out of the window essentially, at least on TV. If you watch his Mr. Beast Games uh series on Amazon Prime. His
than on his YouTube one. His YouTube one is super fast-paced. He talks fast, kind of like me, and it gives people motion sickness when they're looking at it on a 65 in TV. But not only that, YouTube is now becoming like a background noise.
And this is a a genuine quote from someone that made a complaint about this. This is a father who said that he hates watching videos that are 15, 16 minutes long because he plays it in the background when he's putting his kids to
sleep. And by the time he's barely even laying them down, the video is already something else. I think it was car videos that he watched. So, he looks for content that is an hour plus. I believe that people's stamina with that
fast-paced content is going away. And, you know, the counter to that is, oh, you know, Tik Tok and YouTube shorts kind of ruined people's attention spam. Well, yes, but not really. It's for specific styles of content. For example,
my ramen videos, I wouldn't do Mr. Beast editing style for those. I would create normal 20, 30 minutes, hour-long videos about it that people who are interested in that, usually older people will sit, leave in the background as they're
cooking or just doing something random. So, you know, that idea of fast-paced Mr. Beast, you know, blueprint of editing, of pacing, that's not true. It's already been 2 3 years now and YouTube themselves have proven that
that's not the way to go. It's okay to have slow moments. It's okay to, you know, break the pace of of your video. It doesn't have to be loud all of the time. But moving on to the next one, that is niche selection. And I guess
this is more for faceless channels, but the topic of of what your videos are to do the same thing, be different. YouTube is rewarding original content in the era of AI. They now have implemented systems that detect this. If you click
comment, that's going to take you to my school community, and that's where I teach complete beginners how I made over $2 million with faceless YouTube channels. And as of recently, I posted a full breakdown of Google/YouTube's
those of you that care. Now, going back to niche selection, a lot of people make this decision based on CPM and RPM of the niche, which for those of you that don't know, RPM is how much YouTube pays you per 1,000 views. Celebrity news, for
example, has like 5 to6 RPM. And anything to do with finance and economy is over $10 plus. So, people think, "Oh, okay, easy. I'll just make videos about economy or finance and have a $10 RPM." That's not how that works. And that's
decision. But it's like, bro, do your own thing, right? Build authority. Be transparent with the YouTube algorithm. Tell it exactly who you are. Because again, in the era of AI, there were like [ __ ] 6 million YouTube channels that
were created that are getting views with no real human behind it to take credit for it. So, be the one that stands out. The more authority you build, the more impressions you're going to get. with those impressions. After 20 to 30
uploads, the algorithm by that time should know exactly who your audience is based on the AVD, average view duration, and the CTR, click-through rate. And you YouTube studio. And very quickly, I'm going to give you guys some sauce here.
including in my school community, I would always talk [ __ ] on playlists, end screens, cards, and all of these YouTube features that they give you. I always research, I found that that is quite the opposite. it is very very very necessary
in this video cuz that's in my school community that is uh part of the new that's kind of like the meta. So is the community tab. AI channels don't use the that's a at this point I'm just trying to extend the video for no reason.
authority. That's the secret to ranking high not just on YouTube but on Google, on Instagram, on everything. Stay on topic with whatever it is your niche is. Don't go outside of that. Tell Google exactly who you are. Exist outside of
the platform and be known in those platforms for what you do. Don't worry about AB testing thumbnails yet. Don't worry about subscriber growth. Focus only on building a portfolio that matches. With that being said, thanks
for watching. Leave a like, subscribe, comment down below what else you want me comment down below what else you want me to talk about.