[00:00] Have you noticed changes in your video or channel&nbsp; performance? Do you know what to look out for when&nbsp;&nbsp; it comes to evaluating potential causes? Let’s&nbsp; walk through common causes of drops in watch time,&nbsp;&nbsp; things to consider when creating your channel&nbsp; strategy, and helpful metrics to explore in&nbsp;&nbsp;
[00:13] YouTube Analytics. First, have you made any recent&nbsp; changes to your channel or content strategy?&nbsp;&nbsp; Changes in topic, editing style, thumbnail design,&nbsp; on-screen talent, upload cadence, or video length&nbsp;&nbsp;
[00:25] can impact audience interest. If you’ve recently&nbsp; changed your thumbnails and noticed a viewership&nbsp;&nbsp; drop, it might be helpful to look at views,&nbsp; impressions and click-through rates to gauge&nbsp;&nbsp; your audience’s reception to the new look. You can&nbsp; also use the thumbnail Test &amp; Compare feature in&nbsp;&nbsp;
[00:39] YouTube Studio, which lets you upload up to&nbsp; three different thumbnails and compare their&nbsp;&nbsp; performance. As you experiment, take note of the&nbsp; thumbnails that work so you can implement them&nbsp;&nbsp; more often, and the ones that don't perform as&nbsp; well, so you can keep iterating and try something&nbsp;&nbsp;
[00:52] else. Next, check for topic and audience appeal.&nbsp; The topics you cover on your channel can affect&nbsp;&nbsp; watch time and overall channel performance.&nbsp; Remember that YouTube follows the audience and&nbsp;&nbsp; their interests when choosing content to surface.&nbsp; The more a video is resonating with audiences,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[01:08] the more it will be suggested. For example, a&nbsp; gaming creator playing an older release may see&nbsp;&nbsp; a watch time decline compared to a fellow creator&nbsp; playing a hot new release that’s garnering a lot&nbsp;&nbsp; of buzz online. You can use the Audience tab&nbsp; in YouTube analytics to see which videos are&nbsp;&nbsp;
[01:22] currently growing your audience the most so you&nbsp; can learn what’s working not just to drive views,&nbsp;&nbsp; but attract viewers who come back for more.&nbsp; You can also see other channels and videos&nbsp;&nbsp; your audience enjoys, which can help you&nbsp; select topics, evaluate competition, and&nbsp;&nbsp;
[01:35] identify trends. The Audience by watch behavior&nbsp; card in Studio Analytics is one way you can&nbsp;&nbsp; monitor audience appeal. If regular viewers are&nbsp; decreasing, this is a sign that you’re no longer&nbsp;&nbsp; serving a need that was driving retention, or&nbsp; that viewers have shifted their interests. If&nbsp;&nbsp;
[01:49] new and casual viewers are decreasing, this is&nbsp; a sign that your content may not be attracting&nbsp;&nbsp; a broader audience. If you’re looking to increase&nbsp; reach, consider creating content that appeals to&nbsp;&nbsp; a broader audience based on hot topics or trends&nbsp; while still staying true to your overall brand.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[02:04] Check out tools like Google Trends, or the&nbsp; Inspiration tab in YouTube Studio to see&nbsp;&nbsp; how viewer interest has shifted in the topics or&nbsp; formats your channel covers, and find inspiration&nbsp;&nbsp; for your channel. When judging the success of your&nbsp; content, remember that not every video serves the&nbsp;&nbsp;
[02:18] same purpose with your content strategy. A video&nbsp; aimed at strengthening fan connections might not&nbsp;&nbsp; be judged by the same standards and metrics as&nbsp; a video designed to attract a broader audience.&nbsp;&nbsp; Tailor your evaluation criteria based on&nbsp; the intent behind each piece of content.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[02:32] For example, if you have a community-building&nbsp; video and a tentpole event video, understand&nbsp;&nbsp; that their success metrics may differ. A&nbsp; community-building video might prioritize&nbsp;&nbsp; subscribers gained and average view duration,&nbsp; while a tentpole event video aims for broader&nbsp;&nbsp;
[02:45] reach and appeal through a strong impression&nbsp; rate. Rather than solely relying on your most&nbsp;&nbsp; popular video as a tool of comparison, establish&nbsp; baseline performance expectations for your videos&nbsp;&nbsp; or series. These baselines can help you identify&nbsp; outliers in performance and help you drill into&nbsp;&nbsp;
[03:00] specific elements of your content that may have&nbsp; contributed to these outliers. If you have videos&nbsp;&nbsp; that are underperforming, consider promoting them&nbsp; on social media, adding end screens from popular&nbsp;&nbsp; videos that point to them, or experiment with&nbsp; changing the title or thumbnail. You can also&nbsp;&nbsp;
[03:14] create a post promoting the&nbsp; video. It’s also important to consider seasonality&nbsp;&nbsp; in your channel strategy. Different audiences may&nbsp; have different watch habits depending on the time&nbsp;&nbsp; of year. Think about your audience, who they are,&nbsp; which country they live in, if they’re in school,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[03:28] if there are any major holidays coming up, and&nbsp; generally what’s going on in their lives. Expect&nbsp;&nbsp; seasonal fluctuations and plan your programming&nbsp; schedule accordingly. “Off-seasons” can be a good&nbsp;&nbsp; time to relax and refresh, or to work on evergreen&nbsp; content that may help grow your channel during&nbsp;&nbsp;
[03:43] quieter periods. Finally, we recommend making one&nbsp; change at a time to your channel so you can track&nbsp;&nbsp; which changes have the most impact. Remember,&nbsp; one underperforming video won't necessarily&nbsp;&nbsp; impact your entire channel. What’s most important&nbsp; is how viewers respond to each video when it’s&nbsp;&nbsp;
[03:59] recommended to them. What can lead to a decline&nbsp; in overall channel views is people’s interests&nbsp;&nbsp; changing over time, or when viewers stop watching&nbsp; most of your videos when they’re recommended&nbsp;&nbsp; to them. For more information check out the&nbsp; links in the description. Thanks for watching!