[0:00] - Can I tell you something I'm bad at?
[0:02] I am terrible at making clickbait.
[0:05] Up until two years ago,
[0:06] my most popular video
was about a basketball
[0:09] being dropped from a dam
with a bit of backspin.
[0:12] It takes off like a rocket and shoots out
[0:14] way further than you'd expect.
[0:16] This video was embedded
[0:18] on literally hundreds of news websites.
[0:20] And in its first week, it
got 16.3 million views,
[0:25] but almost none of those views
came on the YouTube platform.
[0:29] Why?
[0:30] Because I gave it this thumbnail
[0:32] and I called it "Strange
Applications of the Magnus Effect."
[0:37] This video is sponsored by KiwiCo.
[0:39] More about them at the end of the show.
[0:42] Now, I believe within YouTube,
[0:43] I'm used as an example of how
not to package your video.
[0:47] As if to demonstrate just how bad
[0:48] a title and thumbnail this is,
[0:50] someone else re-uploaded the
video with the clever title,
[0:53] "Basketball Dropped From Dam."
[0:55] And within a few weeks,
that video had received
[0:58] tens of millions of views on YouTube.
[1:01] This is when YouTube gave
me access to ContentID.
[1:03] That's the system that
allows you to earn revenue
[1:05] when someone else re-uploads
your videos, which was good,
[1:08] but I still wasn't very good at clickbait.
[1:11] So for this video, I called in an expert.
[1:14] I wanted to see your reaction face.
[1:16] Can you give me like a reaction face?
[1:17] Like what's a good thumbnail face?
[1:19] - Oh, I got you.
[1:20] This is a thumbnail face.
[1:22] (Derek laughs)
[1:24] I have like 10, I go through
the motions of like...
[1:28] (Derek laughs)
[1:30] And then we just take the best one,
[1:31] I probably have like
500 of these just saved
[1:33] and we can just Photoshop
my face on my face.
[1:36] That way, I don't have to do it anymore.
[1:38] - When I started on this
platform, some 10 years ago,
[1:41] clickbait was less important.
[1:43] Subscribers were what mattered,
[1:45] because most of the views
came from the sub feed.
[1:47] And videos went viral usually
[1:49] by getting a lot of attention elsewhere,
[1:51] like on Reddit or Facebook,
[1:53] not due to the YouTube algorithm.
[1:54] But once you had a big
video and people subscribed,
[1:57] well, then your next video
would likely get a lot of views
[2:00] from those subscribers.
[2:01] So YouTube would take that popular video
[2:03] and share it with more people.
[2:04] And so you'd get more subscribers
[2:06] in a positive feedback loop.
[2:09] But soon, YouTube realized
that this did not create
[2:12] the best experience for the viewer.
[2:14] They discovered that
showing people only videos
[2:17] from channels they were
subscribed to led to fewer clicks,
[2:20] less watch time and less engagement
[2:22] with the site as a whole.
[2:24] Plus, they knew that
relying on other platforms
[2:26] to drive traffic to viral hits was risky,
[2:28] since those other platforms might disable
[2:30] the traffic at any time.
[2:32] So they needed to make YouTube
a destination in itself.
[2:35] They wanted people to come to YouTube,
[2:38] see videos that interested them,
[2:39] click on at least one of them
and watch it for a while.
[2:42] Ideally get sucked down
the YouTube rabbit hole
[2:45] and spend hours on the site
without even noticing it.
[2:48] The ultimate resource is people's time
[2:50] and attention, and every platform
[2:52] is trying to capture as
much of it as possible.
[2:56] So, to make YouTube
this go-to destination,
[2:58] they had decrease the
importance of subscribers,
[3:01] make it less like a podcast app
[3:03] where you only get the
shows you're subscribed to,
[3:05] and more like Reddit,
[3:06] where stuff with the most
engagement rises to the top.
[3:10] But that necessarily meant increasing
[3:12] the importance of clickbait.
[3:14] Now, there seems to be a paradox
when it comes to clickbait.
[3:17] People almost universally
claim to hate it,
[3:21] but you also see it everywhere.
[3:23] So why is this?
[3:25] Well, one of the problems
is we don't all agree
[3:27] on the definition of clickbait.
[3:29] When I google it, the top definition is,
[3:31] on the internet, content
whose main purpose
[3:34] is to attract attention
and encourage visitors
[3:36] to click on a link to
a particular webpage.
[3:39] We could call this type I clickbait,
[3:42] and there doesn't seem to
be anything wrong with it.
[3:44] I mean, if you didn't
try to attract attention
[3:46] and get people to click on your links,
[3:48] then you wouldn't really
be doing your job.
[3:50] But there is a second definition.
[3:52] One that I think more people ascribe to,
[3:54] which is something such
as a headline designed
[3:57] to make readers want to
click on a hyperlink,
[3:59] especially when the link leads to content
[4:01] of dubious value or interest.
[4:04] Wikipedia says, "A defining
characteristic of clickbait
[4:07] is that it is sensationalized
or misleading."
[4:09] And it also talks about teasers
[4:11] that intentionally withhold information
[4:13] to exploit the "curiosity gap."
[4:15] They give you enough
information to make you curious,
[4:18] but not enough to satisfy that curiosity.
[4:21] Here are two actual titles
from a news website.
[4:25] Nine out of 10 Americans
are completely wrong
[4:27] about this mind blowing fact.
[4:30] And someone gave some kids some scissors.
[4:32] Here's what happened next.
[4:34] I think we can all agree
that these are examples
[4:36] of bad type II clickbait.
[4:39] Now, imagine a clickbait
space where on one axis,
[4:42] you have how misleading
or sensationalized it is.
[4:45] And on the other, how much information
[4:47] is intentionally withheld
to create a curiosity gap.
[4:50] Well, then these two titles
fall in the top right corner.
[4:54] And these are the zones
of type II clickbait.
[4:57] At the other extreme,
[4:58] you have things that are so
unsensationalized as to be dull.
[5:02] You could call this the dead zone.
[5:05] Now, here is where you would find
[5:07] "Strange applications
of the Magnus Effect."
[5:10] I mean, I didn't tell you
what the applications were.
[5:13] Now, in the middle is where you
would find type I clickbait.
[5:17] But honestly, I think type
I and type II clickbait
[5:20] are so different, that
we shouldn't even use
[5:22] the same word for them.
[5:23] Instead of type I clickbait,
[5:25] my friend and YouTuber, Brady
Heron suggested legitbait.
[5:29] I mean, it might sound
enticing, but it is legit.
[5:33] Instead of type II clickbait,
[5:34] we could use clicktrap,
clicktrick, linktrap or dupechute.
[5:40] What's important to recognize
is that for any given video,
[5:43] there is no one true title and thumbnail.
[5:47] Each video could have
hundreds or thousands
[5:49] of different legitbait titles.
[5:51] For example, how does a zero-G plane work?
[5:55] I went on a plane that does
parabolic trajectories.
[5:58] What happens to fire on a zero-G plane?
[6:01] Now, the most enticing
titles and thumbnails
[6:04] are found close to type II clickbait.
[6:07] I'm reminded of the infographic
by smarter every day,
[6:09] showing that on social media,
[6:11] the greatest engagement
occurs close to the boundary
[6:13] of what's allowable.
[6:14] But remember that everyone's
definition of clickbait
[6:17] is different, and everyone's perceptions
[6:19] of words and images are different.
[6:20] So these are not clear boundaries.
[6:22] They're actually kind of fuzzy.
[6:25] What for one person might be legitbait,
[6:27] for someone else, could be a clicktrap.
[6:30] What's clear is that on a site
[6:32] where click-through rate is important,
[6:33] clickbait of all types is inevitable.
[6:36] How important to a video's success
[6:38] is the title and thumbnail?
[6:40] - Very important. Of course.
[6:41] If they don't click on the video,
[6:42] they don't watch it.
[6:43] You can't get 10 million views
[6:45] unless 10 million people
click on the video.
[6:48] So, I mean, it's literally that simple.
[6:50] They don't click on it,
they don't watch it.
[6:52] - So, why is clickbait everywhere?
[6:55] Well, because it works.
[6:57] More enticing thumbnails get more clicks.
[6:59] Despite some people's claims
[7:01] that they won't click or they'll unsub,
[7:03] it's just like evolution.
[7:04] Whatever survives, multiplies
and traits become amplified.
[7:09] If you don't begrudge
the giraffe its long neck
[7:11] so it can reach the highest leaves,
[7:13] can you begrudge a YouTuber the red arrow
[7:16] that allows them to
reach further audiences?
[7:18] I talked about this in
my video two years ago.
[7:21] To be successful as a YouTuber,
[7:22] you need to optimize two things,
[7:24] watch time and the click-through
rate of your videos.
[7:27] That's the number of times
[7:28] the title and thumbnail are clicked,
[7:29] divided by the total number
of times they're shown.
[7:32] That's the number of impressions.
[7:34] Now at the time,
[7:34] this was something of a revelation for me
[7:37] because I always thought my
job was to make great videos.
[7:39] And then a title and thumbnail
[7:41] that adequately represented
what the video was about.
[7:43] But now I've realized that
making the title and thumbnail
[7:46] is at least half the job.
[7:49] This is not just because
better titles and thumbnails
[7:51] get you more clicks,
[7:52] but because better titles and thumbnails
[7:54] will get you way more impressions.
[7:57] YouTube has limited real estate
[7:59] with which to show you
virtually infinite content.
[8:02] And so it's not enough
to make a good video
[8:04] even if people watch all of it,
[8:06] you also have to make
a title and thumbnail
[8:08] that gets clicked,
especially in competition
[8:10] with other really good
titles and thumbnails.
[8:12] That's the only way you can expect YouTube
[8:14] to give you more impressions.
[8:16] Now, the big development
since my last video on this
[8:19] is YouTube introduced real-time metrics
[8:21] like views, impressions
and click-through rate.
[8:24] Now, I suggested this
would create an arms race.
[8:26] So what you can bet will happen
[8:28] is that creators will launch a video
[8:30] and then they'll be sitting there
[8:31] with all these different
variants of thumbnails
[8:33] and they'll be swapping them out
[8:35] and looking at what that
does to click-through rate
[8:38] and then going with the one
[8:39] that leads to the greatest
click-through rate.
[8:42] And this is basically what has happened.
[8:45] Let me give you my favorite example.
[8:47] Last year, I made a video about asteroids,
[8:50] which I thought was really good.
[8:51] I called it "Asteroids:
Earth's Biggest Threat,"
[8:54] which is something Stephen Hawking said.
[8:56] And people were very
positive about the video.
[8:58] They thought it was maybe one of my best,
[9:01] but the performance
was well below average.
[9:03] In its first day,
asteroids was ranked ninth
[9:06] out of my previous 10 videos.
[9:09] It was probably on target
[9:10] for about one and a half million views.
[9:13] So I tried different titles and thumbnails
[9:15] like, "Asteroid Impact:
What Are Our Chances?"
[9:18] Or "Asteroid Impact: What Could We Do?"
[9:20] But none of these changes
got much traction.
[9:23] And then on day three after launch,
[9:25] I changed the title and thumbnail
[9:27] to "These Are the
Asteroids to Worry About."
[9:30] And immediately the video
started doing better.
[9:33] It quickly shot up from almost
my worst performing video
[9:36] to my best.
[9:38] It now has 14 million views.
[9:42] Nothing about the video changed,
[9:43] just that one image and 38 characters.
[9:47] But because of that, the video has reached
[9:49] nearly 10 times as many people
as it otherwise would have.
[9:52] And the title and thumbnail
accurately describe
[9:55] what the video is about.
[9:56] I mean, sure, there's a curiosity gap,
[9:58] but you couldn't explain the whole concept
[10:00] in the length of the title.
[10:02] So if you see a YouTuber
changing titles and thumbnails,
[10:05] this is why.
[10:07] Because that effort can be
rewarded many times over.
[10:10] I've seen people
objecting to this practice
[10:12] because they think the creator
[10:13] is trying to dupe their audience,
[10:14] get them to click on the
same video more than once,
[10:16] but that's not it.
[10:18] The whole point is to get YouTube
[10:20] to show the title and
thumbnail to more people.
[10:22] We're trying to increase
the number of impressions,
[10:25] which is heavily dependent
on the click-through rate.
[10:28] Now, a lot of my recent videos
have this typical view curve.
[10:32] There's an initial spike
after I release the video
[10:34] and then a dip, and then a second bump
[10:37] after I have figured out a
better title and thumbnail.
[10:40] I change the title and thumbnail
[10:41] and I watch the real time view graph.
[10:44] What I'm looking for is a
noticeable bump in views.
[10:47] Sometimes there's no change,
sometimes it gets worse,
[10:51] but on occasions, when you
see something like this,
[10:53] well then, you know you've found a winner.
[10:56] This is something all the
big YouTubers are doing.
[10:58] Not even Mr. Beast knows exactly
[11:00] which thumbnail will work best beforehand.
[11:02] Have you ever changed
a title and thumbnail
[11:05] and then the video did better?
[11:06] - Oh, of course.
[11:07] So everybody, I usually make
like two or three thumbnails,
[11:10] and then if it's not
doing as well as I want,
[11:12] we usually just swap 'em out
and see if it does better.
[11:15] 'cause the thing is like,
you don't really know.
[11:17] I mean, you could know if you
just were an almighty being
[11:21] that could just predict what
people would be interested in,
[11:23] but you know, usually...
[11:25] Like, you can do hide and seek.
[11:26] You don't really know if
like you hiding in a tree
[11:28] and then someone walking
below you is a good thumbnail.
[11:30] Or if you hiding a trash can and
them walking in front of you.
[11:33] So, you know, just do both
[11:34] and then see which one interests
people a little bit more.
[11:37] - I feel the same way,
[11:38] but I do feel like you have a better sense
[11:40] of this than like most people.
[11:42] - Of course.
[11:42] I mean, no one gets 40
million views a video.
[11:45] (both laughing)
[11:47] - But what is the point
in getting more views?
[11:50] If you're cynical,
[11:51] you might say it's all
about money and fame.
[11:53] And while there are certainly
financial incentives
[11:56] to getting more views,
that's not why I do it.
[11:58] As an educational YouTuber,
[12:00] I think there are two very good reasons
[12:02] for using excellent type I clickbait
[12:04] over more straightforward packaging.
[12:07] To understand the first reason,
[12:08] let's consider two
different possible titles
[12:10] for my most recent video.
[12:12] I called it "The Simplest Math
Problem No One Can Solve,"
[12:16] but it's a video about
the Collatz conjecture.
[12:18] So perhaps a more straightforward title
[12:20] would have been simply to call it that.
[12:22] The problem is, if I publish a video
[12:24] called the Collatz conjecture,
[12:26] the most likely people to click on it
[12:28] are those who already know
what the Collatz conjecture is.
[12:31] And the vast majority of people
will never have heard of it.
[12:34] So for them, the title is meaningless
[12:37] and only the very curious
[12:39] or those who really like
Veritasium would click.
[12:41] In contrast, calling it
"The Simplest Math Problem
[12:44] No One Can Solve,"
conveys more information
[12:46] about the video to everyone.
[12:48] And this means more
people can click on it,
[12:50] most of whom will never have heard
[12:52] of the Collatz conjecture.
[12:53] So I get to teach them something new.
[12:55] And since the video has a
higher click-through rate,
[12:58] YouTube shows it to even more people.
[13:01] So if my aim is to increase
the level of knowledge
[13:04] in the world by the
maximum amount possible,
[13:06] this is the way to do it.
[13:09] The second reason we need to
optimize titles and thumbnails
[13:12] is to support the major
goal of this channel.
[13:14] We are trying to make
the best science films
[13:17] on every topic we tackle.
[13:19] That means traveling to meet
experts in film experiments,
[13:22] hiring people to build props,
[13:24] make spectacular animations,
research and fact check.
[13:28] We hire expert consultants
[13:30] to double and triple check our work.
[13:32] I don't wanna make vlogs.
[13:34] I wanna make science
documentaries on YouTube
[13:36] that put broadcast to shame.
[13:38] And to make this possible and sustainable,
[13:40] the videos have to get
views and lots of them.
[13:43] And to do that, we have to make
[13:44] the best titles and thumbnails we can.
[13:47] YouTuber and Patreon CEO, Jack Conte
[13:49] has talked about adjusting your packaging.
[13:52] The idea is know what
you're passionate about,
[13:54] what you won't compromise on
[13:56] and that stuff goes in the box.
[13:58] All the rest, like what
paper it's wrapped in,
[14:00] that's the packaging.
[14:02] So the video is my focus
and the title and thumbnail
[14:04] are the packaging that
I'm happy to adjust,
[14:07] so I can make the type of
videos that are important to me.
[14:10] Now, is it ironic that a
channel whose whole purpose
[14:12] is to promote a true seeking mindset
[14:14] has to experiment at the
edge of what is truthful
[14:17] in order to fulfill that purpose?
[14:18] It is something that I
often worry about.
[14:21] You know, when I did like
risking my life to do X,
[14:24] it's like, well, what probability of death
[14:26] does there have to be for
you to risk your life?
[14:28] Like 50%?
[14:29] - I love how he always overthinks things.
[14:32] (laughs)
That's funny.
[14:33] He's like, is my life risked enough
[14:36] where I can put I risked my life?
[14:38] I only had a 9% chance of dying
[14:40] and I need at least a 13% chance.
[14:42] You're so funny.
[14:43] He was the same way two years ago
[14:44] when he asked me all this stuff.
[14:46] I was like, "Dude, just do
whatever makes the most sense.
[14:49] - Yeah, I mean, obviously
I feel like my instincts
[14:52] are not good.
[14:53] But what I realized
[14:54] is that I don't have
to trust my instincts.
[14:57] This problem of getting the
best title and thumbnail,
[15:01] well, it's a scientific problem.
[15:03] We're just asking which accurate
representation of the video
[15:06] will get the most clicks
from a general audience.
[15:09] And that's a problem we can use
[15:10] the scientific method to solve.
[15:12] So I've hired a couple
of really bright people
[15:14] and we spend a lot of time brainstorming
[15:16] and making titles and
thumbnails and testing them out.
[15:19] For example, on Twitter and Patreon.
[15:21] Varitasium titles and
thumbnails have gotten better,
[15:24] not because I'm better at it,
[15:25] but because of my team and our testing.
[15:28] If you have ideas about
how we could do it better,
[15:30] please get in touch.
[15:32] The results have often
contradicted what I expected.
[15:34] I mean, this video seemed
to perform 10% better
[15:37] when we excluded the word
surprising from the title.
[15:40] So it became simply The
Secret of Synchronization.
[15:44] I thought these two titles
were basically a toss up,
[15:47] but Patreon had a strong
preference for one over the other.
[15:51] What's interesting about this research
[15:52] is that the more clickable
titles and thumbnails
[15:55] often better represent
the content of the video.
[15:57] Let me give you some examples.
[15:59] One thing I didn't expect
when YouTube brought in
[16:01] the real time analytics tools
[16:03] and allowed title and thumbnail changes
[16:04] to affect impressions,
[16:06] was that it would also
work for older videos.
[16:09] So here is an old video
that I originally entitled,
[16:12] "Why the Neutron is the
Hero of Nuclear Physics."
[16:15] In hindsight, it's a weird,
kinda meaningless title.
[16:18] So I changed it to, "Why Einstein Thought
[16:21] Nuclear Weapons Impossible."
[16:23] It's clearer, more accurate.
[16:25] And this is what happened
to views after the change.
[16:30] I changed "Strange Applications
of the Magnus Effect"
[16:33] to "Backspin Basketball Flies Off Dam."
[16:36] Again, more accurate.
[16:37] And the video is now
being watched on YouTube.
[16:40] Probably 10 million more views
[16:42] than it otherwise would have had.
[16:44] Even anti-clickbait has proven effective.
[16:47] Here's a video I originally titled,
[16:49] "Are Negative Ions Good For You?"
[16:51] Which is a question nobody asked ever.
[16:55] Now, I changed it to,
"Do Salt Lamps Work?"
[17:00] Seriously.
[17:01] And here's the result:
[17:04] One and a half million more views.
[17:07] I think looking at these examples,
[17:09] you could easily make the case
[17:10] that YouTube has made
me better at what I do.
[17:13] It has improved the clarity and accuracy
[17:16] of my titles and thumbnails.
It's helped me figure out
[17:18] what is interesting to my audience
[17:19] and how to encapsulate
that in a single image
[17:22] and fewer than 50 characters.
[17:24] For those of you who worry that a focus
[17:26] on titles and thumbnails will prevent me
[17:27] from picking challenging science topics,
[17:30] well, I simply ask you
to look at the videos
[17:33] from the last year or two,
[17:34] like the ones on Gödel's
incompleteness theorem,
[17:36] general relativity, Penrose tilings,
[17:38] the logistic map, Newton's
method of calculating Pi,
[17:41] the one way speed of light.
[17:43] Good titles and thumbnails
make it possible
[17:45] to tackle these topics
and to reach more people
[17:48] who have heard of them before.
[17:50] There is a symbiotic relationship
[17:52] between views and video quality.
[17:55] The more views we get, the more people,
[17:56] locations, props and equipment
[17:59] and research we can invest in.
[18:01] This makes the next video
better than the last.
[18:04] If we can be good at
titles and thumbnails,
[18:06] the ultimate outcome is better videos.
[18:09] That is something I think
you and I both want.
[18:17] Hey, this video is sponsored by KiwiCo,
[18:20] a long time supporter of the channel.
[18:22] Now KiwiCo makes awesome
hands on projects for kids,
[18:24] including big kids like me.
[18:26] They have eight subscription lines
[18:27] targeted at different age groups,
[18:29] all the way down to newborns.
[18:31] What I love about KiwiCo crates
[18:32] is that they make learning fun
[18:33] and something to look forward to.
[18:35] I mean, when I pull out a crate,
[18:36] my kids just jump at the
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[18:39] And all the materials you
need come right in the box.
[18:42] So there's no need to run to the store.
[18:43] You just open it up and go.
[18:45] My kids and I just built
this domino machine,
[18:48] which, who knows, might be
inspiration for a viral video.
[18:52] Now, the big idea is that
while playing and having fun,
[18:55] kids learn about STEAM concepts.
[18:57] That is science, technology,
engineering, art and math.
[19:00] And in addition to the project,
[19:02] there's a magazine with a lot
of additional information.
[19:04] So I think this is the best way to learn.
[19:06] By doing something
yourself and having fun,
[19:09] it's how education should be.
[19:11] So if you wanna try it out,
[19:12] go to Kiwico.com/veritasium50,
[19:14] and you'll get 50% off your
first month of any crate.
[19:17] I will put that link
down in the description.
[19:19] So I wanna thank KiwiCo
for sponsoring Veritasium,
[19:22] and I wanna thank you for watching.