How to Use YouTube for Marketing

Traditional media (TV, print, and radio) has taken a back seat as the marketing industry’s main breadwinner. The internet and social media – specifically YouTube, have been doing all the heavy lifting for marketing as of late.

TV, print, and radio are still around, but they are not as well-used as social media. Social media can be accessed anytime through that device you keep in your pocket. This accessibility has its edge over traditional means. Social media will gain more ground and does not show signs of slowing down anytime soon.

As the world’s second-largest search engine with over 2 billion users. With that kind of public usage, YouTube is surely where you will find whoever it is you want to reach.

Table of Contents

Create Your Business Channel on YouTube

Creating your brand’s YouTube Channel is square one in claiming the part of the internet that rightfully belongs to you.

Make a YouTube channel that is solely dedicated to your brand’s YouTube channel. It is all free to make one, and you can make one through any YouTube account. Follow these simple steps if you want to create a new channel for your business:

On a web browser, log in to your YouTube account.
Once you have logged on to YouTube, click on your profile picture to reveal a drop-down menu.
Click on ‘Switch account’ on this drop-down menu.
Click on ‘View all channels’ on the subsequent menu.
Click on the ‘+Create a channel’ button.
Name your channel, and remember to name it as your brand’s official YouTube channel.
Tick the checkbox that confirms that you understand that you are creating a new Google account.
Click ‘Create.’

Creating a new, separate YouTube business channel will help you streamline your internet presence. This way, you won’t confuse and water down your YouTube business efforts with other YouTube channels that you may have.

You can also customize a dedicated business YouTube channel to have the look and feel to represent your business better. You can find all kinds of customization options in the ‘Customization’ tab on your YouTube channel’s account page.

Define Your Goals

As they say, begin with the end in mind. The same is advisably true on YouTube. Plot out your goals on the platform first, and you will know what kind and how much work is ahead of you.

Everyone is on YouTube to be seen – to get views. You could even say this is the purpose of using YouTube. Everything good on YouTube springs forth from garnering thousands, if not millions, or even billions of views!

The better question to answer is, who are those people who want to see your videos? If you have an answer to this, then you may have just defined half of your goals.

Define what audience you want to reach, and all your other goals will reveal themselves to you. You will have a clearer concept of what YouTube video content to produce to attract your target audience.

Be realistic and objectively measure if the number of views you want can be given by your target audience.

We suggest using the Who, What, & When approach in defining your business’s YouTube channel goals.

Who? – What demographic or niche do you wish to reach and attract with your YouTube content? Who is your niche? Be as specific as you can with defining your target audience.

Maybe review your business’s customer base to help define your YouTube audience further because every viewer on YouTube is a potential customer.

What? – What kind of YouTube video content will you create to attract your target audience? Stick to a format and be consistent.

Refer to this list of YouTube content types and YouTube marketing examples to help you decide what to show:

Vlog – video logs of a host documenting their experiences
How to and Tutorials – instruction videos on how to do things
Sketch/Comedy – a comedic skit about your area of knowledge
Educational Videos – videos that want to impart knowledge in a scholarly manner
Parodies – a subcategory of comedy, these harmlessly make fun of the current popular culture

Pro-tip: You can have more than one kind of content on your YouTube channel.

When? – Make all your goals time-bound. If you plan to reach the US Hispanic middle-aged female populace who are into cooking traditional Mexican food and gain a total of 100,000 views via your Traditional Mexican cooking video content, then you should set a deadline for this goal.

Setting to get 100,000 views is a good goal to achieve in a year. This way, you know what amount of work is cut out in front of you, and this will keep you inspired, hard-working, and motivated.

How frequently do I post videos? Decide on a consistent schedule, and you will be rewarded with loyal subscribers who regularly watch your YouTube content.

Learn More About Your Target Audience

As someone who runs a business, you might have a firm grasp of who your customers are. This is where it gets tricky, as you may initially attract your target niche or customers, but you attract more than this niche as you spend more time on YouTube.

This is what you should learn more about because YouTube is a whole business in itself. Some of the richest people in the world are YouTubers. You may be initially on YouTube to help your business but be open to the possibility that your YouTube channel can be a significant and very profitable business on its own, too.

As your success on YouTube grows, so will your channel evolve. If you diligently develop your channel and consistently put out great content, you will attract other kinds of people. Do not be afraid to absorb them into your community and let them advance the kind of content you produce.

Just stay true to your roots to not water down the quality of content that people loved about your channel in the first place. Evolve, but do not forget who you are in the name of pleasing everyone.

Investigate Your Competitors

Just like in the real world, forgetting to do reconnaissance missions on your rivals will leave you outdated and overtaken.

Check in every so often on what your YouTube competition is doing. Take tips on the things they do great and avoid the things that you find unappealing and disagreeable.

Get in on the trends that your competition does. It is important to notice trends and assimilate them into your content before they get stale. The internet appreciates being trendy, and trendy content is rewarded with views from your target audience.

Also, try to always do better than your competition. This will pay dividends in getting more cross-visits to your other social media platforms and click-throughs to your website.

Produce Quality Videos

We’re sure you have noticed that most, if not all, successful YouTube videos these days are well-produced. Well-produced videos mean well-written, well-shot, and well-edited videos.

A lot of content creators hire production teams to produce quality videos, and you can do this too. Of course, you can always go the DIY route and let production be done by people within your business.

Writing scripts for every YouTube video you release is something you should not overlook. All quality videos have scripts, and you will see how much easier your time would be on YouTube if you invest in learning how to write scripts.

Create Value for Your Viewers

You cannot be just self-centered and only think of what your audience can do for you and your business. All your videos should, in some way or another, give back to your community.

Add value to your audience’s lives through the value you create for them. Aim to help, teach, entertain, educate, and share with every video you release just because it is the right thing to do.

Do this in your style. Do this in a way you will be comfortable with. You are an influencer now, and would it not be great if your influence on other people makes their lives even just a little better?

Social media has become too impersonal and unsocial that giving back through adding value to your viewers’ lives may not be a bad way to make your time on YouTube more worthwhile.

Stay Consistent

Stay consistent every step of the way. Being consistent is a small thing that pays big in the long run. Also, ensure that your new videos do not contradict what you say in previous videos.

If you set out to post a video every Thursday every week, then by whatever means necessary, post a video every Thursday. You would not want to risk losing fans who get disappointed when they do not get the video they have been waiting for all week.

Have the same spiels and signature shenanigans. You may not realize it, but these little things are endearing to your viewers. Just make sure to pick a signature line and polish its delivery until you are comfortable delivering these spiels and lines.

To Conclude

The benefits of YouTube marketing are endless, and they grow exponentially. Stay on the platform and master the craft of running a YouTube channel, and you will get more than you have wished for.

Learn all the ways of YouTube, and it will be like birthing a new successful business from your main brand.