If we were to say the words “search engine” then you would immediately think of Google, right? But, would you associate “search engine” with YouTube? Maybe not so much. Which is particularly interesting, because YouTube is, in fact, the second biggest search engine on the internet. So, if you use YouTube as part of your overall digital marketing strategy, then you need to know what the most important metrics are just like you would on other social media platforms.
Subscriber Growth
It’s important to look at your subscriber growth because these are the people that are genuinely interested in your video content. Subscribers are important for your YouTube channel because when you upload a new piece of content, they will get a notification that will direct them to the video. Subscribers also watch double the amount of content compared to non-subscribers. So, the more subscribers that your channel has the more watch time your videos will get. A YouTube bot or third party tool may help you to get rapid success but having organic reach will help you in the long run
Unique Viewers
Unique viewers is the number of users that watch your video content over a certain time period. What this metric helps you understand is the actual size of your audience. This metric can also give you an insight into how many of the users engage with your content. If your unique viewers are much lower than the number of subscribers your channel has then this means that your subscribers are not watching as much content as they could be.
Audience Retention Rate
Your audience retention rate shows you the percentage who watch and leave your content. This is a particularly important metric to track because if your content has a high retention rate, then YouTube will increase the video in the search engine rankings. Another reason to track this metric is because it can help you devise your future video strategy.
View Duration
The average view duration metric is the total watch time of your content divided by the total number of plays. It’s a way of measuring your video’s ability to engage with viewers and subscribers. If your content doesn’t engage users, then they are going to leave your videos pretty quickly. Which can leave you with a poor average view duration. On the flipside of that, if your content does engage with users, then this can increase your search engine ranking.
Watch Time
Watch time is a metric that tells you the total amount of minutes that users have spent watching your video content. This metric is one of the most important ones for you to measure as it has a huge influence over your video rankings and recommendations.
Impressions Click-Through Rate
This metric is a little bit more complicated to measure, but it is an important one for you to consider. It’s all about measuring your video’s ability to draw in users from a homepage or trending section. If you have a high impressions click-through rate, then this means that your video content is popular with a lot of different audiences YouTube.
One thing to be aware of with this metric is that when you upload of new video, your impressions click-through rate is likely to spike and then decline over time. However, it will then stay at a stable rate. However, if you have a high impressions click-through rate but then users are leaving your content pretty quickly then this indicates that the title of your content or the video’s thumbnail is misleading.
Traffic Sources
This metric is pretty much exactly what it says on the tin. Social media referrals, embedded links and recommendations are all types of traffic sources. It’s an important metric to measure as it tells where users are discovering your content.
Content Engagement
The last metric that we are going to discuss in this article is content engagement. Comments, video shares, likes and dislikes are very valuable pieces of data. Comments can tell you the emotional effect that your content has on views. Likes and dislikes can help you determine what content is most popular amongst your viewers and subscribers.
