Check out Part 1 and Part 2 if you have not already. Community Perhaps the most overlooked part of creating a successful channel is to understand YouTube as a community. If you join Twitter or Facebook don’t just send out one message and leave it at that. The more you engage the YouTube community the better chance you have of your videos being found. YouTube supports content providers who are active in the community. That is why you often see videos with lower view counts rank higher then videos with substantially more views. It’s about interaction:
Subscribe to other channels. Add friends. Comment on other videos. Respond to people who commented on your videos and channel
Collaborate with other musicians or people with channels on YouTube. Recommend their songs, videos, and channels and ask them to do the same for you. This helps cross promote musicians’ channels and brings the collaborators additional viewers. Don’t sit back and wait for people to discover you, go to where they are. Browse popular videos, ones that are currently rising, top videos of the day, etc and drop a comment. It’s best if the videos have some connection or relevancy to your music, but even if they don’t you are just trying to build exposure for your channel. When commenting follow the same etiquette you do on other social networks. Don’t spam and drop tags randomly, leaving unrelated comments or worse just dropping an ad or call out for your video. Attach video responses on other popular videos but make them relevant (since the owner of the video you respond to will need to approve your video). Don’t be spammy. Video responses are very successful in gaining awareness and they get a much higher click through then text comments. This wants to be done daily. If you haven’t logged into your account for a week or a month, YouTube may consider you inactive and it could affect your ranking. YouTube is offering you a free channel to market your music and your showmanship. The more time you put in the more you will get back. Optimize Your Channel The place to start is by optimizing your account. What do you name your channel? I suggest you think long term. You may want to name the channel after your band and that might be a good strategy if you are only building an audience for this one band. If you are establishing yourself as a drummer that would like to play in a number of bands or as a drummer for hire, allow your channel help create your personal brand . You might want to think of creating a channel that has legs beyond this band. Why promote yourself? Because people want to trust that they will have a good experience before they buy your next record or attend the next gig. Major artists are well know. You have expectations around their defined genres, styles, and high production value. You know what you are buying. Not so much when it comes to independent musicians. Write your profile to give visitors a sense of your personality and what this channel is all about. Your description adds some keyword juice to improve search results but more importantly it gives channel visitors an opportunity to know you at a glance. Include all relevant links to your MySpace band profile, Facebook fan page, Last.fm, Soundcolud, iLike, Twitter, and any other links that can help establish your music. You are selling yourself and your content so make sure you tell a compelling story. Think Long Term Just like other social networks and DIY marketing efforts this takes time. I would plan on devoting time everyday to your channel. This is a long-term strategy and it is important to start as early as possible in setting up your channel. If you can produce content before you release new tracks or play gigs, you will have better results when you are ready to announce something actionable by your fans. By staying connected to your audience and adding fresh content you will build a fan base not only for this band but for future projects as well. These are the fans that hopefully will purchase your music or attend your gigs, help spread the word of mouth buzz that greatly contributes to a successful music career and perhaps be the ones who help fund your next project.
