On average 3.7 million new videos are uploaded to YouTube every day, which translates to 271,330 hours of video content. So, how do you make your videos stand out in a sea of content? How do you rank higher on YouTube?

How To Rank on YouTube?

Popular YouTubers implement on-point SEO tricks and techniques to climb the ranks in search results. Let’s discuss some of the proven hacks they use to be on top!

Relevant Keywords

When it comes to YouTube, keyword research is crucial. Picking up the right keywords can make or break the performance of your video. So, choose appropriate keywords. 

YouTube uses keywords as metadata to display the most relevant videos in searches. They are extracted from a variety of fields, like descriptions and tags. It’s common to use at least five hashtags in the description and only one in the title. Adding a closed caption is a bonus trick to give your titles a boost and help you to rank higher on YouTube. 

One of the most effective ways to hunt the best keywords is to review popular videos under your niche. You can even build a list to make things easier. Look at their tags, and terms and use them to create your own title.

Rank Higher With Catchy Titles

Having the right title is important – not just for SEO, but also for the viewers you hope will watch your videos. Because, let’s admit it. Strong keywords are not enough. 

A compelling YouTube title can draw an audience in and increase the number of views. However, if your title is mediocre or just meh, people will scroll by. 

Use psychology and curiosity gaps to create titles. But don’t go overboard with clickbait. The days of clickbait are long gone on YouTube. To be honest, they do more damage than good. If you use click bait, YouTube algorithm will determine that you use the videos solely for the purpose of gaining views rather than to address a problem.  It will cause your channel to be penalized. So stay away from this for your own benefit.

To know more, click here.

Attention-Grabbing Thumbnails

Video thumbnails are an influential element that significantly increases the click-through rate. When your videos appear on their homepage or search results, it’s the first thing visitors will get to see.

Yes, your channel and title are important but viewers will see your thumbnail first. Your eyes are drawn to the thumbnail even before you read the title.

Don’t be lazy and grab a pre-filled screenshot from your video as a thumbnail. Instead, spend time using apps like Thumbnail Maker to create unique custom thumbnails for each video. Magnetic thumbnails work wonders in terms of making you rank higher on YouTube.

Interested to learn more? Read next about thumbnails.

Community Building Helps With Higher Ranking

You can engage with your audience more deeply on YouTube; thanks to a number of its features. Live streams, playlists, cards, shout outs, community posts are great ways to build an invested audience base. 

On top of that. YouTube rewards creators who use them properly.

Another fantastic way to grow your channel is to make YouTube shorts. A vertical video, typically shorter than 60 seconds in duration is identified as short. Even if you don’t have a large audience, you can get a tremendous amount of views in a short time span. 

Top-notch Quality Content

Various formats, different traffic expectations, vibes, and aesthetics: tons of videos are being posted on a daily basis. That’s why everything boils down to the quality of your content

Keyword research, titles, thumbnails are positive catalysts but your content is what actually matters the most. Make your videos short but informative. But remember, factual videos are not that memorable. Use humor, drone footage, time-lapse, text on screen, and other visual elements to engage your audience. 

So, to get ranked, your SEO game needs to be strong in the first place. Captivating titles and thumbnails, relevant keywords will help you reach a wider traffic and quality content will make you grow quickly. 

To know more about SEO, read here.