YouTube Influencer: What Is Their Secret Recipe?

What is a YouTube Influencer?

 

A YouTube influencer (also known as a YouTuber) is someone who has positioned themselves as an expert in a niche and established a massive following on the site. 

 

Due to the platform they have, these YouTubers hold the power to set trends and influence audience members. That’s led to the rise of YouTube influencer marketing, as companies want YouTubers or as you call it YouTube influencers to share their products in front of a wide audience.

 

Having said that, being a recognized or an accomplished YouTube Influencer isn’t as easy as you think. You have to put in the effort, immense time and creativity, sooner or later, you will get the flow and functions of it. In spite of it being a tough path to follow, with the right guidance and the fair amount of effort you put in, you will grow leaps and bounds in your venture.

 

YouTube helps in every way

• Allows influencers and entrepreneurs to present themselves in a variety of unique and creative ways. The viewers want to watch good content!
• And Youtube has basically no limit on the way you use the platform (within reason and meaningful purposes, of course)
• Makes the possibilities for showcasing content nearly endless. 
• Yes, the YouTube is the perfect vehicle for establishing a one of a kind brand identity

 

Things escalated for YouTube pretty quickly, though. By September of their launch year, YouTube had a video reach 1 million views. And did you know that the first advertisement published on the platform is from Nike, it’s no surprise then that Nike was one of the first brands to really acknowledge YouTube as a potential marketing platform. 

 

In the beginning, most videos uploaded to YouTube were short amateur videos made from content creators all over the world. The barrier to entry was pretty nonexistent — yeah, I guess it hasn’t changed that much. Going back to 2011, YouTube only optimises for clicks and reviews and it was not unique for YouTube. So, many platforms started venturing and recommending videos that people were just likely to click into. Hence, YouTube has given more insights into its algorithm and how its recommendation system works.

 

What has changed is the overall quality of videos. Since Google acquired YouTube less than a year and a half after it launched (for a cool $1.65 Billion), it’s made many strategic changes to the platform. Giving a variety of video quality options to the viewers tailing from 240p up to 2160p — like, wow!

 

Getting the attention of the viewers

YouTube is an excellent platform to market your brand and reach a wider audience. However, the ranking of your content depends on the number of views and type of engagement. YouTube algorithm collects content that applies to a particular search and recommends it to the users. User engagement, number of likes, comments, and views are a significant part of the YouTube algorithm.

 

To get a good SERP (Search Engine Results Page) ranking, you will need to increase engagement on YouTube and get more views on your videos. The fastest way to improve your video ranking is to follow the trends of YouTube. Having larger views and likes affects your popularity as it increases the chances of your video being picked up by the algorithm. How to increase you ask? Start off with a:

 

A strange but engaging thumbnail

If you’ve browsed some of the most popular videos on YouTube lately, you may have noticed something strange: Many of them appear eerily similar. What unites them are their “thumbnails”—the customised photos creators upload to advertise their videos. Thumbnails play the internet-equivalent role of a movie poster, enticing you to click and watch. If you scroll through YouTube’s latest viral hits, you’ll likely notice that a shocking number of thumbnails appear indistinguishable from one another, like a theatre where every film’s poster is the same. Take “Valorant” as an example of having the same formula. There’s always a person looking overly excited, accompanied by a video title often in caps.

 

 

So what’s hot in thumbnail trends these days? Essentially turning yourself into an emoji. The brighter, louder, and more intense the thumbnail, the better and the more viewers you are going to attract.

 

What type of YouTuber you wanna be?

YouTube has more than 1.5 billion monthly active users, and more than 50 million users publish videos each day. The video-sharing platform is home to a diverse range of YouTube Influencers and it has become one of the most favoured places online to learn new skills, relate to others, and have a good entertainment source for your day. 

 

Since you have decided that you want to start up a YouTube channel, which category do you want your content to fall into? Let me just list down some of the common types of categories in YouTube:

• Daily Vloggers
• Fashion/Beauty
• Lifestyle
• Sports
• Gaming
• Education
• Health and Fitness
• Travel

 

 

Gaming – Now one of the most recognisable names in the industry of the biggest YouTube influencer, gamer, and streamer from Sweden — yes you may have him in your mind right now, but if you don’t, then his name is Felix Arvid Ulf Kjellberg known aka “Pewdiepie”. He started off his YouTube career while being in school, however, he decided to drop out and pursue a career with his YouTube career at a time when YouTube wasn’t a reliable career path. One of Pewdiepie’s first videos to blow up on the platform was his play-by-play video of the beloved game “Minecraft”.

 

Then goes on and earned a whopping over 20 million views on the video that was posted in 2010. His video categories are mostly on gaming and comedy having an engagement rate of 6.38% and an average of 7.1 million. After being in the YouTube industry for quite a while now, many prominent brands have partnered with Pewdiepie like Razer, Clutch Chairz, and GFuel.

 

 

Fashion – Ashley (the content creator), with her channel named as bestdressed gained popularity and is one of the top Fashion YouTubers. With her quirky personality and charm, the YouTuber has managed to gain a huge following of 3.8M on YouTube, just at the age of 22. The prime focus of her channel is aesthetic lookbooks.

 

Besides that, Ashley makes videos about her thrift sprees, flipping them into something trendy, makeup, hairstyles, and room tours, and makeovers. Whether you need inspiration for an aesthetic room or want to dress your best, best dressed is the right channel for you.

 

 

Fitness – one of our very own aspects, Jordan Yeoh. Jordan Yeoh is a certified fitness instructor, born on 2 August 1987 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Jordan is passionate about fitness and upload fitness tips videos on his YouTube channel Jordan Yeoh Fitness. 

 

He has over 3.52 Million subscribers on his YouTube channel and has uploaded over 257 videos on his YouTube channel. Jordan has over 872K followers on Instagram and has over 5 million followers on Facebook. Jordan is really an inspiration for many, he was never a fitness enthusiast but he has worked hard to get the physique he has today.

 

YouTube is a genius brand-building tool, but how do you make it your genius brand-building tool?

Relating it back to my last article, YouTube has been dominating the video-sharing space and totalling up to billions of monthly users. Nowadays, we watch almost 5 billion videos a day on YouTube, totalling over 1 billion hours of content. This is more than the likes of Netflix and Facebook put together. Many started off filming themselves in their rooms, it may have sounded very odd back then, but it completely kicked off. It’s now the second most visited website after Google.

 

Brands are turning towards influencers, such as YouTubers, to market their products. Big names such as PewDiePie, Zoella, and Smosh, are prime examples of major marketing channels for brands. They are the internet’s version of celebrity endorsements. At Digital Glue we love putting our clients in the spotlight. We do this using a variety of methods, including influencer marketing and public relations. 

 

By launching a brand, you as an influencer can engage with their communities on a new level. You can build even more loyalty and trust, especially if you involve their community in the project early on in the process. This is exactly what many influencers and celebrities do when they launch their own fashion or beauty brand. It can also be special for the consumer to buy an influencer’s or celebrity’s fashion or beauty brand. Viewers and followers may feel closer to you and identify even more with their favourite influencers if they own something you created.

 

By the way, as an influencer, you can also create an offline brand to help secure your financial future. Developing a business can offer an additional avenue for financial security in a sector that is pretty new and uncertain. We know that social-media-based jobs can be very temporary. Hence, launching an online or offline label can offer a new income stream for you especially in this current situation — where everyone is shopping online. Make sure to bring differentiated products to the market, add more unique designs, produce what attracts your viewers and followers. Multiple roles can help you create additional stability and revenue.

 

Beating other Influencers with your own personality 

Be uniquely you. But, once you’ve checked that box, the best thing you can do is to name things. When you develop a framework, a concept, or a step-by-step plan, give it a name! Naming your ideas and product sets them apart and makes them stand out, especially in a crowded marketplace

 

Don’t be afraid to evolve. Just because you started your channel with a certain focus does not mean you can’t keep growing until you find what’s right for your brand. Ensure your content is created, edited and delivered professionally. As you can see, competition is fierce out there on the Youtube playing field, and if you want to be the MVP you’re going to have to make sure your delivery is top notch. Don’t be intimidated, just be confident and ensure editing is done well before you hit that publish button.

 

Be completely transparent with your intentions. If you’re not honest with yourself and your audience as to why you’re vlogging, you’ll likely find it difficult to grow your viewership. For instance, vlog in a way where you show the ‘behind-the-scenes’ of being an author and creative entrepreneur—to show others what it might be like if they were to pursue a similar path.

 

FAQs about Influencers

What is an influencer agency?

An influencer agency is an advertising and marketing company that works with influencers to monetize their brands and name by matching them with companies that are looking for social media influencers for campaigns and events. Top influencer marketing agencies excel at creating, tailoring, and optimising campaigns for individual brands, marketers, and goals, as a result of having structured and carried out a wide variety of campaigns

 

Sounds amazing right? The agency typically gets a cut of payments from the brand, while the influencer doesn’t need to worry about the logistics.

 

Conclusion 

At the end of the day, YouTube is still a visual platform, meaning that the tone with which you speak, the expressions you give on your face, and the illustrations you give can go a long way in keeping people on your page.

 

Already, you know what the geographical details (age, gender, location, beliefs, etc.) of your viewers that interact with your business are, so when you’re creating videos, advertising, creating brand awareness, you need to make sure that the style and format of your videos appeal to these people. 

 

You can find out more on how to take advantage of these platforms for your brand through here. For more information click on the button below to contact us for more social media marketing consultancy.