YouTube: 5 Things Which You Should Do After Creating A Channel

This post is part of the step by step guide to successful youtube channel series. You can follow the series with the series home page.

In the last post about YouTube, I have covered how to create a channel and the success factors for that channel.

Now once you understand that watch time is the most important stats along with number of visitor coming to your channel, lets look at the 5 important things which you should be doing after creating your channel.

You can check the below video or read through the article for the things to do after creating a channel.

[youtube src=”dU6XFoDYp5I”]

1. Create the channel Art and Icon

With the new YouTube one design, it is easy to update the channel at one place and it automatically displayed correctly on all devices. The screen will adjust based on the screen size of the device and will show correctly for all users.

There are channel art which will be shown to anybody coming to your channel, channel icon will be shown on your channels and on the youtube video’s if you have annotation on.

Channel Art image size should be 2560 x 1440 px, It will automatically be cropped for other sizes. While uploading just make sure that the cropping is correct and it is showing correctly on all sizes.

Tip: Try to have your content at the center as that’s the place which will be shown on small screens.

Channel Icon is a small icon which will be shown at many places. If you are using your Google+ profile than this icon will be taken from your profile.

2. Channel Trailer and Description

Channel trailer is a new place to show your visitors that what your channel is all about. It will be shown to any visitor who is not a subscriber of your channel.

Its a good place to add your pitch and in the description you can ask them to subscribe for your channel.

Your channel trailer should be short, 30 seconds to 1 min is probably good enough. It also needs to convey about what visitors can expect from your channel and when can they get the new video on it.

You can end with it by call to action for subscribing your channel. Your description should also have call to action and should ask them to subscribe.

3. Edit Links

With the new one design, there are links which will be shown on your channel. You can include your social networks and the blog in those links. It is a good place to promote all the related social pages and profile of that channel.

Currently there are 18 social profiles which you can select and it will be shown as a icon. You can also add custom links to the profile, which can be a link to your blog or to a landing page.

Social profile also includes Google Play or iTunes links, so you can also link it to your app.

4. Link YouTube Channel to Google+ profile

Next thing which you should be doing is linking your YouTube channel to your Google+ profile. This will start showing your YouTube videos on your Google+ profile.

Your Google+ profile will start showing a tab for YouTube where all of your videos will be promoted. It can be done under YouTube Settings -> Connect Google+ Profile.

This will also take the icon from Google+ profile and will start using it as a channel icon.

If your Google+ profile is on different email than the youtube email account than you will not be able to connect them. Currently this is not supported but there is a way to connect it to your Google+ page. I will cover it in the next blog post.

5. InVideo Programming

InVideo Programming is another way to promote your YouTube channel or a specific video. You can setup to promote your channel or specific video at a selected time in all of your videos.

You can set up at Video Manager -> Channel Settings -> InVideo Programming.

You can start the promotion at a specific time or specific duration at the start or end of the video. Its a good way to remind users to subscribe to your channel or brand your videos.

You can also decide to promote any specific video at it will be displayed in all your videos.

So what all you have done after creating your YouTube Channel, share with us..