How to Maximise Audience Engagement on Your YouTube Channel
Learn how to get more views, boost your watch time, and build your subscriber base. Below, we share tips on how to maximise audience engagement on your YouTube channel.
YouTube plays host to almost 4 billion videos. With all that content to contend with, how does the algorithm decide which videos to promote, and which to ignore? The answer is audience engagement.
The better your audience engagement, the more the algorithm will promote your video – and the process repeats. Therefore, you can increase the chance of your channel taking off by prioritising audience engagement.
Below, you’ll find our complete guide to audience engagement, including what kinds of engagement matter the most, and how to maximise your metrics.
What counts as engagement on YouTube?
Audience engagement refers to any interaction between your viewers and your channel, and includes the following metrics:
- Views: When a viewer watches your video (even if only partially).
- Watch time (retention): The amount of time viewers spend watching your videos (and the percentage of your videos they watch).
- Likes and dislikes: When a viewer gives your video a thumbs up or thumbs down to share quick feedback.
- Comments: Written responses from your viewers under your video.
- Shares: When viewers share your video to other sites or with other people.
- Subscriptions: When viewers subscribe to your channel to get notified when you post.
- Click-through rate (CTR): The percentage of people who clicked on your video after seeing your title or thumbnail.
What are the most important metrics on YouTube?
Not all kinds of engagement are equal on YouTube. Some engagement types are good for growing your audience and increasing visibility, while others really only serve as an ego boost.
These are the engagement types that matter most on YouTube (and the ones you should prioritise):
- Watch time/retention: Watch time is the most reliable metric to gauge whether viewers are enjoying your content. The longer someone spends watching a YouTube video, the more ads they’ll be shown, and the more money YouTube will earn. The YouTube algorithm will therefore promote videos with high watch time, so viewer retention should be your top priority!
- Click-through rate: If people aren’t attracted by your thumbnail or title, they won’t watch your video. And if no one clicks on your video, YouTube will stop recommending it to others.
- Comments: Comments show that your video is making an impact. They spark conversations that encourage more people to join in, and give you a chance to personally connect with your audience. Plus, when someone takes the time to leave a comment, they’re spending more time on your video page, boosting your watch time too.
- Shares: Shareable videos make it easy for your audience to promote your video, doing a lot of the hard work for you. They’re a great way to grow your audience faster and reach more people without depending solely on the algorithm.
- New subscribers: As your subscriber base grows, your videos will automatically be shown to a higher number of people. A growing subscriber count demonstrates viewer loyalty and is a key metric for YouTubers who want to make money from their channel.
Now that you know which engagement signals are the most important, you can work to maximise those metrics. Keep reading to find out how.
How to boost watch time and retention on YouTube
Hook your audience within 15 seconds
As the content we consume gets shorter and shorter, so do our attention spans. Therefore, the first 15 seconds of your video are crucial. They should grab your audience’s attention and convince them to stick around until the end.
One of the most effective ways to do this is to create a sense of jeopardy or drama e.g.
- “Picture this: you’ve just won the lottery – do you buy X or X?”
- “This one mistake almost ruined everything for me”
- “Over 99% of people fail this challenge, but today, I feel like winning.”
Aside from the above, you can also mix in some of the below techniques to encourage viewers to watch your entire video:
- Tease some of the best upcoming clips.
- Share interesting or surprising facts.
- Promise a reward e.g. “at the end of this video I’ll be sharing my number one tip for beginners”.
- Tell your audience what they can expect e.g. “in this video, I’ll be sharing my top 10 software recommendations for social media managers”.
Plan a strong video structure
Unless you’re filming chronological, day-in-the-life style vlogs, you should plan your video before filming. Approach your video structure like you would if you were writing a blog or a TV show:
- Beginning: Hook viewers in and set the scene. What are you doing, and why?
- Middle: Organise your content in a way that makes the most sense. The content may be ordered chronologically (unfolding of events), or presented in list or countdown form.
- End: Summarise what you’ve covered in your video, and end with a call to action e.g. “subscribe to my channel”, ‘like this video”, “comment what you want to see next”.
Make YouTube Shorts
Long-form content can be tricky to get right, especially if you’re just starting out. Making YouTube Shorts is a great way to improve your content creation skills and test content ideas before committing to a longer video.
The YouTube algorithm may also take a while to figure out your target audience. Posting Shorts frequently will expand your reach and help your audience find you faster than relying solely on long-form content.
Start with shorter videos
Videos longer than 10 minutes typically take hours, days, or even weeks to produce. It’s also a bigger ask to expect your audience to commit that much time to a small channel.
Posting shorter videos will free up a lot of your time and allow you to focus on improving the quality of your content. You should also test out different kinds of content to see what yields the highest audience retention.
Analyse dips in viewer retention
YouTube makes it easy to see exactly where in your videos your audience is dropping off. In YouTube Studio, select one of your videos and click on the Engagement tab, then scroll down to Audience Retention. You’ll be able to see the average percentage watched and check for any significant dips in retention.
If you find any dips, review that segment and consider what might be going wrong. It could be anything from your sound quality to your content not reflecting what was promised in the thumbnail or title.
Make use of YouTube’s ‘Community’ tab
If you already have a decent amount of subscribers, you can leverage the Community tab to maximise audience engagement.
The Community tab functions like a social media feed, where you can post quick updates that your subscribers can interact with. Many successful YouTubers will tease exclusive content or host Q&A sessions to keep their audience invested and coming back for more.
Here are some ways you can use the Community tab to interact with your audience:
- Tease clips of upcoming content
- Host Q&A sessions
- Create polls so your audience can vote on upcoming video concepts
- Create a fun quiz to accompany your giveaway
- Post behind-the-scenes content (images or videos)
How to increase your click-through rate
Create better thumbnails
Improving the quality of your thumbnails will likely have a bigger impact on your click-through rate than anything else. Because thumbnails must stand out in order to do well, it unfortunately means there’s no exact template you should follow.
However, there are a few key rules which most successful thumbnails tend to follow:
- Keep words to a minimum: Don’t overcrowd your thumbnail with lots of text or try to describe the whole video in the thumbnail.
- Create drama: Some of the most clicked-on videos have dramatic thumbnails with simple phrases like “The Truth!”, “I was wrong!”, “So cheap!”
- Use bright colours: Bright colours can help you stand out from other thumbnails. You can use brightly coloured text or even change the colour of your outfit using Photoshop.
- Keep it simple: Don’t use too many graphics on your thumbnail or it might look spammy and unprofessional.
For some thumbnail inspiration, check out VidIQ’s 12 Best Thumbnail Ideas.
Focus on SEO
If your video isn’t optimised for YouTube’s search engine, it won’t show up in search results or get recommended on similar videos. Optimising your titles can help your target audience find you, leading to more impressions and a better click-through rate. Here’s how you can improve your video title SEO:
- Include keywords: Use free tools and plugins like VidIQ to conduct keyword research for your video ideas. VidIQ’s free plan allows you to research up to 5 keywords at a time. For the best results, look for high search volume keywords with relatively low competition (always ensuring the keywords match your content). Answering FAQs in your niche is also a great way to boost your discoverability with evergreen content.
- Use numbers: Using numbers in your YouTube titles can encourage more clicks – they can add drama and make your video concept more easily understandable.
- Include power or emotional words: Power words can also help add drama and make your video more click-worthy. You can also capitalise these words for an even bigger effect e.g. The One HUGE Downside of Going Pro.
Test your thumbnails and titles
You might think the biggest YouTubers nail their thumbnails and titles on the first go – but this couldn’t be further from the truth. Mr. Beast – YouTube’s biggest earner – is known to generate up to 20 different thumbnails for just one video.
Testing thumbnails and titles is the best way to gauge what’s affecting your click-through rate and impressions, and maximise your viewership.
YouTube’s built-in A/B thumbnail testing feature allows you to test up to 3 thumbnails at once and see how they compare to your watch time. Alternatively, you can manually change your thumbnail and title periodically to get a better idea of how each one affects your impressions and click-through rate.
How to boost comments and shares
Ask questions in your video
Asking your audience questions is the easiest way to invite responses. Ask viewers what kind of content they’d like to see next, what they think of your video/viewpoints, and if they have any tips they’d like to share.
Be controversial
If there’s one thing viewers love to comment on, it’s to disagree with your opinion. In this respect, being controversial can give your engagement a huge boost, so don’t shy away from sharing a controversial view you genuinely believe in.
That said, you shouldn’t intentionally keep creating controversial content for the sake of engagement ‘farming’ – this could be detrimental to your channel in the long run.
Be a personality in your videos
Although they make it easier to produce videos, faceless YouTube channels are undoubtedly harder to grow. This is perhaps because audiences can better connect with a channel when they know who’s behind it – see a face, hear a voice etc.
Showing yourself and your personality in your videos also sets you apart from the sea of similar content that’s probably already out there. Unique video concepts are a rarity these days, so creators must leverage their personalities to succeed.
Reply to your comments
It’s imperative that you reply to every single comment in the early days of growing a YouTube channel. Use open-ended questions to encourage further responses and invite others to join in on the conversation e.g. “I’m glad you liked the video! Which car would you choose and why?”.
All that time people spend replying to your comments contributes directly to your watch hours. In this respect, replying to comments is probably the easiest way to boost your viewer retention and revenue.
Top tip: reply to comments quickly in YouTube Studio’s ‘Community’ tab. You can filter comments by ‘I haven’t responded’ to view and reply to any you might have missed.
Do giveaways
Giveaways can be great for boosting your subscribers and encouraging lots of engagement. If you decide to do a giveaway, just make sure that what you’re giving away is relevant to your niche. Otherwise, you may attract viewers who aren’t actually interested in your channel, and this will be bad for your engagement rates in the long run.
What do you want your audience to say?
While some viewers might comment just to say ‘great video!’, most people will only comment if they have something more significant to say. Unfortunately, this usually comes in the form of disagreement or constructive criticism (which isn’t all that bad, really – all engagement is good engagement!).
Before recording your content, think about what you might want your viewers to say. Would you like them to share their stories or join in on the conversation? Then be sure to include prompts throughout your content to encourage this.
Use calls to action
Sometimes people need to be reminded or invited to take action – that’s why you’ll be hard-pressed to find a big YouTube creator who doesn’t ask viewers to subscribe, comment and share.
Here are some common calls to action to include in your content:
- “If you liked this video, please subscribe! We’ve got more content just like this coming up.”
- “What are your thoughts on this decision? Let me know in the comments if you think I’ve made a mistake.”
- “Thanks for watching. If you enjoyed this video and know someone who might benefit from these tips, please share it with them.”
How to get more subscribers
Post your videos elsewhere
The YouTube algorithm is notoriously difficult to crack, especially for newer channels. Relying on the algorithm alone to boost your content can produce less than satisfactory results and lead to frustration.
Promoting your videos on other websites can get your content in front of more people – some of whom may not watch YouTube regularly. When sharing your content, you can really target your niche too, posting to specific groups on the likes of Facebook and Reddit.
You can also condense your videos into short form content and post them on other social media sites such as X, TikTok, and Instagram for further exposure.
Repurpose your content
Repurposing your content into helpful guides or article essays can further enhance your discoverability and bring in more subscribers. Blog sites like Medium and forums like Quora and Reddit allow you to present your content in a different format to build credibility and garner more attention.
Use visual reminders in your content
Sometimes viewers need to be reminded to subscribe – even if they regularly watch your videos. Including visual reminders that prompt viewers to subscribe can make all the difference, and a simple graphic overlay usually does the trick.
Pexels has lots of copyright-free subscribe buttons to choose from – all free of charge. Download your favourite and overlay it on your video in your chosen editing software. You can also check out Motion Array for a vast selection of plug-and-play motion graphics for all popular editing software.
Create playlists
To help prospective subscribers navigate your channel and content, organise your videos into themed playlists. This can encourage binge-watching and make your channel feel more cohesive and professional, which could lead to more subscribers.
Post consistently
Posting consistently or sticking to a posting schedule will show that you’re committed to the game and let viewers know when to expect new content.
Collaborate with other creators
Collaborating with other creators is one of the best ways to get your channel in front of lots of new viewers in an instant. When reaching out to potential collaborators, be sure to formulate an attractive pitch, rather than just asking for a collaboration. You could suggest an interesting video concept and include some reasons why the partnership will benefit the other creator’s channel.
Create a compelling about me section
About me sections are often overlooked, but creating a compelling bio that resonates with viewers could convince them to subscribe. You can talk about your journey, your credentials, or your passions or interests. If your viewers enjoy reading your story, they may want to follow your journey by subscribing.