YouTube For Musicians: What We’ve Learned Promoting Thousands Of Artists

While it may seem obvious that to be successful on YouTube you have to have a quality channel, there are a lot of things that people miss regarding the optimization of their channel. 

To start off, create a YouTube artist channel. This is a newer feature on YouTube and it provides artists with unique functionality on their channel to increase their chance of success. Some benefits when you create a YouTube artist channel include being more discoverable in searches, engaging with fans with ease, the ability to highlight promotional content, and a greater ability to organize your content. 

You can find more information about the YouTube for artists sign up process on their page here. There are certain requirements that your channel needs to meet before they can allow you to create a YouTube artist channel. Some requirements are easier, like having a YouTube channel that represents an artist, whereas others are harder, like working with a label network connected to a partner manager. 

The most important step after you create a YouTube artist channel is to create a consistent brand image. This should include everything from the name of the channel to the description of the channel. It is also important to have graphics that correspond with your brand, such as a banner and an avatar. Custom thumbnail graphics can also help draw people into your videos. 

You should also use your YouTube profile to market your other online links, such as a website or any social media accounts. The goal is to make it as easy for your audience to access your music as possible and connecting with them on all fronts will help do this. 

Last, there are some smaller technical things you should do to your channel such as making a custom URL, making a playlist to organize your content, and creating a channel trailer so that new viewers can get an idea of what you are all about. 

If you have a successful YouTube channel, it will probably be one of the primary ways that your fans find out about you. You should seize on that opportunity to connect with them in as many ways as possible.

Put as many links to different online channels that you have on your YouTube channel. If you do not have a website, you can connect it to your social media accounts. The more your fans connect with you, the more they will be inclined to listen to your music. 

Similar to something like Google, YouTube has its own search engine within the platform. In fact, YouTube is the second largest search engine on the internet. There are multiple factors that you can control which will influence how your videos rank on YouTube searches.

It all starts out with having catchy titles that will bring users into your videos. Your title should be clear, on topic, and use words you want to rank for in searches. Creating a strong description for your videos is also equally important. The description is an opportunity for you to summarize your video and provide your audience with links to your social media outlets. 

Adding relevant tags is also a significant way to rank higher on the YouTube search engine. Keep in mind that the more tags that you use, the less effective they will be. The best strategy is to focus on the most important tags that pertain to your video. 

If you watch any successful YouTuber regularly, you may have noticed that they often ask you to subscribe or like their video. The reason they do this is that it works. Effective calls to action will significantly increase positive engagement on your videos. 

You can do this in editing software before you upload your Youtube video, or you can use YouTube cards if you are not comfortable editing. You can place calls to action throughout your video and at the end of your video. Just make sure that if you are using them throughout your video that they're not annoying or intrusive. 

The YouTube platform provides creators with very useful analytics and statistics tools. They're easy to understand and it would be foolish not to take advantage of the benefits they provide. 

By using these tools you can find out more about your channel audience and individual video performance. Some information provided by these tools includes viewing time, audience location and video engagement. When you become comfortable using these tools, you can leverage them by focusing on the videos that will give the best results. 

If you want to become a successful artist on YouTube, it requires hard work and consistency above all other factors. There is no secret trick to make your YouTube channel famous overnight. 

First, you need to be patient. While you may make a successful video quickly, creating a firm fan base is something that will happen over a lengthy period of time. If you want to create a community that will continue to follow your music you will have to work on your YouTube channel consistently and provide a sizable amount of quality content. 

Keep in mind YouTube is a social network above everything else. One of the most important things to do to increase engagement and build a stronger fan base is interacting with them regularly. Some common ways to do this include responding to comments, interacting with fans on social media, and doing periodic giveaways. 

The thing that will give you the best chance of being a successful artist on YouTube is uploading content often on a scheduled basis. A good interval to shoot for is one upload every week. When you upload regularly, you will keep your audience entertained and reach more people to bring into your audience.

At Omari, we have promoted thousands of artists on the YouTube platform. There's no secret recipe for overnight success, and the main contributing factor is hard work and consistent uploads. 

However, there are steps you can take to give your channel a sound foundation to support these consistent uploads. You also need to optimize your channel so it becomes an efficient way to market your music. 

This hard work required can detract from you focusing on the music itself. If you need help to promote your YouTube channel and become a successful musician on the platform, reach out to us. When you work with us, we will leverage our years of music marketing experience for your benefit.