What YouTube Viewers Value: Secrets to Keeping Them Engaged
Learn the secrets of keeping YouTube viewers coming back for more in 2024. Here are the must-know strategies to elevate your content and build a loyal audience. Understanding what YouTube viewers value can significantly enhance your approach.
What YouTube Viewers Value: Secrets to Keeping Them Engaged
by Bobby Owsinski of Music 3.0
If you’re like everyone else who’s created YouTube content, you’re probably wondering why some videos are a resounding success with viewers while others never seem to hit the mark. YouTube wondered that too, so it embarked on a scientific study to discover how viewers perceive video content. It surveyed 12,000 viewers from markets around the world and came to a number of conclusions, but there’s one big one that was the difference between either liking a video or passing it by.
What they found is that everything revolves around emotional triggers. We like videos that make us feel something. It doesn’t matter what the emotion is, if we feel it strongly we react to the video. This happens because of emotive markers and technical markers that make us perceive a video as “high quality content.”
High-quality emotive content means that it …
- Captures viewer’s attention throughout
- Tells a compelling story or narrative
- Is original or creative, or offers a unique perspective
- Teaches something new or useful
- Really means something to to the viewer personally
- Enhances or helps the viewer in everyday life
- Is relevant to the viewer’s interests and preferences
- Is authentic and relatable
- Helps the viewer reflect or clarify their thoughts
- Is emotionally engaging
High-quality technical content means that it …
- Has clear visuals and good audio
- Exhibits technical excellence in terms of camera work, editing, aesthetics, and overall production
- Includes features (such as video filters) or elements that set it apart from content without these features
Technical Excellence Is Not Enough
Just making a video that has high quality visuals isn’t enough anymore though. The study found that 91% agree that high-quality content should be meaningful, and 90% agree that it should be
relevant and relatable.
Audio is extremely important in delivering these emotive goals, with 86% of viewers saying that clear visuals with good audio are essential for high-quality content. That said, if you think that you need to have a special effects wizard edit your video to get viewer engagement you’ll be pleased to know that only 54% value the use of distinctive visual effects.
The bottom line is that while the technical aspects of a video are very important, viewers want stories that capture their attention and engage their emotions.
So that’s the secret. It seems so easy, yet Hollywood producers get paid big bucks to inject their shows with just this thing. It’s something that you can aim for with your YouTube content as well.
You can read the report here.
Bobby Owsinski is a producer/engineer, author, blogger, podcaster, and coach. He has authored 24 books on music production, music, the music business, music AI, and social media.
