Whenever we use the term “channel” anywhere in this article, we are simply referring to YouTube in particular, not any other social media. If you want to know how to grow your other social media platforms such as Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, your blogs etc, check out my article on 10 Awesome Ways To Promote Your Social Media As A Musician. These points I’m sharing are some of the things that have helped me personally in my journey as a music YouTuber/content creator, I hope you find them useful too?.
The first thing to do to grow your music channel on YouTube is to create one if you haven’t. In creating your channel, ensure uniformity, make sure your channel’s name has a part or all of your band/stage name, and make sure you use the same name you’ve used on other social media platforms; this makes you “findable” and easily recognizable. Maintaining consistency on your other social media profiles and linking it to your channel is the first solid step to growing your channel.
If you already have an existing YouTube channel, be sure to attach links from other social media profiles (Twitter, Instagram, SoundCloud, Facebook, Website etc) so that your viewers can also connect with you and find you via those links.
Post Consistently
Many subscribers and YouTube followers easily get bored and leave when they don’t get to hear from you or see something fresh from your end regularly. I’m not saying it has to be daily, but once or twice a week or two is not a bad idea as a music YouTuber who aspires to grow.
Create Entertaining Content
As a musician, I understand that music is in your blood, and music is all you know how to do best, but to grow your channel and subscribers and also increase your monetization, you’d have to learn to be creative. Music videos are awesome! But how many music videos can you put out in a year? I know I earlier said you should post consistently, but you also have to make sure your posts are not boring. Spice things up a bit; it could be live Question and Answer sessions, or behind the scene contents of your music videos, or music tutorials showing how to play some of your best songs, or even a random video where you can talk about specific topics like what helped you improve on your career etc. Remember, you’re not only trying to promote your brand, you’re also trying to promote your personality!
Keywords
When it comes to looking for any kind of video you want, YouTube is your go-to plug. YouTube users can find virtually any kind of video they are looking for just by entering keywords, which is why you must use keywords and hashtags in the description column of your videos to enable users find your videos with ease. Use more than one keyword, it makes your videos appear as many times as possible, so long as a user types in all the keywords related to your video (Please remember to use keywords that are related to your video).
Video Description And Thumbnails
Video descriptions enable YouTube users to know what the video is all about even before watching it or going any further into it. Your description is the written aspect of your video. Make it as clear and descriptive as possible. The description of the video should not state something else, and the video is something different entirely. Same thing goes for your thumbnails; a thumbnail is a pictorial representation of the content in the video, it appears as the front cover for your video, it can be an image with a writeup, or just a writeup. Please and please, this is very important: Never use a thumbnail as a clickbait. Let whatever is described on your thumbnail, be exactly what is in the video. For example, don’t use a “learn to play the G major chord in 5 easy steps” for a video content that talks about “how to tune your guitar”. This generates a bad name for your channel and highly discredits you, no one would want to visit your channel again if they find out you’re a fraud.
Cards, End Screens, Annotations And Calls To Action
In the process of every video upload, there are options to choose from to set up your video in a way that it would further promote your channel. You are allowed to choose options that would redirect your users to a donation page, or a subscribe link, or a suggestion to watch another video of yours…the options are endless. Carefully go through them before uploading your videos and set them up in appealing ways. Be sure not to make your cards pop up too many times in a single video, it annoys users a lot and makes them lose interest in the video they are currently watching.
Community Channel
YouTube community channel should be treated like other social media platforms. You could occasionally share pictures, respond to comments and enquiries, like comments, reply messages etc. It makes you a very interesting person and endears your subscribers and makes them stay while referring you to new ones and also sharing your videos across their own channels and social media platforms.
Do Covers
There’s nothing subscribers love more than to hear their favourite songs performed in another unique and spectacular way, you may ask “how should I know their favourite songs?”. Here’s a simple way to go about it: you can create a short video, telling users to click the link in your description box which would redirect them to another page or site (this should have been created already) where they can vote for a song of their choice, the highest vote wins and a cover of the song that wins would be done. Or you can simply just do any other amazing song that comes to mind. Doing music covers of great musicians engages audience on your channel and grows your channel notably.
Share Your Videos On Other Social Media Platforms
Don’t just post on YouTube and leave it alone to promote itself; play your own part in promoting it too. Share your videos and content on other social media platforms and provide links to redirect them to YouTube to see other amazing content. You can upload a 1-minute snippet on Instagram or Twitter and post a YouTube link for your followers to watch the full video. This way, they visit your channel more regularly, subscribe and engage there.
Connect With Other YouTubers
Make it a habit to also comment and like videos of other musicians. Sometimes in your videos and description, you can tag them to recommend or appreciate them, doing this overtime will also attract same favour from other musicians. When they tag you, new subscribers are automatically drawn to your channel from their own fanbase.
Building your channel is not rocket science. It’s not something thing you can achieve with just a snap of your fingers. Just like any other thing that grows, your music channel would need lots of time, positive input and patience. It will not ‘click’ at once, it will carry on gradually, and when it does, you’ll find it extremely rewarding?
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