Rolling out video a bit gradually—on a schedule–may build viewership
YouTube recommends establishing a regular schedule—if you follow their recommendations, you’d release a video every single week (well, with fewer than five breaks a year), and always on the same day. We believe that most YouTube channels will be publishing with this kind of frequency within a few years. But if you don’t have 47-50 videos a year to release at this time, how do you translate this advice to the number you do have?- Post one per week, on the same day of the week, for as long as your supplies last. A consistent, reliable schedule helps you build viewership. The same principle that applies to appointment television and newspaper deliveries applies here.
- Post one per day, at the same hour, for a week leading up to a significant event. Asking your viewers to watch a video every day that exceeds three minutes is probably pushing it. But if you have a big conference coming up and you have five videos promoting it, maybe rolling out video can look like this: release 30-second videos Monday and Tuesday, one-minute videos Wednesday and Thursday, and a three-minute video on Friday.
- Post one video per month at the same time each month. A year may be a long time to realize SEO (search engine optimization) benefits from having 12 more videos on your channel and website. But rolling out video at the rate of one video a month may make a very reasonable request of viewer’s time, and if you make the schedule very regular (say, the first or last day of the month, or the first Monday of the month) you will obtain a year-round video presence without making the investment that a weekly or even twice-monthly plan requires.
- Post them all at once. If your videos comprise a series and people might want to watch several in a sitting, that’s something to encourage. After all, binge watching on Netflix also has many proponents. Let your fans immerse themselves in your content by rolling out videos several at a time. One of our clients did that recently and it was definitely the right thing to do for their audience and goals.