How to Create a Successful YouTube Channel for Your Business

In recent years, videos have not only dominated the social media space, but they’ve also become a powerful asset for businesses of all sizes. So if you’re looking to take your business to a whole new level, video marketing is the magic wand you need and there’s no better platform than YouTube. Beyond being the most popular platform dedicated to video, YouTube attracts a large audience of over 2 billion active users monthly. 

YouTube has the potential to help you market your business, boost your brand reach, and drive conversions over the top. But if you’re going to leverage all that business potential, you need to know how to create a YouTube channel, upload videos, and optimize it for better visibility.

If you’re overwhelmed with the whole idea of creating a YouTube channel and wondering how to get started, you’ve come to the right place. 

In this article, we’ll teach you everything you need to know about YouTube marketing. We’ll also show you how to create a YouTube channel for your business and optimize it to get better results.  

Let’s get to it. 

Understanding YouTube Video Marketing for Businesses

Let’s face it. You’ve probably spent countless hours on YouTube watching all kinds of YouTube videos, including explainer videos, comedy, and funny videos, tutorials, reactions, Q&As, challenges, and more. Just name it; YouTube has it all. It’s no surprise that it has become the go-to video hub for billions of users worldwide. 

Whether you’re starting a new business or looking to scale, YouTube should be your top priority. Not only is it a popular entertainment or educational platform, but it’s also a powerful marketing tool. 

Of course, the stats don’t lie:

• YouTube is the world’s second-largest search engine.
• People watch over 1 billion hours of video on YouTube daily. 
• YouTube reaches more people between the ages of 18-49 on mobile than any TV channel or cable TV network.
• The time people spend watching YouTube on TV has doubled year over year.
• More than 87% of brands use YouTube for marketing.
• About 89% of video marketers intend to use YouTube as part of their video marketing strategy.
• More than 50% of B2B decision-makers use YouTube for research before making purchases

People of all ages globally love watching videos online. So regardless of who your target audiences are, YouTube has got you covered. Even more, it has immense potential for increasing awareness for your brand, driving more traffic and engagement and generating more leads.

The beauty of it is that YouTube isn’t showing signs of slowing down. And there are many different ways you can use YouTube to drive the business to the next level.  

But before we dive into the basics of using YouTube for business, let’s explain how YouTube Marketing works. 

How Exactly Does YouTube Marketing Work

YouTube marketing is the process of promoting your product, service, or brand on YouTube to increase exposure. It involves a wide range of marketing activities such as:

• Creating and uploading valuable videos on YouTube and YouTube Shorts to reach a large audience and expand your customer base
• Advertising on YouTube to boost brand reach and grow sales
• Promoting branded merch on YouTube 

On a general note, YouTube marketing comes with many benefits, which we will discuss in the next section. 

However, to achieve meaningful results with your YouTube marketing efforts, you need to understand what your target audience wants. Don’t make the mistake of making videos you think your audiences want, which is a trap many marketers fall into.

Once you get the hang of what your audience wants, you can go ahead and produce videos that resonate with them. Sounds simple, right? Yes, it is, as long as you have an easy-to-use video editor like Promo.com that lets you create stunning videos for any niche or purpose in a matter of minutes. 

Why Should You Promote Your Business on YouTube?

Now you have a feel of what YouTube marketing for businesses is about. Let’s look at why promoting your business on YouTube should be your top priority.

Boost Online Visibility

YouTube gives your search engine optimization efforts a boost. and increases your ranking on search engine result pages (SERP) 

Why is that? Videos now appear more frequently at the top of search engine results. And when it comes to page rankings, Google favors YouTube not only because it is one of its subsidiaries but also because the two websites have a smooth and native transition.

By making YouTube a key part of your marketing strategy, you’re asserting yourself on the first page of Google. This can help drive traffic to your page and increase your authority in the social media space. 

Video is Huge

YouTube is the largest video marketing platform. If you aren’t using it in your marketing strategy, you’ll lose out to competitors who do. 

Here’s what you should know. People love videos and prefer them over other content types. No wonder they spend an average of 18 hours watching online videos per week.  

Using video is a quick and easy way to capture the attention of your ideal audience and invite them to engage with your brand. Beyond driving people to purchase from you, people tend to share videos with family and friends, leading to increased reach and engagement for your business. 

Massive User Base 

Like we’ve mentioned earlier, YouTube has a massive user base. In addition, it opens the door to a diverse audience who gladly use YouTube to find any type of content they need. Here’s a snapshot of YouTube’s demographic data.

Image Source: Statista 

The numbers above show that your audience is definitely on YouTube. In a nutshell, you’re guaranteed to find people who’ll become raving fans and loyalists as long as you entertain, educate, and provide solutions to their pain points.  

The best part? With your business YouTube account, you can upload videos to YouTube for free and reach a huge audience without paying a dime.

Valuable and Actionable Insight to Boost Marketing Efforts

The beautiful thing about YouTube marketing and advertising is that it offers free analytics and insight into your content performance. 

With YouTube Analytics, you can gather valuable and actionable insight into:

• How your audience finds you and what channels are used to find your videos. 
• High performing videos in terms of views, watch time and engagement
• How video elements like title and description, length, and thumbnails affect your video performance
• Information about your target audience (demographics)

 You can glean this insight and use it to optimize your video and improve your YouTube marketing performance.

How to Create a YouTube Business Account

YouTube offers businesses numerous opportunities to promote their product and services to a burgeoning user base. However, you need to create a YouTube business account to make the most of this opportunity. 

But that’s not all. You’re going to have to customize your profile and optimize your YouTube account for SEO to get your brand in front of the right audience. 

Let’s take you through the process of creating a business YouTube channel and how to use YouTube for business. 

1. Create a Google Account

Before you get ahead with creating a YouTube channel for business use or recording video content, you need to create a Gmail account.  

YouTube is one of Google’s subsidiaries. Creating a Gmail account automatically grants you access to many Google products like YouTube, YouTube Shorts, AdSense account, Google+ account, Maps, and much more.

Before you get started, you may want to avoid linking your personal email to your business YouTube Channel. 

This is important, especially if you’re going to share account access with other team members or agency partners. Rather we recommend you set up a shared email account to share access with multiple people.

Here’s how to create a Google Account for your business

Step 1: Go to the Google Account page or visit Google.com and click Sign in in the right corner of the page.

Step 2: Next, click Create Account at the bottom left of the page. 

Step 3: Once done, a pop-up will appear with options to create an account for yourself, your child, or manage your business. Go ahead and click To manage my business, since you’ll be using the account for business purposes.

Step 4: Next, enter your first name and last name 

Step 5: Enter your desired email in the username field, input your password, confirm it, and click Next. 

Step 6: Then, input and verify a phone number for your account and add a recovery email (optional). Proceed to add your birthday details and gender and click Next. 

Keep in mind that the minimum age requirement for managing a Google account is 13 years.

Step 7: Tap I agree to accept Google’s Terms of Service and Privacy Policy

Step 8:  Verify your account with a code sent via phone call or text. Once done, your Google account is ready for use. 

2. Create a YouTube Account

Now that your Google account is set up, you’re halfway through your journey to publishing eye-catching videos. 

But before you go ahead, you’ll need to create your YouTube business channel.

If you’re looking to use a different name on YouTube than your Google Account, you should connect your channel to a Brand Account. Brand Account allows you to: 

• Grant multiple user access to your YouTube business profile and manage edit permissions
• Manage different YouTube channels from one account 
• Build a robust online presence and much more 

Follow these steps to create a channel with multiple owners or managers.

Step 1: Visit YouTube’s homepage. By now, you’re probably already signed into your Google Account. If you’re not, click on the Sign In at the top right of your screen, input your username and password to continue. 

Step 2: Once you’ve logged into your Google account, you can begin to customize your channel. Click on the account avatar at the top right of your screen, tap Your Channel from the dropdown menu.

Step 3: Next, select Create a New channel. To create a YouTube channel for a Brand Account you already manage, simply select the Brand Account from the list.

Step 4: Fill out your channel name and then click Create. 

There you go; your YouTube channel is ready. Pretty simple, right?

How to Customize Your Profile

Now that you know how to set up a YouTube channel for business, the next step is to get creative with your channel identity. Let’s dive into how to polish your channel to make it shine as well as pique the interest of viewers and search engines.  Customize your YouTube channel on Android, iPhone, and iPad

Upload your banner image or channel art 

Click on your profile picture and then tap Your channel. Once done, tap  Edit Channel and click the banner image on the right.  Proceed to take a picture or choose a photo to upload and click Save

Add a profile picture

Click your profile picture at the top right of your page. Next, Click on Your Channel and then tap on the Edit channel. 

Go ahead and click the profile picture avatar. You can select a photo or select an image from your library, upload it and click Save.

To change your channel name and description, click the edit icon beside each field, input your information and click Ok.

Customize your YouTube Channel on Computer

To brand your channel identity on PC, Tap your profile picture at the top right of your page and then click Your Channel.  

Next, tap Customize channel and you’ll be redirected to Channel customization in YouTube Creator Studio. Here, you can change your channel’s home page layout, branding, and basic information.

Decide on Your Channel Layout

Here you can fine-tune what users see when visiting your channel homepage by adding a video spotlight and featured sections.

Under the video spotlight section, here are the options available. 

1. Add a channel trailer for people who haven’t subscribed
2. Add a featured video for returning subscribers

These videos can be short yet interesting clips that highlight what you create, what your audience expect from your channel and encourage people to subscribe

To add each video, click on Add, upload your video and add it to your profile. To change or remove the video, simply click three dots, and you’ll find the option right there. 

When it comes to Featured Sections, you can organize and showcase videos on your channels. Essentially you’re able to customize your home page layout with up to 12 unique sections. 

• Simply click Add Section and scroll to select your content category under Videos, Playlists, and Channels.

For example, selecting Popular uploads under Videos will automatically showcase your top 12 videos with the highest views. 

• Next, tap Edit to modify the content in each section
• To reorder each section, click the vertical bar beside each section you want to adjust, then drag-and-drop to reorder. 
• Once you’re satisfied with the feel and appearance of the featured section, you can click Publish.

Branding Tab

Here you can add various branding elements that can help make your channel visually unique. This feature lets you change your profile picture, channel banner, and video watermark.

Profile Picture

Our first stop is the profile picture which appears in your videos, comments, and user search results. To add a profile picture, simply click Change, choose an image from your computer. Next, preview and adjust the size of your image and click Done and then Publish

Banner Image

Next, we have the banner image that appears as a background at the top of your YouTube page. To upload a banner image, tap Change. Proceed to select your image, preview it, tap Done and then Publish

Video Watermark

This appears at the bottom right hand of the video player, and viewers can use it to subscribe to your channel. You can choose when it shows up on your videos – at the end, custom start time, or throughout the entire video. 

To add a Video Watermark, click Upload, choose your image from your local computer and adjust the size. Go ahead and choose the preferred display time and click Done. 

Remember, these are the first things visitors will see when visiting your YouTube business account. So you want to use high-quality images that align with your overall branding.

Also, make sure your pictures are in the right YouTube format, size, and dimensions. This makes your channel look attractive and professional.

For channel icon or profile picture: YouTube recommends 800 × 800 pixels and a square or round picture of about 4MB or less.

For Channel banner: The minimum dimensions recommended by YouTube is 2048 x 1152 pixels with a 16: 9 aspect ratio. The safe area for text and logo is 1235 x 338 pixels. 

Basic Info Tab

Here’s where you can edit your channel name, add a channel description. You can also add translations for your channel name and other languages, add links to sites you want to share with your viewers, and your contact information. 

Once you’re done with your changes on the layout, branding, and contact info tab, click Publish at the right hand of your page to make it live on your channel. 

How to Optimize Your Profile Using SEO

After you’ve created your channel, getting your videos and channel in front of the right audience is the final piece of the puzzle.

You’re going to have to optimize your video metadata to rank high on YouTube and search engine results pages. Your video metadata includes your video’s title, description, thumbnail, tags, category, subtitles, and closed captions.

Here’s how to optimize your metadata for better visibility. 

Perform keyword research to know what viewers are searching for. Then go ahead and include these keywords in your metadata. 

Title, Description and Tags

Be sure to make your video title and description clear and compelling. Keep it brief and include your call-to-action or important links in the beginning.  When adding tags, use a rich blend of popular and long-tail keywords to broaden your video reach. 

Thumbnails

Your video thumbnails are the main image users see while browsing YouTube. As a result, they can have a huge impact on clicks, views, and engagement. After uploading your video, YouTube automatically generates a few thumbnail options. However, you can upload a custom thumbnail if your account is verified, and we strongly recommend this option. 

YouTube recommends a 1280 x 720 px image to ensure that your thumbnail looks perfect on all devices. You can use Promo thumbnail maker to quickly create high-quality and attractive thumbnails that stop the scroll and get the view flowing in.  

Subtitles and Closed Captions

Subtitles and closed captions make your videos accessible to a broader audience. But that’s not all. Search engines also crawl subtitles and captions to understand the context of the video. So we recommend incorporating relevant keywords in your subtitle to optimize them for search engines. You can use YouTube’s automatic subtitle feature or Promo caption maker to make your video readable by Google and boost its ranking. 

When you do these things we’ve highlighted, your video will rank high on YouTube, leading to more views and engagement.

This may appear daunting, but once you put some of the tips we’ve shared into practice, it’ll quickly become a piece of cake.

Finally, Create Your Content

Producing engaging and captivating videos is the key to nailing your YouTube video marketing. It has the potential to boost your SEO, capture the hearts and minds of viewers, connect them with your brand, making them yearn for more.

Before you begin content production for your YouTube business channel, you need to research your target audience. Understanding your viewer’s location, age, and viewing preference will help you create videos your audience want to watch 

If you’re already running a YouTube channel as a business, YouTube analytics will give you valuable insight into your audience’s needs. 

To draw these insights, make sure you pay attention to the comments, engage your audience, create polls, and ask the right questions to find out what matters most to your audience. 

While creating content, it’s also essential to keep an eye on your competition. Analyzing your top competitors allows you to see how your strategy stack up to theirs. Plus, you can learn from your competitors, see what works for them and use it to accelerate your growth. 

To get started, leverage keyword tools to see which brands have the highest ranking in your industry. Then pay close attention to their channel, content, titles, description, and comments to uncover actionable insights and inspiration. 

If you are ready to start creating videos for your channel, we recommend using a video-making tool like Promo.com. The software makes it super-easy for anyone to create stunning YouTube videos, attract subscribers, get more views and boost sales. You’ll find millions of eye-catching images, videos, and templates that cut across any niche you can think of. 

Pros and Cons of Using YouTube to Promote Your Brand

Although YouTube offers far-reaching benefits for businesses of all sizes, it also has drawbacks. 

Let’s dive into the pros and cons of YouTube. 

Pros

Supercharge Brand Visibility

Brand visibility is the foremost benefit of having a YouTube channel for business. As the largest video platform and second most popular search engine, YouTube caters to a huge audience. And using YouTube for business offers you a chance to enhance your reach and bring your brand to the attention of millions of potential customers and build a solid brand image. 

Visual Content Performs Better

Although text is an integral part of marketing, visuals perform better. They help you convey large amounts of information in a short time. With the shrinking attention spans of humans, videos are perfect for attracting and holding audience attention and driving conversions for your brand.

YouTube is the king of visual content, and about 85% of brands use it for video marketing. Leveraging YouTube can liven up your visual content, promote increased engagement rates and make your brand stand out. 

With YouTube, you can host different content types to enhance your business, like explainer videos, how-to videos, tutorials, demonstrations, customer testimonials, and more.

Enhance Your Web Content

Adding YouTube videos to your website can boost content quality. Viewers love videos, and embedding them in your blog post, product, or support page can get them to stick around much longer. This will up your chances of converting them to customers. 

What’s more? It reduces bounce rate, increases your average session duration and page rankings on search engine result pages. 

It’s Free and Easy to Use

YouTube is perfect for new businesses or small business owners because they’re mostly on a lean budget. You can create a YouTube channel for your business, upload videos, and reach new audiences, all for free. 

In addition, YouTube is intuitive and pretty easy to use. As you can see from the guide we shared earlier; you don’t need to be a tech expert to get the hang of it. You can get your channel up and running in a few simple steps.

Creative Freedom

Every business has a story, and YouTube gives you the creative freedom to connect with customers, share your story, and help people learn about your brand. 

There’s no limit to what you achieve on your YouTube channel. The platform favors different content types, so you’ll need to get creative to market your business. For example, you can repurpose your blog post into a video, create tutorials and how-to guides, video testimonials, product reviews, meme videos, or entertaining skits.

Cons

Here are some of the disadvantages of using YouTube for marketing.  

High Competition

One of the major cons of YouTube marketing is that the platform is crowded. 

More than 500 hours of video content are uploaded on YouTube per minute. As such, breaking through the noise can be a daunting task. It takes a lot of time and effort to build a large audience and gain exposure on YouTube.

You have to consistently create stunning videos and optimize your channel for YouTube algorithms to stand a chance of getting found. 

Video Production Can Be Time Consuming

Producing high-quality YouTube videos that bring you results can be expensive and time-consuming. 

You’ll have to invest in expensive equipment, hire videographers and editors, deal with high equipment maintenance costs, and much more.

Well, here’s the good news. You no longer have to blow your entire marketing budget on video production. Promo.com offers a feature-rich video-making tool that’s not only affordable but easy to use. With as low as $29, you can create unlimited and publish videos to your YouTube business channel. 

Low-Quality Videos Can Greatly Damage Your Brand

You may not know this, but viewers watch a lot of high-quality videos on YouTube. Therefore badly produced video can be a major turnoff. Not only will it create a negative perception of your brand, but you’ll lose out on a chance to engage your audience and convert them to customers. 

Again Promo.com is your best bet for creating top-quality YouTube videos. After making your video, you can choose your preferred dimension, size, and quality before uploading it to your channel.

FAQs

Why is Video Marketing Important?

Video marketing helps brands of all sizes amplify their reach, increase engagement and conversion across social, digital, and sales channels. It gives you a chance to reach new audiences and deepen relationships with existing customers. 

How Much Does Video Marketing Cost?

The amount of money you’ll spend on video marketing depends on factors like the type of video you want to make and the equipment, software, personnel, and other resources you need. 

Outsourcing video production and marketing to an agency will save time and get you results. However, it could cost you hundreds to thousands of dollars per video. 

Nowadays, video editing tools like Promo offer cost-effective solutions for small businesses to make videos in-house. These tools enable creators to make unlimited videos for as low as $20 per month. 

How to do Personalized Video Marketing?

Personalized video marketing is the process of creating unique video content to target specific individuals or audiences within a larger demographic. Personalized videos aim to create a unique experience for prospects, existing customers, or partners using their personal data and interactions with your brand. 

Personalized videos could include:

•  Thank-you videos to your most valued clients
• Customized birthday video
• Personalized event invites 
• Sales pitches recorded for valuable prospects.  

To make the most of personalized video marketing, you need to collect customer data, understand their needs, create strong visuals, and include a clear call to action. 

What is ‘Inbound Marketing Video’?

All inbound marketing video refers to any type of video content that aims to attract customers by addressing their pain points or providing value.

This value could be in the form of a video that addresses a topic they are interested in, provides answers to their question, and a how-to guide for a task they are struggling with. Inbound marketing videos help attract prospects, increase conversions and build long-lasting relationships with your clients.  

Your Turn: Create a High-Converting YouTube Channel for Your Business

There’s no denying that YouTube is a marketing goldmine for your business. At a glance, mastering the art of YouTube marketing may seem like a daunting task. 

By following the tips, we’ve shared in this guide, your YouTube channel for business should be up and running in no time. Plus, optimizing it for better visibility should be a walk in the park. 

Once you get your YouTube business channel running, go ahead and use Promo.com to produce captivating videos that make your channel the next big thing.