I’m going to get a little meta about running a YouTube channel.
Growing a YouTube channel is hard (especially if you post as infrequently and about as niche things as I do), so of course I’m going to be exploring my options for channel growth early on. After trying my hand at YouTube’s answer to TikTok, Shorts, I’m pretty sure it’s not going to help me.
Before I begin, let me two things clear. First: This is all anecdotal. My experience does not necessarily represent the experience of every YouTube creator. Second: My channel had ~1300 subscribers when I made the Short I will reference in this article, which if you know anything about statistics, means I don’t have a large sample size. With that out of the way, let’s dive in.
How Did the Short Effect My Channel Stats?
A few months ago I made this Short (I meant to write this article much sooner, but life happens). No, I don’t expect you to click the link and watch it, but I need to make sure you can see for yourself that the graphs I post are taken from a real world Short.
The Short in question is a mix of jokes and references to a previous video, all of which is directly related to the hobby I create in (tabletop gaming). I would expect it to perform about as well as anything else I make. Let’s see if my expectation lined up with reality.
Channel’s Daily Views Including Publication Date of the Short
Wow! Look at how many views this Short got relative to my daily view count. That’s a considerable bump, isn’t it? Well, yes, but it also almost immediately returns to normal. But that’s not entirely unexpected, especially considering I don’t have a lot of content on my channel for new viewers to latch on to. We have to look at more graphs to start building a picture of what’s happening. Surely all those views translated to watch time!
Channel’s Daily Watch Time (in Hours)
OK, that’s not all that impressive. Yes, the day the short was released is among the highest for hourse watch, but just 2 days before it was another equally high hour day and without any bump in views. This is well within normal fluctuation. This makes some sense, as a 45 second Short would have to be watched 10 times to net the same hours watched as a 7-and-a-half-minute video, assuming the same average watch time.
Okay, so those views didn’t translate into much watch time, but what about subscribers?
Channel’s Subscriber Gain Over Time
Wow. If it weren’t for the line showing the publish date in this graph, I doubt you’d be able to tell me when it happened. It’s a little disheartening to see that none of those views translated into subs. I guess people just don’t stick around after a short long enough to click subscribe (or even like).
It’s possible I just made a stinker, but I have two bits of data I want to talk about which collectively I think result in Shorts being a bad path for those who want to grow their channel within a niche.
YouTube Gives You Less Than 48 Hours
Short have less than 48 hours to succeed. That’s a bold statement, isn’t it? I think I’ll let my Short’s view count speak for itself.
The Short’s Total View Count Over Time
Wow, just under two days after publishing and the view count has flatlined. This is nothing like any of my standard videos, which typically see an organic slowdown in viewership over time after an initial steep climb. This short experienced just over a day and a half of above average viewership, then flatlines, as though YouTube turned off tap. Every view after this point is someone browsing my channel content and viewing the short.
YouTube Doesn’t Care Who Your Short is Meant For
To demonstrate this, I want to use some demographic information from the short, specifically gender.
The Short’s Gender Demographic Data
This baffles me. I would love to believe that my niche is an inclusive and welcoming one (something my this hobby can really struggle with at times), but let’s take a look at my channel average for the same stat.
My Channel’s Overall Gender Demographic Data
Not only is the percentage swapped, but I can assure you my female viewership is only as high as it is because of the Short. Beforehand it fluctuated between 0.5 and 1%. So, if YouTube was pushing the Short to people it new already viewed this sort of content, why would I see such a massive disparity?
Simple. YouTube DIDN’T push my video to people who already view similar content. It dumped it into the sea of all Shorts with a high five and a “good luck”. It was listed beside vlogs, memes, challenges, reactions, and all sorts of other content.
Mind you, I have nothing against any of this content, and I don’t want to come off as an angry Gamer™️ shaking my first at things that are different than what I like. It’s just a simple fact that if content in a certain niche is pushed out to an audience who doesn’t engage in that hobby, well, it’s going to do poorly
Conclusion
To summarize, this Short did not drive people to view my other content, and I can’t imagine any creator in a narrow niche would see a substantial return on their Shorts. YouTube’s algorithm simply doesn’t care who your primary audience is. They have a very specific goal in mind for Shorts, and unless you make your Short to appeal to a wide audience, it’s going to get left in the dust.
And I don’t think YouTube is necessarily wrong for using it the way they do as there is a very real market for Shorts, as evidenced by TikTok. I am not arguing that Shorts are without a purpose, nor that anyone trying to build up a channel on YouTube should actively avoid creating them. They can still be a fun way to connect with your more die-hard audience (casual viewers will never even notice the Shorts). But I can’t imagine you’ll have any success growing your channel with them.