6 Steps to Reach the Right Audience on YouTube
How to Find Your Target Audience on YouTube
Identifying your YouTube audience requires six key tactics: understanding YouTube targeting, using advanced search filters, engaging with YouTube communities, leveraging paid video ads, optimizing video metadata for discovery, and using effective CTAs for audience direction.
1. Understanding the Significance of Targeting on YouTube
According to Sprout Social, YouTube has over 2 billion monthly active users, making it a platform with a diverse user base that can likely connect to your target audiences.
Understanding the significance of targeting on YouTube is essential for success, as it enhances engagement and improves ROI by reaching the most relevant viewers.
It also provides valuable analytics and insights, increases visibility, and contributes to a positive brand reputation within your niche or industry.
In addition to these fundamental reasons, YouTube offers several lesser-known targeting features that are unique to the platform:
Affinity Audiences: These are groups of YouTube users who have shown a strong and consistent interest in specific topics or niches.
Targeting affinity audiences allows you to connect with viewers who are already passionate about content related to your own.
Here are some of the YouTube affinity audiences that your viewers might fall into:
Auto enthusiasts
Sports fans
Luxury travelers
Fashionistas
DIY enthusiasts
Cat lovers
Social media enthusiasts
Custom Intent Audiences: Custom intent targeting enables you to reach users based on their recent search behavior on Google.
This is particularly valuable for advertisers, as it allows them to target users who have demonstrated a specific intent related to their products or services through their Google searches.
2. Using Advanced Search Filters for Audience Identification
YouTube's advanced search filters allow you to narrow down your search by factors like keywords, video duration, upload date, and more.
According to Buffer, advanced search filters help researchers quickly narrow down their search results to the most relevant information, saving time and effort in the research process.
Here's a step-by-step guide on how to use YouTube's advanced search filters for audience discovery:
2.1. Go to YouTube
Open your web browser and navigate to the YouTube website (www.youtube.com).
2.2. Access the YouTube Search Bar
Locate the search bar at the top of the YouTube homepage and click on it to activate the search function.
2.3. Enter Your Search Query
In the search bar, type your initial search query. This could be a keyword related to your niche, topic, or the type of audience you want to discover.
2.4. Click on "Enter" or Hit the Search Icon
Press "Enter" on your keyboard or click the magnifying glass or search icon to initiate the search.
2.5. View Search Results
YouTube will display a list of search results related to your query. These results will include videos, channels, and playlists.
2.6. Click on "Filters"
To access advanced search filters, look just below the search bar, and you'll see a button labeled "Filters." Click on it.
2.7. Filter by Type
You can filter the search results by different types, such as Videos, Channels, Playlists, and more. Choose the type of content that is most relevant to your audience's discovery.
2.8. Refine Your Search
Below the "Type" filter, you'll find additional options to refine your search further:
Upload Date: You can specify a time frame for the content you want to discover, which can be useful for finding recently active channels or videos.
Duration: Filter videos by their duration (e.g., short, long).
Features: Select specific features like "Live" or "4K" if they are relevant to your search.
Sort By: You can sort the results by relevance, view count, upload date, or rating.
Apply Filters
2.9. Apply Filters
After customizing your search with the desired filters, click the "APPLY" button to apply those filters to your search results.
2.10. Check Refined Results
Review search results matching your audience or content needs after adjusting filters.
2.11. Keep Exploring
Experiment with filters to find more relevant content and channels by repeating the process.
By following these steps, you can effectively use YouTube's advanced search filters to discover and connect with your desired audience, helping you tailor your content and engagement strategies to better serve their interests and needs.
3. Engaging with YouTube Communities for Niche Audience Interactions
Engaging with YouTube communities is smart because, according to Sprout Social, almost a quarter of the world's population uses YouTube, offering a huge opportunity to connect with your target audience.
Active participation in YouTube communities and forums is an excellent way to connect with your niche audience.
Here's how you can do it:
3.1. Identify Relevant Communities
Find online spaces related to your niche, such as YouTube Groups, subreddits, or forums where your target audience congregates.
3.2. Lurk and Learn
Observe and understand the community by reading discussions and comments to grasp members' interests and preferences.
3.3. Contribute Meaningfully
Start engaging by sharing expertise, answering questions, and participating in discussions without spam or self-promotion.
3.4. Build Relationships
Interact genuinely with members to establish connections. Engage with their content and respond to comments on your own.
For example, Cajun Koi Academy responds to the comments of their viewers in their YouTube videos.
3.5. Collaborate on Projects
Seek opportunities for partnerships with influencers or content creators in your niche, like joint videos or podcasts, to expand your reach.
3.6. Promote Your Content Thoughtfully
Share your content when it adds value to a discussion or answers a question, but avoid excessive self-promotion.
Additionally, collaborating with niche influencers is a powerful but lesser-known community engagement tactic that can yield significant benefits. Here’s how you can do it:
1. Find Niche Influencers
Identify influencers in your niche with a substantial following and a similar target audience.
2. Send Personalized Message
Reach out with a tailored message, explaining your collaboration goals and what you can offer.
3. Suggest Value-Adding Collaborations
Propose collaborative content ideas that benefit both you and the influencer's audience.
4. Emphasize Shared Interests
Highlight common ground within your niche to enhance the content experience.
5. Execute the Collaboration
Plan and carry out the project, coordinating content creation and promotion.
6. Harness the Collaboration
Promote the collaboration across your platforms, encouraging cross-promotion to expand audience reach.
These strategies collectively enhance your presence on YouTube and contribute to a more engaged and loyal audience.
4. Using YouTube Ads for Precise Audience Targeting
YouTube has different ways to show ads to the right people. One way is by choosing who sees your ads based on age, gender, whether they're parents, or how much money they make.
You can also make custom groups of people from your customer list or website visitors to show ads to.
YouTube also has a special feature where you can show ads to people who really like certain topics or things.
They figure this out by looking at what videos they watch and what they do on the internet.
According to WebFX, YouTube offers over 130 affinity audiences, allowing creators to find the best fit for their business and provide viewers with a personalized ad experience.
Creators can get to know their most valuable customers with the Find My Audience tool on YouTube and discover new audience segments to better target them in their upcoming YouTube campaign.
5. Optimizing Video Titles, Descriptions, and Tags for Audience Discovery
Optimizing video metadata, which includes titles, descriptions, and tags, is crucial for increasing your video's discoverability on YouTube.
Here are some strategies for doing this effectively:
Keyword Research
Find the right words people search for by using keyword research tools.
Compelling Titles
Make interesting and short video titles with those important keywords.
Detailed Descriptions
Write a detailed description of your video, adding keywords naturally, and provide extra information and links.
Tags
Use relevant tags related to your video's content, including both broad and specific keywords.
Transcriptions and Closed Captions
Adding transcriptions or closed captions can make your video more accessible and help YouTube understand it better.
Custom Thumbnails
Create eye-catching thumbnails that show what your video is about and make people want to click.
Consistency
Keep your video information consistent to help YouTube understand your content better.
Monitoring and Updates
Regularly check and update your video information as audience interests and search trends change.
For example, Ali Abdaal incorporated a compelling title, detailed description, closed captions, and custom thumbnails for his YouTube video.
Compelling title and custom thumbnail
Transcriptions and Closed Captions
Detailed description
While many creators are familiar with popular keyword research tools, here are some lesser-known ones that can help you find niche-specific terms:
A tool that finds keywords by collecting questions people ask on search engines, helping you discover specific queries in your niche.
It suggests keywords not only from Google but also from YouTube, Bing, Amazon, and more, making it useful for niche-specific keywords on various platforms.
Combines keyword suggestions from multiple search engines in a visually engaging way, making it good for uncovering less competitive niche keywords.
A browser extension that provides keyword data directly in your search results, including search volume, CPC, and competition, making it handy for niche terms while browsing.
Offers keyword ideas, search volume, keyword difficulty data, and content suggestions based on your target keywords, making it a comprehensive tool for niche keyword research.
Incorporating these strategies and using lesser-known keyword research tools can help you optimize your video metadata effectively, making your content more discoverable to your target audience on YouTube.
6. Incorporating Call-to-Actions(CTAs) for Audience Direction
According to Think with Google, optimized YouTube ads with a strong CTA have been shown to increase the likelihood of short-term sales by 30%.
Clear and compelling CTAs on YouTube are important for audience engagement, retention, and growth.
These prompts encourage interactions, foster loyalty, and guide viewers to take specific actions, enhancing your channel's success.
While many creators use traditional CTAs, there are lesser-known strategies and placements that can enhance user engagement:
Interactive Cards
YouTube's interactive cards let you add polls, links, and external website links within your videos, encouraging viewer interaction.
Mid-Roll CTAs
Place call-to-actions (CTAs) at specific points within your video, prompting viewers to take action during relevant moments.
End Screen Elements
Add CTAs in the final moments of your video to promote other content, playlists, subscriptions, and engagement.
Info Cards
Use small clickable panels in the top-right corner of your video to link to related content, merchandise, or external websites for more engagement.
For example, Ali Abdaal places a button in the upper right corner of some of his videos that, if clicked, will direct you to another video.
Engage with the Comments
Encourage viewer participation by asking questions and interacting with their comments to build a sense of community and foster interaction.
Incorporate Annotations
While annotations are no longer available for newer videos, you can still use them in older content to create clickable links and text boxes for directing viewers to other content or actions.
In summary, clear and compelling CTAs are essential for guiding audience actions and enhancing engagement on YouTube.
Wrapping Up: How to Find Your Target Audience on YouTube
Discovering your audience on YouTube involves six key strategies:
Recognizing the importance of targeting
Using advanced search filters
Engaging with YouTube communities
Leveraging YouTube ads
Optimizing video metadata for discovery
Including effective CTAs for audience guidance.
While these practices are key for finding your target audience on YouTube, it's important to keep in mind that YouTube audience discovery is an ongoing process.
You may need to combine and adjust these strategies based on your specific content and audience preferences.