Quit dipping your toes and go all the way into content creation with YouTube.
There are a million reasons to start a YouTube channel in 2022. Not the least is that everyone is doing one. If you’re looking to enter the public realm – especially as a brand personality – then having a YouTube channel or podcast is absolutely a prerequisite.
For tips on starting a podcasting channel, check out our blog here.
There are two levels of having a YouTube account. You can simply have an account, which is just dipping your toes in the water, or you can take the full plunge and have your own actual channel.
An account allows you to leave comments, like/dislike videos, make playlists, or share. If you have a gmail account, that means you already have a YouTube account. And when you make a YouTube account, you’re slotted for a gmail account.
That’s just the first step. If you want to do more and make your own videos, you’ll have to start a Channel.
A business/brand channel or a personal channel?
Don’t make the mistake I did and go with a personal channel. Even if you’re not approaching creating videos in a serious way, you might eventually want to. Create a brand channel and use that, even for personal use. You might want to later turn it into an actual project, or you might want to start a new branded channel to start from scratch. Either way, you’re left with that freedom. It’s much harder to scrub your personal channel – so keep that in mind.
Below I’ll go through making a brand channel. As I’m strongly advising against using your personal channel (which you get automatically anyway), I won’t go over that.
The branded channel
You can make as many branded channels as you’d like. It’s a good idea to maintain separate channels for separate purposes. For a brand that might have various aims under a unified main idea, you can implement playlists with great success to controlling your brand’s video output – I’ll cover this later when I delve into branding a channel.
The advantages of a branded channel?
- Make channels specific to each brand
- Have more than one manager or owner
- Create a brand presence separate from your personal presence
How to create a YouTube Channel for your brand
Create a Google account at www.youtube.com. If you already have one, sign in.
Go to your channel list.
Click on your avatar. Then click: “Switch account”, followed by “View all channels” and “Create A Channel”
See this happy picture with a rainbow on it? Google thinks this will help you come up with a successful channel name. Hopefully it will! Type it under “Channel Name”, where I’ve typed “Your Super Awesome Channel”.
Congratulations! Now you’ve got a channel! But it’s all empty, lonely and doesn’t look very special, does it? Above I’ve included a pic of what you should do next. Click on that “Customize Channel” button and it will take you straight into YouTube Studio.
How to customize your YouTube Channel
Now you’ve got some options on how to customize your channel and give it its own little much needed flair. As you can see below, you’ve got three sections here: Layout, Branding, and Basic Info.
Layout
Layout dictates the different sections that can be seen when someone first views your channel. On the top it shows “Video spotlight”. This refers to what video is seen at the top of the channel. You have two options here: You can have people who haven’t subscribed see one channel, and for returning subscribers, a different video.
Featured sections are where you can control which videos are seen and how they’re organized. You can make several playlists of your videos and show them in different sections. For example, if you have a lifestyle vlog, you can show a “Shopping” section, a “Unboxing” section, a “Makeup” section, and so on. Keep this area tidy and well organized so your viewers and potential viewers can go straight to what interests them.
Branding
In this section, you can control the images and colors that are seen. Upload your pic or your brand’s pic for the avatar, the banner image and the video watermark. The requirements are all right there.
Basic info
This is where you let people know about your channel and any of your future plans you might have. If you want it searchable by language, add your language (not necessary).
You can’t choose your URL at first, but when you get more than 100 subscribers and your channel has passed its 30th day jubilee, then you can. So make sure to come back there and change it to something more palatable, like youtube.com/channel/YourSuperAwesomeChannelWOWZAS
If you want to add links to your main webpage, your Insta, your FB or your Tok, you can do so here. And then finally, direct all spam mail to your email address.
That’s it!
You are now officially a YouTuber. Now get working and once you can get 1,000 subscribers, you can start trickling in the dough through monetization. When you’re creating your videos, keep in mind that you have an unlimited source of original, customizable audio here at Smartsound Cloud.
