The Ultimate Guide to YouTube Analytics: Full Tutorial

The online content scenario is changing drastically. Businesses have become a lot more dependent on video platforms, such as YouTube. If you are looking forward to video content marketing, you couldn’t probably ignore YouTube. And why so? YouTube has acquired some outstanding ranks, making the platform one of the most sought-after by modern businesses.

YouTube has almost any type of content available, from tutorial videos to stunts, dance to music. It shows the versatility of the platform, along with its potentiality to support anything. But, if you want to use it as a marketing platform, you’ll have to know what’s working and what’s not.

YouTube metrics bring you a lot of such valuable information, which helps you to plan your content strategy accordingly. However, understanding the metrics may be a little overwhelming if you haven’t had any idea yet. Hence, we have brought you the ultimate guide to YouTube analytics: a full tutorial. Keep reading ahead.

All You Need to Know about YouTube Analytics

With more than 2 billion active users, YouTube is also the second-largest search engine on the web. It indicates the popularity of the platform. Eventually, it also portrays how this opens the door to the ocean of endless opportunities. All you need is quality content and some grand strategy.

But, even after that, you might not succeed if you fail to read your progress. YouTube analytics help you measure the performance of your content and your channel. As you understand the metrics, you can plan or change your strategies accordingly and make the most out of your channel.

But before you start reading the metrics and start refining your strategy, you have to know where you can find the available data. So, how do you find YouTube analytics?

How Do You Find YouTube Analytics on YouTube

First, log in to your YouTube account, however, if you are already logged in.
Click on your profile icon on the top right corner. Now, go to the YouTube Studio from there.
Now, you will find the summary metrics on your channel’s dashboard.
Click on the Analytics. You will find it on the left side menu on the screen.
Now, on the screen, you can see different metrics available. You can toggle between the Overview, Reach, Engagement, Audience heading to see more information. You might also have the Revenue option enabled if your channel is monetized.

Now, if you want a more detailed report, click on the Advanced Mode on the right upper corner. You will find a more detailed breakdown of the analytics. You will find metrics for your individual content from here.

You can also download a report from the Advanced Mode. Select the parameter you want to download and click on the download option on the right top corner. Select whether you want to save the file in a .csv file or Google Sheets.

You can also compare these metrics between 24-hours video performance and year-over-year channel growth. It helps you get a proper idea of the performance of both your channel and individual content.

All You Need to Know About YouTube Analytics Metrics

YouTube Channel Metrics

Under the overview menu, you get the overview of your YouTube channel. The metrics available here tell you about your viewers, video performance, real-time watch, watch time, etc. As we move ahead, we have explained each of these metrics. The channel metrics are the most helpful for understanding the trends. It also helps you to understand your channel better.

Watch Time

Channel watch time is the total amount of time people have spent watching your videos on YouTube over a given period. But why is it important?

Sure, most of the YouTubers run after views. While views are one of the most important factors to decide the success of content, it is not the only factor at all. Why so? Because you earn a view as soon as your viewer watches your content on YouTube for 30 seconds- which most of them do.

Under the watch time report, you can get some more detailed information when you click on “see more.”

Geography: This metric allows you to know the general geographic location of your viewers watching your content. It helps you get an idea about your audience base and which content type affects them the most.
Viewer Age: This metric provides you an insight into your viewer’s ages. It is helpful to plan your content based on that.
Viewer Gender: Viewer Gender helps you to analyze the gender of your viewers.
Device Type: The device Type metric lets you know about the type of device most of your videos are being viewed from.
Translation Use: Providing a translation to your video is always beneficial. This metric helps you see how many people are using the translation provided for the content.

But, it is not sufficient to gather enough information about your video quality or performance.

So, what happens when you measure success based on view? You don’t get to learn the necessary changes required in your videos. Hence, Watch time is necessary and should be observed on the analytics.

Subscribers

Subscribers are the number of people who have subscribed to your channel. YouTubers value subscribers a lot.

In most cases, subscribers are the first ones to see your videos and react to them. They are the most loyal people on your channel who bring the most engagement. Hence, increasing your subscriber count over time is necessary.

However, it might not be that easy. YouTube analytics overview menu lets you see the number of subscribers you have on your channel. But isn’t it something you can watch on your channel page as well?

Well, yes, you can do so. But here, you can simply hover your mouse through the subscriber area and see its growth or decrease. Thus, depending on the overall count, you can implement necessary changes to your strategy.

Channel Views

Channel views let you see how many people are actually visiting your channel. YouTube calculates the channel growth depending on the overall number of views your channel could gather over a certain amount of time. It helps you monitor the channel growth carefully.

You can use the metrics to compare your average channel view as well. Set the time span on 28 days, and you can see the metric automatically comparing the performance or channel views you receive on an average. It gives you a detailed insight into your channel growth or whether it is growing at all.

Real-Time Views

Real time view is presented with a bar on the analytics. It shows you the performance of your video received in the past 48 hours with hourly updates. Since the calculations are made live, you get to know the performance of your newly uploaded videos immediately after the launch.

It is helpful in many ways. You can always buy cheap YouTube views, but they do not indicate your content’s performance. Real-time views give you an idea of how it is performing so far and at which hour you get the most views on your content. It might be helpful to plan your next content strategy.

YouTube Reach Metrics

YouTube Reach Metrics helps you see the reach of your videos. It helps you find out how people are viewing your channel and content. By understanding these metrics and observing the development over time, you can plan your strategy accordingly. Let’s see what you get under this tab on YouTube analytics.

Impressions

Impressions are the number of times your thumbnails have been shown to your viewers. However, the metric loaded here does not include other external sources, such as social shares or website embeds.

Impressions click-through rate (CTR)

CTR or Click-through rate is an indication indicating the percentage of people who have clicked on your thumbnail on YouTube. YouTube takes note of such clicks and counts them as CTR.

A High CTR is always a good indication that your thumbnail is performing well. However, you should always take note of CTR for different videos and compare which type of thumbnails had the highest CTR and which had the lowest.

CTR is also affected by keyword use. So, by comparing the content having high and low CTR, you can see which of your approaches had the most impact. Thus, you can plan your strategy ahead.

Traffic Source

The traffic source report gives you a calculation of where you are getting your traffic from. It can be from YouTube search, Channel pages, Suggested videos, or the Playlist page.

In the external sources, those have been recorded where people have found your videos on some other website, social media platform, etc. Sharing your video on other sites will bring you more traffic.

If you have a monetized channel, it will help you get more views and increase watch time and subscriber count. It is one of the most effective tips on how to make money on YouTube.

YouTube Engagement Metrics

YouTube engagement is very important if you want to see your channel successful. So, what is engagement? Engagement on YouTube is how people interact with your content. For example, likes, comments, shares, subscribing are all some engagements on YouTube.

Engagement metrics let you see how people are engaging with your channel and content. The more engagements you receive, the better ranking your channel would get overtime. Let’s see what you get under this menu.

Average View Duration

Average view duration is the time indicating how long average viewers of your channel watch your content. But, how is it important? Let’s look at it this way: High CTR means that your content is being clicked upon, whereas average view duration shows whether it is being watched thoroughly or not.

So, if your CTR is high but the average view duration is low, viewers are not helpful from your content. In most cases, they do not get what they were promised on the thumbnail or title. Therefore, they leave without watching the entire content. So, if you spot such issues on your channel, make sure you focus on your content more.

Top Playlists

In this section, you can see which of your playlists have the higher watch time. But why is this list so important? Well, you make playlists to keep referring your audience to watch other videos on your channel. However, not all playlists work well. But, if you get an idea of which ones are performing well, you can keep adding videos to those.

It will increase your watch time and overall video views. However, you can also boost the performance of your low-performing playlists by simply shuffling the order. It is easy.

You need to shuffle the playlist and put the best performing videos in the list at some higher position. Thus, you can maintain the performance of high-performing videos and boost the performance of the low ones.

YouTube Audience Metrics

YouTube audience metrics help you understand your audience and their movements more. These metrics calculate how your audience is interacting with your channel, audience retainment, and your competition.

Returning Viewers

Returning viewers are the loyal viewers of your channel who watch most of your content. A high returning number is always a good message for your channel. It means that your content is resonating, and people love it.

Unique Viewers

Unique viewers are the new viewers on your channel. They have never watched your content on your channel. After watching your content on your channel, if they decide to come back, they will become the returning viewers of your channel.

Subscribers

Subscribers are the people who have subscribed to your channel. In most cases, subscribers are the first ones to watch your content and interact with them. Increasing subscriber count is a good sign. You can also compare your subscriber growth over the years to see how your channel is performing.

When your viewers are on YouTube

This report is presented in bars filled with different shades of purple. Each column represents one day of a week, whereas the bards represent the time of the days. When your viewers are on YouTube helps you find the peak hours for your channel to publish a video. You can see when most of your viewers are active on YouTube and plan your publishing schedule accordingly.

Other channels your audience watches

Other channels your audience watches report lets you do competitor research. You will get an idea of the content they watch on other channels. Thus, you can implement some of their unique strategies in your content as well.

Watch Time from Subscribers

This metric shows you the total watch time that you receive only from your subscribers. Subscribers, in most cases, are the ones who make the most of your watch time.

They bring you two times more watch time than normal viewers. However, if you see that your subscribers are not doing well, you might want to change your approach. Make the best out of your subscriber base.

YouTube Revenue Metrics

This feature will only be available if you are eligible for YouTube monetization. To access the feature, you will have to go to the revenue tab (if available). There you will find the following details.

Estimated revenue

Estimate revenue is the basic details of your total earning you have received from your channel from all transactions and Google-sold ads. One can only view his estimated earnings on YouTube analytics. If you want to see your finalized earnings, you have to access the Adsense account report.

Ad Rates

This metric is only available for YouTube partners, which is almost similar to the estimated revenue. It provides you information on estimated monetized playbacks, YouTube Ad revenue, impressions, and CPMs.

These metrics are beneficial for YouTube business accounts. Here’s a tip: if you want your business profile to make it look more attractive, go for a customized YouTube URL. You can follow the guide to getting a custom URL.

Conclusion

YouTube is the second most popular search engine on the web. With more than 2 billion monthly active users, YouTube presents a massive market of potential customers before companies and brands. But, understanding your progress on YouTube is crucial for your growth.

Of course, quality content is necessary. You need to be regular on the platform and pitch different approaches. But even after that, not all of your content will get the same results. YouTube analytics help you assess your journey by showing the performance of your channel and the content within it.

By watching your content’s individual performance and the overall channel performance, you can plan your strategy, change it, or improve it further. Thus, YouTube analytics helps you to better yourself in your endeavors. We hope the ultimate guide to YouTube analytics was helpful for most of you. We will see you again on the following topics.