The New YouTube Algorithm
By: Luciana Lambert
Tags: Technology, Media, Data Science, Creativity, YouTube

The New YouTube Algorithm

How the way to get people watching your videos changed

Algorithm illustration created by the author. Images: Canva, Anete Lusina and Antonio Batinic.

YouTube is finally raising the bar for quality content. Aware of the platform’s power for self-learning, it will start recommending videos you will be happy to watch based on the algorithm.

What is the algorithm?

“The algorithm” is a formula that factors in your search history and preferences to optimize YouTube’s suggested content for you. When you open YouTube on your laptop, an avalanche of suggestions is pre-loaded for you. If this is your first time using the platform, the recommendations will be randomized based on the videos’ popularity.

That is until you start clicking on them and watching them. That’s how YouTube tracks the data to analyze your preferences and tailor recommendations for you on what to watch next.

Once you are enjoying some videos, the “Up Next” feature located on your screen’s sidebar is also using the formula to keep adding your preferences to the algorithm. Your searches, your watch history, and the channels you subscribed to will create an identity on the content YouTube will suggest to you.

The Research

The Pew Research conducted a study on families and individuals about their YouTube experience, especially when looking for “How-to” (tutorial) videos. Their analysis showed that the videos recommended by the platform are the most-watched by viewers.

“Some 81% of YouTube users say they at least occasionally watch the videos suggested by the platform’s recommendation algorithm, including 15% who say they do this regularly, according to the survey.”

ThinkMedia CEO Sean Cannell, a popular YouTuber, recently shared documentation of the platform driving 53% of his audience to his content — he showed his screenshots on YouTube, of course. For him, who established himself as a leader in Content Creators tutorials, YouTube’s recommendations added up to more than a half a billion impressions towards his channel, which turned over 21 million viewers.

What are impressions?

“Impressions” are counted when a thumbnail is shown for more than one second, and at least 50% of the thumbnail is visible on the screen. All of the videos suggested for you that sit in plain view longer than that ultra-brief time count as an impression. Unless you click away fast enough for a thumbnail to disappear from your screen, it will generate an impression. Cannell’s words about how impressions drove his impressive numbers up were:

“It makes me think of YouTube holding up a billboard of your thumbnail being like, ‘Do you want to watch it? Do you want to watch it? Do you want to watch it? Do you want to click on this video?’ Out of that, 21 million views came from those impressions. So, figuring out how to really crack the code on their algorithm is huge.”

As a YouTuber and marketer, Cannell relies on studying viewers’ behavior. That plays an integral part in the success of anyone looking to monetize and share their expertise on the platform. But as Cannell himself explains, it is no longer a good idea to attract viewers without delivering high-quality content. While the algorithm gave you a lot of low-quality suggestions in the past, now YouTube’s goal is to keep you satisfied with the content it recommends. Having an attractive thumbnail and clickbait video title might have put your videos on someone’s algorithm — even when the content did not deliver what it promised. But that is about to change.

The change

The algorithm is designed to help you. When you click on a suggestion, and the result is underwhelming or even frustrating, you think poorly of YouTube as a whole. As a free platform for creators, a lot of content is uploaded every minute. It would be hard for you to sort through the video library and manually separate the good stuff from the trash.

Now, YouTube is trying to understand you, learn what you love, and give more of it to you in a way that will keep you coming back for the quality of your experience. The algorithm focuses less on how many clicks a video gets and more on how long it is watched. When you watch a video until the end, save it to favorites, re-watch it later, pause, and come back to it, you are telling YouTube that you love that content. In return, it will give you more of it, or anything very similar, for you to enjoy. On the same token, if you skip a video from your suggested options after having watched a similar one, YouTube now computes that too.

That means a clickbait thumbnail and title might make you watch someone’s video. But suppose you hated it and start bypassing the “Up Next” suggestions on the sidebar. In that case, YouTube will get the message: you do not want to receive those suggestions anymore. That’s how you will be helping the platform design the algorithm specifically for you.

The guidelines laid out on the YouTube Creator Academy page are clear :

“We share recommendations both on YouTube’s homepage and in the ‘Up Next’ section as a suggestion of what to watch next when you’re watching a video.” “YouTube tries to match each viewer to the videos they are most likely to watch and enjoy. With over 400 hours of video uploaded every minute, that can be a challenge. YouTube’s recommendations systems provide a real-time feedback loop to cater to each viewer and their varying interests. Our goal is to get people to watch more videos that they enjoy so that they come back to YouTube regularly.”

Aiming for quality

Speaking of separating good from bad, YouTube is distancing itself from harmful content and conspiracies, resulting in a more family-friendly platform. Starting around September 2020, YouTube terminated several channels that infamously spread fake news and even harassed people online.

If you try to post a video full of unsubstantiated claims or outright lies, it will be removed. Repeat offenders are setting themselves up for being permanently banned from YouTube.

As part of the platform’s efforts to be more family-friendly, children’s content will be considered a niche. Once you set your uploaded content as “kid-friendly,” videos made for adults will not be allowed on the same channel.

As far as how you grow your audience on YouTube, video consumption is more important than subscribers. Suppose someone keeps watching your video once it starts. In that case, it will help it be recommended, regardless of the viewer having subscribed to your channel.

In conclusion

The way people monetized on YouTube required little quality in the past: as long as you had clicks, the algorithm helped you. That formula encouraged clickbait. Without anything of value in the video per se, an eye-catching thumbnail and a teaser title generated enough clicks to keep a lousy channel in a viewer’s suggestions.

When you don’t watch a video until the end or bypass the suggested videos list, the algorithm will take note. That is why YouTube wants feedback, including in surveys, from viewers on the content’s quality. Clickbait meant easy money for some, but it hurt YouTube’s reputation with a good chunk of viewers considering the entire platform bad due to poor content. Good videos were still there: tutorials, credible news, music, lectures, but the viewer just didn’t want to use a platform with so many problems.

Many subscribers were also mandatory if you wanted to grow your channel enough to profit from it. With the new guidelines, the content creator’s main goal who wants to succeed on YouTube will have to be on the quality of their videos. Providing something of value to your audience will make them come back even when they are not subscribers. If they enjoy your content and re-watch it multiple times, they will receive recommendations accordingly.

On the same token, a video originally posted five years ago might get a spike in views because of the once-neglected quality in it. Suppose you posted good videos that never got to your targeted audience. In that case, it is an excellent time to bring them back via tags. You can do that by utilizing the YouTube Creator Studio. You can also give them new thumbnails and cards. “Fresh content” is no longer more important than “good content.”

Understanding your audience should not be left to the algorithm alone: it should be the content creator’s job too. Whatever YouTube is recommending to your audience that is not yours is what they are interested in. Finding out what those interests are will help you predict what they want you to bring in your next video. It is a way of discovering a niche you can engage with, a group of people unique to you and your content.

In the words of Sean Cannell, “The content creator who understands the viewer better wins.”