How YouTube took away 70-85% of your subscribers, this goes for all channels! - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: madsbarnkob
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 13, 2019, 06:54:09 am
content: YouTubes change from subscription to notification bell has had a huge impact on all channels, as they only themself estimate a average of maximum 30% of subscribers will actually get a notification due to people not updating their notification settings for all previously subscribed channels.I myself have run through my entire subscription list and turned on notifications for all channels, as that was the reason I subscribed to them in the first place, I want to see the videosI know it can be used differently by browsing the subscription page and then only get notifications from a few select channels.I made a little video about @Veritasium's algorithm analysis, @YouTubeHelp's notification system and analytics compared up against my own analytics.

author: wilfred
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 13, 2019, 07:36:23 am
content: I subscribe to about 50 channels and I don't want 50 emails. Maybe YT makes 1 email a day for all notifications, I don't know. I do know I clicked the bell on Fran's channel and I don't get a notification. Same goes for Veritasium. These are the only two channels I ever clicked the bell on.If I get 1 email with all notifications and there are 10 say then I'm no better off than if I just go and look at my subs list for the blue dot and pick them off in order depending on time and my mood.I accept that what once worked for a subscriber can no longer work with so many channels. Replacing that with a bell for every channel is equally burdensome. I don't even subscribe to all the channels I watch. People with less free time than me to watch a YT video must find it even worse.

author: madsbarnkob
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 13, 2019, 08:39:08 am
content: I can completely follow your line of thought, that it quickly goes into spam instead of being a help on discovering new content from preferred creators.I use my gmail for youtube, obviously as they got paired so many years ago, that all comments, subscription emails etc. gets sorted into the "social" tab of gmail and thus does not look like spamming my inbox, so I agree with you, I would not want a email per new video either.I do use the popup on the youtube app on my smartphone instead, this is by far the best tool to get my attention and also to react on new content the moment it goes live.Thank you for sharing your point of view.

author: bitwelder
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 13, 2019, 08:55:32 am
content: I watch the YT channels of my interest via Kodi app, so I just select 'my subscriptions' and I can see all the recently released videos, and their status (watched, unwatched, etc)I have absolutely no need (and no desire) to ring any bell, and actually I'm pretty sure that if instead I'd use the bell system for the various channels I'd actually end up missing some of the notified videos in the multitude of notifications.So, sorry, but I'm going to ignore the last part of the constant plead from youtubers to like-subscribe-clickthebell. IMHO it's just wrong.

author: Mr. Scram
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 13, 2019, 08:56:51 am
content: Quote from: wilfred on June 13, 2019, 07:36:23 amYou could consider creating a mail filter, which sorts notification into a dedicated folder automatically.

author: Dubbie
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: June 13, 2019, 08:59:12 am
content: Every time I do things like that Mr Scram, I find I never look in that folder again

author: Berni
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 13, 2019, 09:06:59 am
content: Wait, so now even clicking the bell icon will not always notify me of a uploaded video by a creator?Does the "Subscriptions" tab on the main page of youtube show all of the videos?This is ridiculous that as a user i have to find workarounds for there stupid broken website. All i want is to have a list of videos from my subscribed channels, that's it. Sure i don't watch all of them, but i like to pick and chose depending on my mood rather than what youtube thinks id like to watch.Sure youtube is pretty good at finding videos i might like and suggesting them to me, but i will click on those when i want to, don't just shove the recommendations in my face while hiding away my subscriptions.

author: T3sl4co1l
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 13, 2019, 09:11:12 am
content: I turned off notifications because I want to browse videos at my leisure, and adding alerts anywhere (notification area, push alerts, email..) would be preposterously irritating.The recommendations are shite for the most part, with respect to my interests, so I've always used the subscriptions tab. As far as I know, videos always show up there?So I'm in that 84%, but I still see your new videos. I'm not "missing".Then, how many viewers in turn use their subscriptions tab, versus read alerts or find subscription/alert videos in the recommended area?Tim

author: madsbarnkob
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 13, 2019, 09:32:46 am
content: Tim, maybe I have completely overestimated how many people that are interested in notifications, that I wanted to blame the notification system more than it deserved, yet it was a huge impact when they made the changes.I took a look at my statistics for traffic source and as you can see, notifications is so far down the list that it reinforces my fear that not many people wanted to review their subs-notifications after the changes, but instead disabled a lot it. This is to some extend also out of reach from youtube, that many smartphones have improved greatly on privacy settings and to avoid app spam etc. So that will have an impact aswell.As you can see, search, external and recommended is by far the highest scoring traffic sources, where I guess that "browse features" is the subscription page among others.

author: madires
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 13, 2019, 09:37:49 am
content: I don't log in to YouTube, and cookies are deleted automatically. I'm trying to minimize tracking and SPAM. When I like to watch videos I simply select a bookmark folder and "open All in tabs" to check for new stuff which might interest me.

author: wilfred
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 13, 2019, 11:03:58 am
content: Quote from: madsbarnkob on June 13, 2019, 09:32:46 amMaybe I, and perhaps Tim also, are not typical viewers. Some will take an active role in managing YT and most won't bother. The notification system is to blame. But YT is, in spite of what a few will grumble about publically, just trying to maximise the system to their advantage. Which unfortunately means they are tuning it to suit most viewers whom they want to stick to the YT screen. If YT find the changes don't work for viewers and hence for themselves they'll change it again and again.Niche channels like yours and even big channels in the electronics niche have to find another way to connect with their fans. You cannot depend on YT anymore. Not even clickbait thumbnails will work eventually.Maybe an email list might work where you circumvent YT entirely for notifications.

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: June 13, 2019, 11:44:11 am
content: Sub 10% signed up for notifications on EEVBlog and EEVblog2

author: langwadt
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 13, 2019, 12:31:35 pm
content: Quote from: Mr. Scram on June 13, 2019, 08:56:51 amthat doesn't fix the notifications on my phone

author: German_EE
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 18, 2019, 09:23:08 am
content: Quote from: madires on June 13, 2019, 09:37:49 amI do exactly the same. I have 48 different You Tube channels in my video bookmarks and by opening them all in tabs I can check for new content in about two minutes, all without logging in and/or collecting cookies. Google and others track web habits WAY too much and I don't see why I should have to create an account with them just to see if new content has been uploaded.

author: paulca
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 18, 2019, 09:33:27 am
content: I turned on notifications for one or two channels, but now every time I log into a PC and run chrome I get 3 pop ups. When I close the first one another appears. When I close that another appears. This kinda goes on for a while. So I'm going to turn it off or at least not adding notifications for other channels.However I do notice that some of the people I subscribe to have videos and they have not even appeared on my "Recommended" list. I also notice that certain things go in and out of "algorithm fashion" and I have specifically search for them.I think a subscription feed on the opening/home page would be a big plus.As an aside one thing YouTube needs a link to the playlists the video is in. When you are watching a series of videos, say a game play through that has 105 videos, YT will recommend the next episode to you, but it's decoupled from the playlist and left to it's own devices it doesn't always make the next video next and getting from an individual email back to the playlist from the channel is ... cumbersome.

author: wilfred
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 18, 2019, 02:31:15 pm
content: The YT algorithm recommended Looking at my Analytics by Pewdiepei. So I watched it. I found out Australians and Kiwis do nothing but watch YT. What can I say?I watched my first, and last PDP vid.I don't know about creator burnout but I think I have viewer burnout coming on. I'm watching less and less of many channels.

author: SparkyFX
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 19, 2019, 07:16:35 am
content: There is another explanation:Short before youtube introduced the bell notification thing on the website, they updated the youtube app for android to make an audible notification for new videos.Which means: if you are subscribed to 200 channels and come home from work your phone will ring for 2 minutes with this clipped sound for new videos while you try to open the door (because your phone just connected to your WiFi). Not funny.That happend for like 2-3 days... guess what, the app showed no setting to disable this, there was no setting to set the notification sound to "nothing" without losing other notifications, i still want to use the youtube app, therefore i unsubscribed from these 200 channels. I think they updated quickly, i assume many other people did the same and then yt introduced the seperate notification bell.It was just a big fail, imho. Of course now it is not a problem anymore, but i guess that was that kind of untested use case they had not on the screen for being very connected.I still don´t have a data package constantly on for the phone, i don´t need it, and even if i had, i would not want to watch videos using it (its unpractical while riding the bike or at work).