📉 Let's talk about retention

How to YouTube #21

Hey YouTubers,

Today, I want to talk about retention and why it actually matters.

📉 What is retention?

Retention is about how well you retain a viewer on a given video.

YouTube gives you a graph that looks something like this for each video showing you how well you retained the average viewer’s attention.

In general, for educational channels, good video retention hovers between 20-40% and often averages at around 30% (which is the same for Ali, it almost never goes above 40% on videos longer than 15 minutes).

🚀 Why does it matter?

I’ve spent a lot of time looking at the analytics on Ali’s channel, and there’s a painful truth that’s clear to see.

There is no clear correlation between how many views a video gets and how good the retention is.

But isn’t retention really important?

Yes, it is, but no matter how good the retention is on a video, people still have to click on it first to watch it. So if no one is clicking on the video, it doesn’t matter how good the retention is, the video still won’t get many views.

The thing that has by far the biggest impact on views on Ali’s channel is what the video is actually about. No matter how good the retention is on a video reviewing the Kindle Scribe, it’s unlikely to perform as well as a video about making more money.

Imagine an extreme scenario where a Christopher Nolan Hollywood masterpiece is hidden under the worst thumbnail you’d ever seen.

Unfortunately, it wouldn’t matter how good his movie was. No one would see it because if no one clicked on it to start with, it wouldn’t get recommended. Good thing Christopher Nolan didn’t post Oppenheimer on YouTube with a bad thumbnail.

So, retention can’t cause high views, it only correlates with high views (This is a good thread to read for more info on this). The thing that actually causes views is having a video topic that resonates with the audience enough for them to click on it and for YouTube to continuously recommend it to similar viewers. And the video has to have ‘good enough’ retention.

💡 Why retention actually matters

Ok, even though I’ve just said good retention can’t cause views, YouTube is fundamentally about good content, not good thumbnails. It’s a video platform, so whilst we need to get good at making people click, the thing that actually matters in reality is still making good videos.

So what is retention all about?

Retaining viewers across videos, not just on one.

We want to make good videos because we want to build an audience of people who love our content and want to come back again and again.

In other words, we’re retaining their attention across multiple videos, and when we upload a new one, they’re all there waiting because they love our content so much.

This is true retention, and that’s what more people should be talking about. I suggest replacing the word retention with “consistently making videos people want to watch.”

It’s boring but it’s true.

It’s not about hacking someone’s brain every few seconds to keep them watching, it’s about making great videos that they actually want to watch, so that they keep coming back.

This is otherwise known as audience building. The goal is to collect people who love what you do and support you.

🧐 What does this mean for you?

Ultimately, the reason you want to improve the retention (i.e. improve your videos) isn’t just so that one video gets more views, it’s so that you’re making videos that people want to return to.

The more someone enjoys one video, the more likely they are to watch another. That’s why making good videos truly matters.

True retention is about retaining viewers long term. It does depend on the nature of your channel, but for most YouTubers the best strategy is make great videos in order to build an audience of viewers who love what you do, and keep coming back.

And how you do that ultimately depends on your channel. But for talking head educational channels, the best bet is sharing lots of value, making the videos easy to follow and bringing some personality.

Isn’t it annoying how all YouTube advice comes back to making videos that people want to click on and that people want to watch.

It’s like there’s some work involved there or something. How dare anyone suggest that.

Let me know how you feel about retention by replying to this email or commenting on Substack.

Have an epic week making videos!

Tintin 🧑‍💻

The YouTube Tin

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To be read with love, care and retention.

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2. How to Write a Great Hook

3. 4 YouTube Mistakes Beginners Make

4. The Hidden Benefits of Being a YouTuber

5. The New Thumbnail A/B Testing Tool