While it’s obvious that YouTube’s popularity is unparalleled in terms of video sharing, but did you know that it has quietly been around since 2006? Believe it or not, but six years is pretty old for a social media platform. While YouTube may not seem like traditional social media, its recent update may challenge that notion. It’s interesting that YouTube would wait this long to borrow inspiration from other sites such as Facebook and Twitter, but their recent redesign shows that they’re trying to actually compete with everyone else. Let’s take a look and see how the redesign affects your small business.
1. New Home Page: YouTube’s new home page is a far cry from the old days. Before, you could expect to be barraged with a variety of home videos of users doing silly, interesting, and outrageous things. Now? They’ve set up the home page so you when you log in, you automatically have a stream or feed of videos from the users you subscribe too. Interestingly, it resembles feeds from Facebook and Twitter. Now, whenever a user logs into their account, your agency videos will show up on their feed if they subscribe to your channel.
2. New Channel Pages: YouTube, in an effort to help businesses, have also revamped their channel pages. According to Social Media Examiner, YouTube is becoming more and more “channel centric,” meaning that when a term is entered into the search bar, more channels will show up in the results, as oppose to individual videos. The moral? Constantly update and optimize your channel!
3. YouTube Analytics: The video sharing site has also released a new, comprehensive analytics tool that allows companies to learn more about audience and activity on YouTube. Similar to how you can track your results with Facebook and Twitter, you can now see your action in more detail than you ever could before.
Understandably, YouTube tends to take a backseat to Facebook and Twitter when it comes to expanding your brand online. However, this redesign not only proves that it is possible to broaden your business, it also serves as a reminder that there are other platforms out there in terms of social media. Try it out and let us know what you think!