How to Make a YouTube Video

YouTube is owned by Google, so to access its functions – such as liking content, subscribing to channels, and accessing your watch history – you’ll need to have a Google account. 

Once you’ve done that, create a personal channel:

• Sign in to YouTube via the web or the app 
• Click your profile picture, then ‘Create a channel’ 
• Check the details are correct, then hit ‘Confirm’ to create your channel

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Here are six top tips, with examples drawn from YouTube’s best and brightest. 

1. Build a community around your pet topic 

Successful creators relish discussing their niches. That means they demonstrate genuine passion, go beyond surface-level details, and ultimately turn their experience and knowledge into info-packed and entertaining videos. 

Take Melbourne-based Michael Brady from Oceanliner Designs. His channel focusing on ‘the design, construction, engineering and operation’ of ocean liners is certainly niche, but it’s attracted 510k subscribers. You know before starting his exhaustively researched videos that this is someone who isn’t going to run out of ideas or serve watered-down content. 

2. Tell stories, not facts 

Research and expertise are important aspects of your niche, but people don’t care about raw data. Stories are what drive us: it’s why human-interest pieces play so well on the news, and it’s why successful YouTubers are great storytellers.

There’s no better model than the New Zealand–based Internet Historian, whose channel currently sits at 3.97m subscribers. 

“I think it’s really important to turn things into a coherent story,” he said in an interview. “That's easier to tell if you've got something like a winner and a loser or a sort of protagonist and antagonist.”

His videos don’t just give you the what, where, why, who, and when. They weave everything together into an entertaining narrative. He’ll even drop his online avatar (an image of popular stock photo model ‘Hide the Pain Harold’) into a narrative as if he were actually there, as in The Failure of Fyre Festival (19m views). 

We’re not talking about commentating on War and Peace, but even a makeup tutorial or game review can provide storytelling opportunities that maintain interest and forge emotional connections. Questions to ask while making a YouTube video include: Where does the story begin and end? Is there an interesting backstory? Who are the main people surrounding a product or event? How might something like this fit into someone’s day? 

3. Create a dialogue with viewers 

Arun Maini, aka Mrwhosetheboss, has 18.6m subscribers, and a huge part of that success comes from his personal, conversational approach. 

He explains: “The default is not to be very emotional. … As the channel’s grown, I’ve realised this is a human platform. … The reason people would choose YouTube over, like, Netflix is to connect with a person.”

Form connections by addressing your audience directly. Videos should feel like you’re talking to a friend, not pitching to a board or hosting a TV show. Speak clearly, maintain eye contact, and ditch words you wouldn’t use in casual conversation. 

While a true back-and-forth isn’t possible, you can mirror the energy of a conversation and keep viewers engaged by using vocal variety and expressive body language. 

4. Open with a hook and keep your viewers engaged 

Viewers click away the second they think you’re wasting their time. YouTube recommends focusing on the first 15 seconds to ensure you start delivering right away. Cut to the chase and minimise waffle. 

Chloe Ting’s videos show how it’s done. Even with 25.2m subscribers, her exercise videos kick off with a quick demonstration of workout moves followed by a concise lowdown on what’s coming. Her videos even incorporate a timer during the introduction showing when the workout itself begins. 

5. Plan ahead 

Quality is rarely an accident. Planning ahead can help you create tight, focused content. Case in point: Lachlan and Jaxon Fairbairn of Fairbairn Films have gained 1.7m subscribers to their short comedy skits. 

Their videos have an improvisational and homemade feel that never hints at the effort involved. But Lachlan breaks down their surprisingly exhaustive process in How to Make a Fairbairn Film. This includes:

• Considering clickable titles and thumbnails
• Writing and rewriting the script, ensuring only two people are onscreen at once
• Listing the different shots required
• Accounting for any props that might be needed
• Planning out filming angles and locations

Regardless of your video’s genre, working from a set script and storyboarding its  flow will avoid tangents, save on time, and deliver a polished final product. 

6. Watch lots of YouTube – actively

One common denominator among YouTubers is their understanding of the platform. That isn’t learnt – it comes from their own time as viewers. If you want to be a YouTuber, watch more YouTube – actively – taking note of what you think works and where improvements could be made. 

That’s what John Plant of Primitive Technology did. At 10.9m subscribers, he’s among Australia’s most popular YouTubers – all from silently chopping wood, shaping earth, mixing clay, and more, to craft things from scratch with no modern tools or materials. 

His approach came from his own viewing experiences. “Look at what’s out there already and find out what you don't like. … I saw videos about making bows that would take ages and have all this nonessential information. Just show me how to make the bow. So I made the video that other people weren't making. Now when you type in ‘bow and arrow’ on YouTube, mine is the first one.”

You’ve three options for uploading your video to YouTube: the YouTube app through your smartphone, the YouTube Studio App through your smartphone, or YouTube Studio through your computer. Here’s a quick step-by-step for each. 

YouTube App:

• Open the app 
• Tap ‘Create’, then ‘Upload a video’ 
• Select the file you want to upload, then tap ‘Next’ 
• Videos under 60 seconds will be uploaded as a ‘short’. To upload a longer video as a short, tap 'Edit into a Short' and trim it down. 

YouTube Studio App:

• Open your YouTube Studio app.
• Tap ‘Create’, then ‘Upload a video’ 
• Select the file you want to upload
• Add details, such as the title and privacy settings 
• Tap ‘Next’  
• Choose your audience ('Yes, it's Made for Kids' or 'No, it's not Made for Kids') 
• Tap ‘Upload video’ to publish 

YouTube Studio through your computer: 

• Sign in to YouTube Studio 
• Click ‘Create’ at the top right, then ‘Upload videos’ 
• Select up to 15 files to upload. Click ‘Edit’ on each to edit video details 
• Video will be converted to the highest resolution available, and you can view an estimated processing time for each quality option

Light and Vision/Shutterstock

Lannan Neville Eacott (Lazarbeam) is Australia’s third largest YouTuber with over 21.8m subscribers. His advice on optimisation? “I think it’s less important now, things like tricks in the algorithm and stuff like that. I think the algorithm is so smart, it just knows what a good video is. Just make sure people are interested.” 

Still, there are optimisation tips that can give content a nudge in the right direction without compromising on quality.

1. Choose your keywords wisely 

Keyword research doesn’t need to be exhaustive, but using accurate, concise, and punchy language to describe your video can help. This applies to a video’s file name, title, description, and script (which you can upload for closed captions). For a video about lengthening mascara, for example, using 'lengtheningmascara.mov' as the file name, 'How to Maximise Shorter Lashes with Lengthening Mascara' as the title, and '8 simple steps for elongating shorter eyelashes using lengthening mascara' as the description is going to help the algorithm along.

2. Promote your channel

End screens (interactive outro screens added to the last 5–20 seconds of a video) with clickable links can take viewers to other videos or your channel’s homepage, and creating playlists can help people find more of your content. 

3. Engage the community

Respond to comments, host Live Q&As, and collaborate with other creators to help bring you into the community and boost your channel. 

4. Avoid clickbait

Viewers hate being bamboozled onto a video through clickbait practices that offer one thing (“This man got attacked by a crocodile and you’ll never guess what happened next”) but deliver another (often a lot of adverts). You might get views this way, but the algorithm won’t like it when people almost immediately click away. 

5. Use custom thumbnails

The pictures below a video’s title are known as thumbnails. Yours should have a consistent style, attention-grabbing appearance, and maybe a small amount of relevant text. The thumbnails Ting uses on her videos are a great example.