Google YouTube Creator Playbook Guide Sports - Manual (Page 11)

11
Punctual Optimization
How do I optimize my videos for the timely nature of sports?
For sports content, timeliness is crucial - in terms of
content creation, publishing, and optimization. Since
sports video content is often event-focused, sports viewers
search for the latest clips, immediate reactions, and
breaking sports news around a particular event. Your
channel needs to be ready to serve this content at the right
time.
Here are four strategies to help you keep up with the
fleeting nature of sports content:
1. Timely publishing
2. Metadata
3. Thumbnails
4. Hook Your Audience
Event-based sports videos experience a surge in traffic
immediately after an event, and a sudden drop-off a few
days later. Sports videos oriented around larger, more
newsworthy events, such as the World Cup, also see similar
traffic patterns; search queries build up in the weeks
leading up to the event, and then decline sharply
thereafter. So, what does this mean for you as a sports
creator?
Timely Publishing
• For one thing, it means that content should be
uploaded as close to an event as possible – even
during the event itself! As soon as something big
happens in the sports world, your audience is
going to be searching for content about it. Be the
channel that offers it to them first.
• In addition to uploading content quickly,
event-based videos mean that the window to
capture audience from search queries is short.
So, it is even more important that your videos are
optimized - in terms of metadata and thumbnails
- at the time of upload.
Metadata
Optimize your metadata when uploading. Optimizing
metadata after a video has been published, or after
the event has already happened, likely means that
that traffic has already been lost and the opportunity
missed.
• Try to anticipate what will be trending based on
what has been popular in the past, and include
similar information.
• You have a very short traffic window, so pre-draft
your metadata or create an inventory of tags.
See Playbook Sections:
Metadata, Thumbnails, Captivate Your Audience
Remember that it is a violation of YouTube Terms of Service to use misleading metadata
on your videos.