Introducing YouTube Insight
One of my jobs hobbies as a missionary is creating videos to give people glimpses of daily life and ministry in another culture (Nicaragua, in our case). One of the tools I use in the video-making process is YouTube. (Being one of the 10 most popular websites in the world, I figured it was a good idea to post my videos there!)
Yesterday when I was uploading my latest video on YouTube I noticed an announcement for “YouTube Insight.” What is YouTube Insight, you ask? In a nutshell, it’s Google Analytics for YouTube. Pretty cool. I can look at who’s watching my videos…
Apparently, I’m more popular with the ladies than the guys. (Don’t tell my wife.)
Explanation. In general, women are more involved at church, in the community, and in short-term mission work. This could explain the higher percentage of female viewers. (The 60/40 split is pretty big, but it’s even bigger when you consider that men spend more time watching YouTube videos than women, on average.)
Next, age demographics…
I see that I’m doing really well with the 35 to 45 age demographic — almost half of my audience is accounted for here. If I were a TV show, I’d be making bank on advertising! Too bad I’m doing this for fun/free. Looks like I need to find a way to improve with 18 to 35-year olds.
Explanation. Thirty- and forty-somethings are more interested in short-term missions? That could be. Or perhaps this demographic is more interested in traveling or learning about other cultures (specifically Latin America). My videos are tagged with places like “Nicaragua” and “Costa Rica.” I could be attracting a lot of travelers.
Finally, geography…
For some reason, “Missions Minded Videos” are really popular in California. I expected viewership to be high in the Southeast, where I’m from, but California even blows my home turf out of the water.
Explanation. One, California is a big state. By default I should have a lot of viewers there (it’s an absolute count of viewers, not a percentage of the population). Two — and this is just a guess — could it be that the tags I’m using are popular with California YouTube watchers? Californians love to travel to Central America to vacation and/or hunt for real estate. I could again be attracting the “traveler” demographic. That’s something I’ll have to investigate.
The rest of the map makes sense to me. I do well in the states that “know me” (we have family and friends in the Carolinas, Georgia, and Florida). The big states are home to more viewers (California, Texas, and New York). And Nebraska is home to my mission agency, Christ for the City International (it’s nice to see that our home office is watching what we’re doing down here!).
There are a few other charts in YouTube Insight: popularity, views over time, etc. It’s not as robust as Google Analytics (yet), but I’m sure the guys at Google are working on that. If you want to see more about YouTube Insight, here’s the video guide, which is posted on YouTube, of course.
A couple of questions to think about:
- 1. How can I expand the reach of “Missions Minded Videos” using YouTube Insight as an analytics tool?2. More specifically, how can I improve my viewership among men and 18 to 35-year olds (preferably ones interested in missions)?
3. What accounts for the popularity in California, what can I learn from it, and how can I apply my learnings to increase hits in other parts of the country and the world?
4. Finally, does any of this matter? Do YouTube videos help at all in spreading the vision and importance of cross-cultural missions? (I have my opinion, but I’m interested in yours!)
Answers to these questions (hopefully!) and more coming in future posts…
