10 YouTube Metrics Give Insights Even Once a Month

A publisher can look at YouTube metrics only once a month and still gain important insights about how to improve performance.

A small business or website publisher may have an equally small video channel and not enough free time to publish or track the channel daily or weekly. Still, some channels offer value without having dozens, hundreds or thousands of videos.

Channels with 10 or fewer videos might simply offer some branding value, a little revenue or other benefits that make the channel useful.

In that case, a monthly tracking report will often offer enough information to the publisher to decide whether to grow or just maintain the channel.

Valuable YouTube Metrics

A monthly report that I use is integrated into my overall monthly report for multiple websites and clients. The tab has 29 data points that I track. It takes about five minutes to update. Busy clients are more than happy with monthly updates. None have ever requested more frequent numbers unless a particular video is especially important or newsworthy.

I include the YouTube tab as part of the overall monthly metrics for my business because I don’t have to remind myself to fill out a separate spreadsheet. I do everything in one batch.

Publishers may easily do a report with fewer than 29 data points. Some may want more. If I had to pick 10 metrics, they would be:

1. Watch time
2. Views
3. Revenue
4. Monetized views
5. Retention rate
6. Subscribers
7. Likes
8. Shares
9. Cumulative cost
10. Return on investment

The first eight are available in the YouTube metrics. Number 9 requires internal accounting, and number 10 is revenue divided by the cost. Cumulative cost is an estimate of the value of labor that goes into each video. It is an important metric for tracking return on investment for video production.

Anyone wanting to maintain a strict accounting control over the business and grow profits should consider number 10 as the most important metric.

Even More Important Metrics

Anyone who wants even simpler reporting may want to start with retention. A high retention number means that the video is keeping viewers glued to it, which also means that YouTube will look favorably on the video.

High retention rates reflect quality, and quality often translates into more subscribers.

A high number also indicates that the publisher is using time wisely and not investing too much effort into wasted video segments. They are a waste of time if no one or few people watch them.

That said, it’s best to have a retention number that is not too high. Something between 60 and 70 percent is a sweet spot.

Why Even Monthly Numbers Help

A good tracking report will show YouTube metrics for each month over a period of time. The shortest amount of time is 13 months to compare the most recent month with the same month of the previous year. It is also useful to have total numbers for each calendar year to see if the overall trend is positive or negative.

Let’s cut to the chase. It’s all about growth. If the numbers for the most recent 12 months show growth over the same period a year ago, a YouTube channel is a successful endeavor and worthy of more attention.

Likewise, a decline should lead to some hard questions about what is going wrong and what needs fixing.

What matters most for channel publishers is consistent attention to what the metrics are saying, whether it’s monthly, weekly or daily. The larger and more impactful the channel, the more often a YouTube metrics report is useful.

Either way, a channel publisher will find it helpful to build a mechanism into the business to look at the numbers at least once a month. Sometimes even small details can grow or hurt a business.