Message to YouTube Creators to Use Audience Retention Every Single Day

How Zoella uses a hand to focus the camera

Twenty years ago I started teaching, and if I had Audience retention back then - I would have been a million times more effective.

In a regular lesson, I had to position myself in the classroom so I could always see every child. It's called risk management - you may stop children throwing stuff, fighting or even falling asleep.

But if I was at the board with marker in hand talking fractions, there was a tiny chance some learning may break out.

Teachers, and don't they know it, get embroiled in assessment - it's a nightmare. Marking books, adding comments, planning the next lesson and guessing (if they the teacher) have been effective.

That's why YouTube Audience Retention is genius. It's let's you see immediately what percentage of a video has been watched along with a realtime scrub bar as the video plays.

For my videos, I can tell which parts appeal to my viewers. usually, this is when I show a data slide. I compare this to map directions. Put simply, you want to know what road you need and when to turn.

I'm a modest creator who wants to appeal to as wider an audience as I can. Which means cutting back on bloatware like unnecessary words (or even any spoken words at all), wasted seconds anywhere in the clip, my face (who needs that!?) and certainly any begging for subscribers or likes.

My content should stand on it's own two feet and that means taking a strategy you would expect from a military briefing. I want the viewer to turn up, learning something as fast as possible in easy steps, then leave.

I need to do this in as shorter time as possible, use the simplest route (cutting back on wasted graphics) and most importantly, provide the viewer with something they can remember (and therefore action immediately).

+YouTube Creators and +YouTube Creator Academy and pumping out more help than will fit on a small island, but I really think far too many creators pass this information by. That's a real shame.

But the good news is YouTube is changing for the better. +Susan Wojcicki's now in charge and I'm so impressed. You have to be living under a rock not see see how the planet is lighting up with +Michelle Phan, +Bethany Mota, +Rosanna Pansino and from the UK, +Zoella & +Tanya Burr.

These five creators I've just mentioned are their own TV Corporation. And I'm already cringing as to link these five to TV is not a really compliment, it's a stab at the old school guard, who have no real clue what YouTube even is (or how powerful it has become).

For example, in the UK +ITV have a new breakfast show, Good Morning Britain, that's losing viewers by the day. They employ a bus load of people and pay the talent tons of money. Then we have +Zoella making one upload (all by herself by the looks of it) and getting 1.1 million views.

What's for sure, Creator Analytics are a closely guarded secret. I would love to know what the Audience Retention (and watched minutes) is on any top creator. One recently told me, he gets 3.3 million watched minutes per month (and with that comes Adsense revenue shovelled into your bank account).

To the ITV Daybreak/Good Morning Britain Team, Suggestions for the Show

see the Vive animation

Sunday 27 April update Here's more info on the social media streams for gmb.

Hashtag: #GMB 
(at google, at twitter, at facebook)
Twitter: @gmb (224,243)
Facebook: /GMB (234k)
Instagram: goodmorningbritain (139)
Vine: GMB (26)
Web: itv.com/GMB (54 indexed pages)
Google+    ?
YouTube   ?

I also hear the gmb team have visited +Good Morning America in the US, presumably to learn from them. So where is google+ or youtube?

I will just repeat a few ITV facts. Britains Got Talent, also an ITV show has a youtube channel that has 2.1 million subs and 1.7 billion views (and google+ page with 28.5 millions views). The X Factor Uk also has a youtube channel (with 2.7m subs and 2 billion views and a g+ page with 13.5 million views).

Topsy Twitter @daybreak v @gmb

In case you are wondering, the main ITV youtube channel as 73,246 subs, 24.5 million views. +ITV News has a g+ page with 5.6 million views. Even +ITV Football has 2.8 million views. There is also an +ITV Press Centre (which I particularly like).

So there you are - I am just one simple voice in a million.

Original text (18 April) A month ago, I sent an email to ITV with my suggestions for Good Morning Britain. I received a blanket reply five days later - and that was that. 

I cannot gauge how many suggestions the producers received or how much they listen (and wish to engage with an audience). But I do know I have something to give.

I've had my head in the US for the last few years (via Hangouts). Have a read, I wish the show success. What's not mentioned in my email: Good Morning America's Social Square. 

It seems the show will broadcast it's first episode on Monday, 28 April 2014 (wiki and ITV Press). 

www.itv.com Survey 18 Apr 14

The slide on the left shows an ITV Survey dated today, coincidence I guess.

Having just spent a few minutes answering the questions, I'm pretty disappointed. Same old, twitter, facebook - then, vine, instagram and pinterest, Not one mention of Google+ or YouTube. I will repeat ITV run Google Apps and have done since July 2011.

As a final thinking point, is my digital landscape a place I work with in Public or Private? I now feel I should have gone with my instinct and posted this note in public a month ago. We could have crowdsourced a solution.

What I sent by email: To Daybreak/Good Morning Britain Team, Suggestions for the Show (sent by email 13

Like most people, I wish GMB every success when they launch. I'm also fascinated what will make people watch breakfast TV, especially now we're in the age of mobiles/tablets on buses/trains early in the morning..

ITV are Google Apps already and have a brilliant App (for Catchup, but there is no Live broadcast[?]).. Is that coming soon?

I'm a power user at Google+, I've been in over 2,500 Hangouts, many of those LIVE at Youtube. One example that GMB could replicate is how my friend Maria Quiban of Good Day LA has used Hangouts On Air since 2011 (link to the youtube channel). Now, we have the news anchors (like Tony McEwing) dropping by the hangout for achat - they all get to know the g+ folks in there and call them friends, kinda cool).

The formula is very simple, a guest arrives at the studio, ready for On Air TV, a polite word was said to encourage the guest to say Hello to the people in a LIVE Google Hangout (of course g+ those users were vetted and trusted beforehand).

A few months later, guests where staying longer and longer - eventually we had stars like Mike Tyson, Kevin Bacon, Salman Rushdie and 100s more staying for a full 30 minute fun interview. The guests just love seeing the faces of people all over the world in realtime.

Google see me as an evangelist for google+, I test Hangout features for them, but I'm really working on making someone in the UK successful, we're getting there - but slowly. Manchester United will broadcast fans in the #MUfrontrow very soon, already 600,000+ views at youtube.

Sarah Hill was featured in a Google+ Stories (July 2012) -- I can imagine Susanna and Charlotte doing something like this. My vision, is GMB could be a hybrid of a regular Studio shows, but meets some elements of what The Big Breakfast gave us.

I have a bunch of other ideas.

1, ditch the warm studio and go light weight, on location ie public places or GMA style in Times Sq with a glass wall between you and the audience (Sure other Un Shows have a glass wall, but from a studio - not like in the centre of Liverpool Street etc)

2, get in guests houses -- take the broadcast to them

3, make it more radio show ie where you can listen rather than watch, v important for mobile users (limits on bandwidth etc -- could the App handle that?)

4, put Susannah in situations that brings out her best ie Where's Susannah/Charlotte (on location)? (there are a few videos on youtube of 600,000/925,000+ views usually about what she's wearing or how she is sitting) ..

5, Remember, Channel 4, Sky News and even the odd BBCWHYS have dabbled in Hangouts...

6, make a program that people will watch as Catch Up, my guess -- very hard to do as a breakfast show.

Thanks, Mike

---------------------------

18 March 2014

Dear Mike

Thank you for your email sending us your ideas for our new programme.

We have passed your message on to the editorial team and they will contact you if they are keen to discuss your ideas in greater detail.

Thank you for contacting us and do please get back in touch if you have other comments or enquiries in the future.

Best wishes

Duty Officer - Daybreak

Tracking my Photosphere Views each week while learning about discovery

21 June 2014 update As today, there are 51 images with 20,659 views ..

I made my first #photosphere on 1 Dec 2013 - my total now is 45. What started as a Can I do it with a DSLR? has ended up as a theory into discovery.

In other words, the latest image (of the library) shows a higher view rate than the rest. 

This was the first internal panorama of a public library in Essex, UK. It was tweeted by +Essex Libraries.

It's best to view the data sheet and charts in a new window. Photospheres are can be viewed in four places: 

1, Google Maps 2, Google Maps Views 3, Google+ Photos and 4, Embedded in a webpage. You can see the difference with these links for the library..

1, Google Maps 2, Google Maps Views 3, Google+ Photos and 4, Embedded in a webpage (see below).

To get started yourself, visit the Google Support Page. Anyone can do this. And also make sure you check regular updates from Google's +Evan Rapoport too.

I would be interested in hearing from anyone doing a similar study. I'm a teacher, so I'm not in a race for views, but rather the place a #photosphere sits in the suite of Google Services. For example, we have Panoramio that's also available and now shows g+ photo features (Remember Panoramio has been showing photos at Google Earth for years). 

Views: North Melbourne Library by Mike Downes

Hangout Swapshop renamed #occupyhangouts from #hangoutswapshop

 +Robert Redl interviewing a pigeon (18 March 2014)

Update as 29 March For the last week, we have been using the hashtag #occupyhangouts for these meetings. As the idea was a beta, I will not be using the tag #hangoutswapshop again.

Hangout Swapshop is an idea I'm working on following last night's hangout and the six hours I spent Sunday from 8-2am.

#hangoutswapshop asks two things

1, Come with an idea to share and 2, listen to others (without forcing your own talking point till the time is right). That's it..

The #yearofcode Google+ Community Resource Page

I normally create a resource page first, and then a Google+ Community - but in this case it's the other way around. That means, thankfully for the reader, this post can be concise.

Anyone can join The Google+ #yearofcode Support Community, there two messages that I will post here.

About Welcome to The Google+ #yearofcode Support Community created by Mike Downes. This group does not form part of the yearofcode.org, rather it's for those who wish to understand what coding involves. It's a place for discussion, to share your stories and learn from each other. 

Find Google Help Fast - What do 87 shares and 36,000 views tells us?

On 9 Feb 2014, I made a simple post at Google+ as I was fed up giving people the same links over and over again. It had this slide and text:

Find Help for Google Stuff fast There are 519,000 results athttps://support.google.com so to find ANYTHING by googling 1, Support 2,   3,  .. like support youtube comments or support blogger domain .. This is the No1 way I find stuff .. #googleit #support #help

I have an altruistic rule with myself than I find or

A slide I made from watching a YouTube Help Video

create something useful to me, then it will probably be useful to others. But there's catch - the really useful stuff, goes unnoticed by 99% of the people.

One example is the brilliant series of +YouTube Creator Academy videos made recently. They have like tiny views compared to what they should be getting. Take a look at the last six videos with +Rachel Lightfoot & +Yury Polnar where views are 1,331 to 2,722. 

What I'm getting at here is the busy life we lead, the uncontrollable urge to click on something when we shouldn't and the irresistible temptation to walk away, when we know we should stay. Bottom line, a video (or post) gets a million views in a day or just a few.

I never ever post anything for the views - I do it usually, to teach somebody something. It's a bit like my own FAQs - I want to be left alone, so if I can help people answer themselves - great.

It took a day to get 80 shares and I declared give a person a fish and you feed them for a day; teach a person to fish and you feed them for a lifetime.

My Take Away When people get stuck, they often panic a bit, get fed quickly and become impatient too. Even if one person reading this could just stop and think - Google, support and read the results - I will be very happy.

Autonomy Did I tell you about the friend I had in teaching who had the latest iPhone? She showed me the latest features are how wow it was. But when she was late for a city centre appointment - she was late, defaulted to what she knew and rushed to find a copy of the local AtoZ Map. We all know the iphone and google maps would be there faster than she could say OK Google ..