YouTube For Replayers

Some advice

YouTube For Replayers

As most of you know, there are a number of channels on YouTube devoted to our hobby.

They vary in approach and quality, ranging from people who film themselves playing card and dice games with a smartphone to people who provide information on how to play games.

Having tried my hand at the YouTube game — and having had some success on my channel — I’ve got a few pieces of advice for those who want to give this a shot.

Audio Is Extremely Important

Above all else, make sure your audio is good.

It doesn’t matter how clear your visual presentation is. If I can’t understand what you’re saying, I’m going to leave the video within a few seconds.

The truth is that the majority of people who watch YouTube videos listen more than they watch. I prefer to “watch” YouTube videos while I do something else, using YouTube as background noise while I wash dishes, write, and work.

My advice:

• Listen to your video before you post it. Make sure the audio is of high quality.

• Use a high quality microphone if you can afford it. I invested in an XLR microphone, stand, and a good quality preamp, all of which improved my audio quality greatly.

• Use a program like Audacity to improve your audio levels before you post. Audacity also gives you better audio mixing options than most video editing software.

Edit Your Video

As tempting as it is to simply turn the camera on, record yourself, and then go about your day, the truth is that unedited vlog videos are not particularly competitive in today’s YouTube.

You can solve this problem by learning how to use simple video editing software.

I use Kdenlive, which is free, open source, and performs very well on Linux.

Video editing shows respect for your audience, and solves the problem of trying to memorize every single point you want to make before you turn the camera on. It’s also now as difficult as you might think.

When you become more proficient at video editing, you’ll find that you can easily and quickly include clips from other audio and video sources to enhance your video. Instead of walking through a PowerPoint as you film, or, even worse, writing things on a white board and pointing the camera at it, you can use custom images and other graphics to more powerfully get your point across.

Even if you don’t want to spend hours editing, do yourself and your audience a favor by at least removing bad takes, coughs, stuttering, and other minor problems. Getting rid of those issues will increase the chances that your target audience (i.e. somebody like me) will actually get through the first 30 seconds of your video.

Script Your Video

This goes hand-in-hand with video editing. You’ll do yourself a lot of favors by actually writing a script and sticking with it.

That doesn’t mean you need to sound robotic. My 13-year-old daughter makes fun of my recording process, saying that I sound like a robot. Don’t be like me: instead, put some character and emotion into your voice. Make it sound natural and interesting.

But write a script and use it.

Your goal is to get people to watch your entire video. If you start fumbling around with words and phrases right off the bat, chances are that I’ll wind up turning it off. YouTube’s algorithm rewards you for creating videos that people watch all (or most) of. The more engaging and interesting you make your video, the larger the audience YouTube will send it out to — and the more successful your channel will be.

Get To The Point

Don’t beat around the bush. Get to the point right from the start.

If I’m watching a video about how to play Replay Baseball, I want to see a video that teaches me how to play the game right from the start. There’s no need for a lengthy introduction, a philosophic note, or your excited rambling about how this is your favorite game of all time.

And, above all else, please don’t use an intro screen. It’s a waste of time and energy. Give your audience what they wanted to see.

Make Thumbnails

Don’t rely on YouTube’s automatic thumbnail generator. Create your own.

It’s not hard, and you don’t need specialized software. I use GIMP. GIMP, like Kdenlive, is free and open source, and works particularly well on Linux. It does come with a bit of a learning curve, but is extremely powerful and useful once you get past that.

Now, you don’t need to make the perfect thumbnail to have a video do well. However, you should spend at least some time figuring out how to make a thumbnail that looks attractive to your audience.

Ideally, your thumbnail and title should work together to attract the attention of a potential viewer. It doesn’t have to be complicated, and it doesn’t really have to look professional. It just needs to look good enough to inspire somebody to click when they see it.

Consider Various Approaches

As much fun as it is to sit down and record a game of Action PC Baseball for two hours, the truth is that there isn’t much of a market out there for videos like that.

Think of other ways that you can deliver your content to your target audience. Is there something you can do that would take less than two hours of their time? Are there interesting aspects of your replay that won’t necessarily come out in gameplay footage? Is there some obscure bit of history that most people haven’t thought of, such as a vintage newspaper article about the rare 4th out?

The sad truth is that most people aren’t as interested in your replay project as you are. However, if you can find interesting aspects about the replay — aspects that would appeal to anybody, including people who aren’t already part of our hobby — you could create content focusing on only the interesting bits. At the very least, that might be a little bit more engaging than walking through another series of advanced fielding rerolls with your audience.

Don’t Give Up

Above all else, don’t give up.

YouTube is actually amazing. Any subject can succeed on the platform, provided that it is presented in an engaging enough fashion.

My mom is a fan of Finnish Knitting Stories, for example — a successful channel bordering on 20,000 subscribers. If people are willing to watch others tell stories while they knit, somebody out there is going to be interested in your baseball replay stories and insights.

The trick is that your audience won’t magically find you. You’ve got to make content to attract that audience.