If you have been creating YouTube videos but not promoting it across other social media channels, you are missing a real trick.
First thing you need to do is go and read about the best places to share your YouTube videos for all of the ideas, and then come back here and we can run through just how important Facebook is to catapulting your YouTube views and traffic.
Why Share YouTube Videos on Facebook?
Why should you be promoting your YouTube videos on Facebook?
Well I think you should be sharing your videos on every social media platform you have! But Facebook is particularly important for several reasons:
- 6 Billion monthly active users
- Leading non video social platform reaching over 60% of internet users
- Over £17 Billion earned in ad revenue in Q1 of 2020
Stats source: Orbelo
With those huge ad numbers and high active users you really can’t afford to miss out Facebook in your YouTube promotions, plus the platforms work together in a really effective way making it super easy for you to promote your new content
Native Videos or Embedded Videos
When deciding to share your YouTube video on other social media platforms you need to decide whether you want this to be native or embedded.
Native videos are hosted on that particular platform, for example you would download your video on YouTube and then reupload it to Facebook, so the video is then also hosted on Facebook. This is good for sharing a related video or a shorter promo clip.
Native video uploads will not increase your YouTube views directly but can help you direct traffic to the full video
Embedded Videos are where you are effectively sharing your existing YouTube video to another platform using YouTube share functions. It is still hosted on YouTube so the views you receive from other platforms will increase your YouTube video views
How to embed your YouTube video on Facebook
Embedding your YouTube video on Facebook is really simple here is a quick step by step guide to help you embed your video
- Find the YouTube video you want to share and click into the thumbnail, this makes sure you are on YouTube’s distinct URL for that video
- Scroll down to directly underneath the video, you will see the thumbs up / down buttons and a share button, click the share button
- You should now have a list of social platforms you can share your video to, click the Facebook button
- Add any text or captions you want sharing along with your video, this is a good place to explain what the video content is as embedded videos do not auto play so will require someone to click.
- Click the blue post to Facebook button and that is it! Your video should now have shared across to Facebook
How to upload a native video to Facebook
Uploading a native video to Facebook is slightly more complicated but it does have it’s pro points too, first of all it’s important to note that it goes against YouTube’s terms of service to use a 3rd party app to download YouTube videos they want you to stream directly from their own servers.
But as you are creating content you will not need to use a 3rd party app because you should already have the video created and saved before you originally uploaded it to YouTube. Here is a quick guide to uploading a native video:
- Locate your video file on your computer and check the files format, you want this to be an MP4, if it isn’t already then you can quickly Convert to MP4
- Open the Facebook URL or app and find the standard ‘What’s on your mind’ for sharing new content. Directly underneath the text should be a button that says Photo/Video
- Click Photo/Video and find the video you want to upload in your files and click open
- Add text or a caption to your post, again this is always important it is a way of selling your video to stop the scroll
- Finally click the blue post button and voila! You have now uploaded your video directly to Facebook.
Which should I use?
This is a trickier question and entirely depends on what your marketing goals, traffic goals etc might be. There are pros and cons to both video options and direct comparisons too which can help you decide which is right for you
- Embedded video links tend to show as a smaller thumbnail whereas a native video will show at the width of the news feed making it more eye catching and noticeable when scrolling through
- Auto play only works on native videos, with an embedded video the audience will need to click to get the video to play
- Native videos tend to keep users on Facebook, understandably it’s a competitive field in the social media game, so where they can Facebook will keep it’s audience on it’s own platform, this isn’t good for you if you’re trying to increase your views specifically on YouTube in order to hit goals to monetize your channel.
- Whether it’s natively uploaded or embedded Facebook posts are not usually crawled by search engines so it’s unlikely to increase organic search traffic, but it obviously does open up your video content to a whole different audience than the YouTube audience
- The lifespan of a Facebook video is relatively short in comparison to YouTube where videos can continually perform.
How do I get the benefits of both?
There are pros and cons to both methods of sharing your YouTube videos to Facebook so it’s important you experiment with both methods to get a good feel for your Facebook audience, determine which they prefer and monitor which type of video gains you more views / click throughs.
A good way of getting the benefits of a native video but the YouTube traffic and increased channel views is to utilise both methods. Try full videos for both, but a common method for gaining traction is to create specific promo videos or a sneak peak video for Facebook.
This allows you to share a short video clip natively that will pique interest and make your Facebook audience want to click through and watch the full video on YouTube
Did you know you can also monetize your Facebook Page using your videos, pictures and blog posts? I even made a video about it on my youtube channel – You’ll be amazed how simple it is!
Promo Videos
When creating a promo video use a tool such as Adobe Spark, this allows you to cut video clips and add shorter clips while also adding slides and overlay text to your video.
This promo video can then be shared across your various social media channels with a link through to your YouTube video therefore gaining strong click throughs and increasing your YouTube views and subscriptions.
Promo videos are an excellent way of gaining the right audience, and an audience that will stick around. If they are interested enough to click through to the full YouTube video the likelihood is that the content resonates with them and they are going to watch the full video
How are you sharing your videos?
Top 5 Tools To Get You Started on YouTube
Very quickly before you go here are 5 amazing tools I have used every day to grow my YouTube channel from 0 to 30K subscribers in the last 12 months that I could not live without.
1. VidIQ helps boost my views and get found in search
I almost exclusively switched to VidIQ from a rival in 2020.
Within 12 months I tripled the size of my channel and very quickly learnt the power of thumbnails, click through rate and proper search optimization. Best of all, they are FREE!
2. Adobe Creative Suite helps me craft amazing looking thumbnails and eye-catching videos
I have been making youtube videos on and off since 2013.
When I first started I threw things together in Window Movie Maker, cringed at how it looked but thought “that’s the best I can do so it’ll have to do”.
Big mistake!
I soon realized the move time you put into your editing and the more engaging your thumbnails are the more views you will get and the more people will trust you enough to subscribe.
That is why I took the plunge and invested in my editing and design process with Adobe Creative Suite. They offer a WIDE range of tools to help make amazing videos, simple to use tools for overlays, graphics, one click tools to fix your audio and the very powerful Photoshop graphics program to make eye-catching thumbnails.
Best of all you can get a free trial for 30 days on their website, a discount if you are a student and if you are a regular human being it starts from as little as £9 per month if you want to commit to a plan.
3. Rev.com helps people read my videos
You can’t always listen to a video.
Maybe you’re on a bus, a train or sat in a living room with a 5 year old singing baby shark on loop… for HOURS. Or, you are trying to make as little noise as possible while your new born is FINALLY sleeping.
This is where Rev can help you or your audience consume your content on the go, in silence or in a language not native to the video.
Rev.com can help you translate your videos, transcribe your videos, add subtitles and even convert those subtitles into other languages – all from just $1.50 per minute.
A GREAT way to find an audience and keep them hooked no matter where they are watching your content.
4. Learn new skills for FREE with Skillshare
I SUCK reading books to learn, but I LOVE online video courses.
Every month I learn something new. Editing, writing, video skills, how to cook, how to run a business – even how to meditate to calm a busy mind.
I find all of these for FREE with Skillshare – Sign up, pick all the courses you want and cancel anytime you need.
5. Shutterstock helps me add amazing video b-roll cutaways
I mainly make tutorials and talking head videos.
And in this modern world this can be a little boring if you don’t see something funky every once in a while.
I try with overlays, jump cuts and being funny but my secret weapon is b-roll overlay content.
I can talk about skydiving, food, money, kids, cats – ANYTHING I WANT – with a quick search on the Shutterstock website I can find a great looking clip to overlay on my videos, keeping them entertained and watching for longer.
They have a wide library of videos, graphics, images and even a video maker tool and it wont break the bank with plans starting from as little as £8.25 ($9) per month.
