"2024 Approved  Discovering 6 Distinct Icon and Logo Providers"

"2024 Approved Discovering 6 Distinct Icon and Logo Providers"

Steven Lv12

Discovering 6 Distinct Icon and Logo Providers

6 Completely Different Places to Get Icons and Logos for YouTube Videos

Richard Bennett

Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions

0

Whether you need YouTube icons and logos to use as pop-up graphics in your videos, to serve as your channel icon, to use as watermarks, or to liven up your channel art or video thumbnails – don’t worry. There are lots of places to get them.

We’ve made a list of 6 sites where you can download icons and logos for free for YouTub videos, and explained how they work.

You might also want to check out these YouTube channels offering free profile picture templates .

1. Flaticon.com

Key Points:

  • Great selection of icons/logos
  • It’s easy to change the colors before you download

I’m putting Flaticon.com right at the top of this list because it has something that really sets it apart from the other sites on this list – it lets you edit pre-made icons before you download them.

You start out on Flaticon by searching for a theme like beauty, gaming, flowers, or emojis. I searched for ‘birds’ and found these cuties.

 YouTube Logo Icon Download Site Flaticon

These aren’t all the birds on Flaticon, just a few. They had a huge selection in all the different searches I tried.

I clicked on the brown bird to open up the download screen, and then clicked into ‘Edit icon’. There may be a pop up that tells you editing tools are only available to registered users, but it’s wrong. Just close it and keep going, unless you want to register.

  Logo Icon on Flaticon

You can edit the colors in your icon just by clicking on the color you want to replace, and then clicking on the color in the color selector you want to replace it with. I made my birdie FLY.

 Edit Logo Icon on Flaticon

I never apologize for puns.

Once you like the look of your icon, just click Download. You will be prompted to choose a format. PNG is the most popular because it is supported the most places (including on YouTube), and because it allows for a transparent background.

After clicking on a format you will also be prompted to choose a size for your image. It’s always best to go with the largest image you can – its way easier to shrink things and keep them looking good than it is to have to enlarge them.

 download Logo Icon on Flaticon

Flaticon has a great selection, it’s free, and they make it really easy to edit your creations. I would strongly recommend this site to anyone in the market for an icon or logo.

Flaticon asks that you include an “Icon made by [author link] from <www.flaticon.com> ” somewhere (i.e. video description, channel ‘about’ section) when you use their icons for free.

2. Freepik.com

Key Points:

  • Good selection of icons.
  • No way to customise them on the site.
  • Attribution requried.

On freepik, you start off by searching for a theme (like the genre of your YouTube title or the topic of a video, i.e. ‘makeup’ or ‘music’). I searched for ‘cat’.

 download Logo Icon on Freepik

A few of the sets available on freepik. The crown icon means you need to be a paying Premium member, but most things are free.

You can’t edit on freepik, and in order to download for free you need to include an attribution/credit to freepik where you use the images.

You do not choose what format to download your images in on freepik. When you hit ‘Free Download’ it will automatically download a zip file which will contain both a .jpg and a .eps. The EPS is editable in any ‘vector graphics editor’, like Adobe Illustrator, and YouTube supports .jpg files.

3. Seeklogo.net

Key Points:

  • Logos from major brands
  • Great for channels that do product reviews

Seeklogo.net has a slightly more corporate slant than some of the other sites on this list. It has logos for a lot of major companies and brands available for download.

In the ‘search’ on Seeklogo.net, you can type in the name of a brand or industry and see if the well-known logo you’re looking for is available. This may be especially useful for people with sports related channels since they have a lot of logos for major teams.

I searched for YouTube – you never know when you might need the YouTube logo.

 YouTube Logo Icon on Seeklogo

Although the site does not advertise PNG in the list of formats on their front page, downloads do include PNG versions (which is useful if you need transparency and don’t have a program which can edit vector files, like .eps).

4. IconArchive.com

Key Points:

  • Site has an office/business slant.
  • Detailed search tool lets you sort by color, theme, etc.

IconArchive has a huge selection of icons with somewhat of an office/business slant. I searched for ‘flower’ and half the results were of file-folders with flowers on them.

 YouTube Logo Icon on IconArchive

Could be cool for a lifestyle video about school or work?

My favorite thing about IconArchive is its search features. It allows you to filter results by color, size (down to the specific resolution), category, background color, style, and a lot more.

 YouTube Logo Icon on IconArchive Editing

Color is under ‘Display’, meaning that it won’t filter out results that have different colors it’ll just list the color you select first.

The ‘Category’ filter is useful because there are some genres you probably recognize there, like ‘Lifestyle’. However, you should be careful not to over-filter. This site is pretty literal in how it categorizes. For example – there are no ‘flower’ images under ‘Lifestyle’.

Downloads are available in different sizes and formats including PNG. PNG is always a good option because it is supported by YouTube and includes transparent backgrounds.

Note that all of your different download buttons will be located underneath your image. They favor those ads that look like ‘download’ or ‘start now’ buttons, and the ads sit right next to the images on the right, so it’s easy to get confused and click on the ad.

5. Logaster.com

Key Points:

  • You’ll have to pay for larger images.
  • Focused more on businesses.
  • Incorporates your channel name.

Logaster is really a service for businesses – they make and sell business cards, letterheads, and other office-y things like that. However, they are still a good choice for YouTubers because they have a free logo creator. Sort of.

You actually have to pay $9.99 to get larger images and remove the watermark, but the process is free.

When you arrive on Logaster there’s a button right on their home page that says ‘Create a logo for free’. Click on it.

In Step 1 it’ll ask for your company name and an activity type. You just need to put in your channel name and choose something from the activity drop down that you focus on in your videos.

 YouTube Logo Icon on Logaster Start Window

My heart burns with the secret desire to be YouTube’s Neil Degrasse Tyson (it doesn’t really, but he is super cool) so I tried ‘Katie Does Science’ and ‘Science, Studies, Education’. Here’s what it came up with:

 YouTube Logo Icon on Logaster

There are 10 pages of suggestions!

You can see how, unless you have a short channel name, you’re probably not going to be able to use any of these as an icon, but a lot of them would look cool on a banner. There’s an ‘Edit Logo Concept’ button which allows you to make changes to the layout, but you can still only choose from preset layouts. For example, some logo concepts allow you to choose whether the icon is above your text or next to it.

After you click ‘save’ in the last step you’ll be prompted to provide an email address and password. Once you sign in, you’ll be able to download a small logo for free, or purchase the higher resolution image.

I personally wouldn’t recommend buying an image from here unless your channel is for your small business and you need things like branded business cards and letterhead. This site might be better for gathering inspiration than actually downloading a logo from.

6. Icons8.com

Key Points:

  • You need to link back to them to use their icons.
  • You can edit the colors on the site and even add details.
  • There’s a size limit on the free service (100x100px)

At Icons8 they have free and paid services. If you download an icon for free it will be a PNG file (which should be fine, YouTube supports PNG and it’s good for transparency) that is no larger than 100x100px. This is not ideal since YouTube recommends 800x800px for profile pictures, but it’s not necessarily a deal breaker either. Profile pictures render down to much smaller than that.

You will also need to link to Icons8 if you use their icons for free (i.e. in the ‘about’ section of your channel page).

To get started on Icons8, type something into the search bar on the home page that you think might work as an icon or as part of whatever graphics you have planned. I typed in ‘game’ for this one, since gaming is the biggest genre on YouTube. Here are a few of the results that came up:

 Gaming Logo Icon on Icons8

Lower down in the results there were different kinds of sports balls, hand-held gaming systems, playing cards, joy sticks, baseball caps and more.

After you find an icon you like, click on it and it will appear on the right side of your screen where you’ll be able to make a few changes (an editing screen will pop up once you start clicking on things). You can edit your colors, overlay small decals, add text, and add a border, change your background and adjust your size. Here’s the editing screen:

 Edit Gaming Logo Icon on Icons8

You can give your icon a pretty different look from its default. Check this out:

 Change Gaming Logo Icon background on Icons8

You cannot download your icon from the editing screen. You need to click Save, and then download it from the main display screen here:

 Donwload Gaming Logo Icon  on Icons8

You can change the size with that drop down menu, but you’ll be limited in your options if you don’t want to pay.

I downloaded my image and tried to see how it would look as an icon/profile picture. As you can see, it was pretty blurry in the preview:

 Add Gaming Logo Icon made with icons8 to YouTube

However, the preview is larger than the actual profile picture. Once I set it, it looked alright.

 Preview Gaming Logo Icon made with icons8 to YouTube

Looking for somewhere you can build your own icon/logo from scratch? Check out this list of logo makers .

After downloading the icons or logos, it is time to add them to your YouTube video. Here I recommend our Wondershare Filmora video editor . Below is a video tutorial about how to add a logo to video in Filmora . Remember to download the free trial version to test.

Download Filmora9 Win Version Download Filmora9 Mac Version

author avatar

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett

Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions

0

Whether you need YouTube icons and logos to use as pop-up graphics in your videos, to serve as your channel icon, to use as watermarks, or to liven up your channel art or video thumbnails – don’t worry. There are lots of places to get them.

We’ve made a list of 6 sites where you can download icons and logos for free for YouTub videos, and explained how they work.

You might also want to check out these YouTube channels offering free profile picture templates .

1. Flaticon.com

Key Points:

  • Great selection of icons/logos
  • It’s easy to change the colors before you download

I’m putting Flaticon.com right at the top of this list because it has something that really sets it apart from the other sites on this list – it lets you edit pre-made icons before you download them.

You start out on Flaticon by searching for a theme like beauty, gaming, flowers, or emojis. I searched for ‘birds’ and found these cuties.

 YouTube Logo Icon Download Site Flaticon

These aren’t all the birds on Flaticon, just a few. They had a huge selection in all the different searches I tried.

I clicked on the brown bird to open up the download screen, and then clicked into ‘Edit icon’. There may be a pop up that tells you editing tools are only available to registered users, but it’s wrong. Just close it and keep going, unless you want to register.

  Logo Icon on Flaticon

You can edit the colors in your icon just by clicking on the color you want to replace, and then clicking on the color in the color selector you want to replace it with. I made my birdie FLY.

 Edit Logo Icon on Flaticon

I never apologize for puns.

Once you like the look of your icon, just click Download. You will be prompted to choose a format. PNG is the most popular because it is supported the most places (including on YouTube), and because it allows for a transparent background.

After clicking on a format you will also be prompted to choose a size for your image. It’s always best to go with the largest image you can – its way easier to shrink things and keep them looking good than it is to have to enlarge them.

 download Logo Icon on Flaticon

Flaticon has a great selection, it’s free, and they make it really easy to edit your creations. I would strongly recommend this site to anyone in the market for an icon or logo.

Flaticon asks that you include an “Icon made by [author link] from <www.flaticon.com> ” somewhere (i.e. video description, channel ‘about’ section) when you use their icons for free.

2. Freepik.com

Key Points:

  • Good selection of icons.
  • No way to customise them on the site.
  • Attribution requried.

On freepik, you start off by searching for a theme (like the genre of your YouTube title or the topic of a video, i.e. ‘makeup’ or ‘music’). I searched for ‘cat’.

 download Logo Icon on Freepik

A few of the sets available on freepik. The crown icon means you need to be a paying Premium member, but most things are free.

You can’t edit on freepik, and in order to download for free you need to include an attribution/credit to freepik where you use the images.

You do not choose what format to download your images in on freepik. When you hit ‘Free Download’ it will automatically download a zip file which will contain both a .jpg and a .eps. The EPS is editable in any ‘vector graphics editor’, like Adobe Illustrator, and YouTube supports .jpg files.

3. Seeklogo.net

Key Points:

  • Logos from major brands
  • Great for channels that do product reviews

Seeklogo.net has a slightly more corporate slant than some of the other sites on this list. It has logos for a lot of major companies and brands available for download.

In the ‘search’ on Seeklogo.net, you can type in the name of a brand or industry and see if the well-known logo you’re looking for is available. This may be especially useful for people with sports related channels since they have a lot of logos for major teams.

I searched for YouTube – you never know when you might need the YouTube logo.

 YouTube Logo Icon on Seeklogo

Although the site does not advertise PNG in the list of formats on their front page, downloads do include PNG versions (which is useful if you need transparency and don’t have a program which can edit vector files, like .eps).

4. IconArchive.com

Key Points:

  • Site has an office/business slant.
  • Detailed search tool lets you sort by color, theme, etc.

IconArchive has a huge selection of icons with somewhat of an office/business slant. I searched for ‘flower’ and half the results were of file-folders with flowers on them.

 YouTube Logo Icon on IconArchive

Could be cool for a lifestyle video about school or work?

My favorite thing about IconArchive is its search features. It allows you to filter results by color, size (down to the specific resolution), category, background color, style, and a lot more.

 YouTube Logo Icon on IconArchive Editing

Color is under ‘Display’, meaning that it won’t filter out results that have different colors it’ll just list the color you select first.

The ‘Category’ filter is useful because there are some genres you probably recognize there, like ‘Lifestyle’. However, you should be careful not to over-filter. This site is pretty literal in how it categorizes. For example – there are no ‘flower’ images under ‘Lifestyle’.

Downloads are available in different sizes and formats including PNG. PNG is always a good option because it is supported by YouTube and includes transparent backgrounds.

Note that all of your different download buttons will be located underneath your image. They favor those ads that look like ‘download’ or ‘start now’ buttons, and the ads sit right next to the images on the right, so it’s easy to get confused and click on the ad.

5. Logaster.com

Key Points:

  • You’ll have to pay for larger images.
  • Focused more on businesses.
  • Incorporates your channel name.

Logaster is really a service for businesses – they make and sell business cards, letterheads, and other office-y things like that. However, they are still a good choice for YouTubers because they have a free logo creator. Sort of.

You actually have to pay $9.99 to get larger images and remove the watermark, but the process is free.

When you arrive on Logaster there’s a button right on their home page that says ‘Create a logo for free’. Click on it.

In Step 1 it’ll ask for your company name and an activity type. You just need to put in your channel name and choose something from the activity drop down that you focus on in your videos.

 YouTube Logo Icon on Logaster Start Window

My heart burns with the secret desire to be YouTube’s Neil Degrasse Tyson (it doesn’t really, but he is super cool) so I tried ‘Katie Does Science’ and ‘Science, Studies, Education’. Here’s what it came up with:

 YouTube Logo Icon on Logaster

There are 10 pages of suggestions!

You can see how, unless you have a short channel name, you’re probably not going to be able to use any of these as an icon, but a lot of them would look cool on a banner. There’s an ‘Edit Logo Concept’ button which allows you to make changes to the layout, but you can still only choose from preset layouts. For example, some logo concepts allow you to choose whether the icon is above your text or next to it.

After you click ‘save’ in the last step you’ll be prompted to provide an email address and password. Once you sign in, you’ll be able to download a small logo for free, or purchase the higher resolution image.

I personally wouldn’t recommend buying an image from here unless your channel is for your small business and you need things like branded business cards and letterhead. This site might be better for gathering inspiration than actually downloading a logo from.

6. Icons8.com

Key Points:

  • You need to link back to them to use their icons.
  • You can edit the colors on the site and even add details.
  • There’s a size limit on the free service (100x100px)

At Icons8 they have free and paid services. If you download an icon for free it will be a PNG file (which should be fine, YouTube supports PNG and it’s good for transparency) that is no larger than 100x100px. This is not ideal since YouTube recommends 800x800px for profile pictures, but it’s not necessarily a deal breaker either. Profile pictures render down to much smaller than that.

You will also need to link to Icons8 if you use their icons for free (i.e. in the ‘about’ section of your channel page).

To get started on Icons8, type something into the search bar on the home page that you think might work as an icon or as part of whatever graphics you have planned. I typed in ‘game’ for this one, since gaming is the biggest genre on YouTube. Here are a few of the results that came up:

 Gaming Logo Icon on Icons8

Lower down in the results there were different kinds of sports balls, hand-held gaming systems, playing cards, joy sticks, baseball caps and more.

After you find an icon you like, click on it and it will appear on the right side of your screen where you’ll be able to make a few changes (an editing screen will pop up once you start clicking on things). You can edit your colors, overlay small decals, add text, and add a border, change your background and adjust your size. Here’s the editing screen:

 Edit Gaming Logo Icon on Icons8

You can give your icon a pretty different look from its default. Check this out:

 Change Gaming Logo Icon background on Icons8

You cannot download your icon from the editing screen. You need to click Save, and then download it from the main display screen here:

 Donwload Gaming Logo Icon  on Icons8

You can change the size with that drop down menu, but you’ll be limited in your options if you don’t want to pay.

I downloaded my image and tried to see how it would look as an icon/profile picture. As you can see, it was pretty blurry in the preview:

 Add Gaming Logo Icon made with icons8 to YouTube

However, the preview is larger than the actual profile picture. Once I set it, it looked alright.

 Preview Gaming Logo Icon made with icons8 to YouTube

Looking for somewhere you can build your own icon/logo from scratch? Check out this list of logo makers .

After downloading the icons or logos, it is time to add them to your YouTube video. Here I recommend our Wondershare Filmora video editor . Below is a video tutorial about how to add a logo to video in Filmora . Remember to download the free trial version to test.

Download Filmora9 Win Version Download Filmora9 Mac Version

author avatar

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett

Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions

0

Whether you need YouTube icons and logos to use as pop-up graphics in your videos, to serve as your channel icon, to use as watermarks, or to liven up your channel art or video thumbnails – don’t worry. There are lots of places to get them.

We’ve made a list of 6 sites where you can download icons and logos for free for YouTub videos, and explained how they work.

You might also want to check out these YouTube channels offering free profile picture templates .

1. Flaticon.com

Key Points:

  • Great selection of icons/logos
  • It’s easy to change the colors before you download

I’m putting Flaticon.com right at the top of this list because it has something that really sets it apart from the other sites on this list – it lets you edit pre-made icons before you download them.

You start out on Flaticon by searching for a theme like beauty, gaming, flowers, or emojis. I searched for ‘birds’ and found these cuties.

 YouTube Logo Icon Download Site Flaticon

These aren’t all the birds on Flaticon, just a few. They had a huge selection in all the different searches I tried.

I clicked on the brown bird to open up the download screen, and then clicked into ‘Edit icon’. There may be a pop up that tells you editing tools are only available to registered users, but it’s wrong. Just close it and keep going, unless you want to register.

  Logo Icon on Flaticon

You can edit the colors in your icon just by clicking on the color you want to replace, and then clicking on the color in the color selector you want to replace it with. I made my birdie FLY.

 Edit Logo Icon on Flaticon

I never apologize for puns.

Once you like the look of your icon, just click Download. You will be prompted to choose a format. PNG is the most popular because it is supported the most places (including on YouTube), and because it allows for a transparent background.

After clicking on a format you will also be prompted to choose a size for your image. It’s always best to go with the largest image you can – its way easier to shrink things and keep them looking good than it is to have to enlarge them.

 download Logo Icon on Flaticon

Flaticon has a great selection, it’s free, and they make it really easy to edit your creations. I would strongly recommend this site to anyone in the market for an icon or logo.

Flaticon asks that you include an “Icon made by [author link] from <www.flaticon.com> ” somewhere (i.e. video description, channel ‘about’ section) when you use their icons for free.

2. Freepik.com

Key Points:

  • Good selection of icons.
  • No way to customise them on the site.
  • Attribution requried.

On freepik, you start off by searching for a theme (like the genre of your YouTube title or the topic of a video, i.e. ‘makeup’ or ‘music’). I searched for ‘cat’.

 download Logo Icon on Freepik

A few of the sets available on freepik. The crown icon means you need to be a paying Premium member, but most things are free.

You can’t edit on freepik, and in order to download for free you need to include an attribution/credit to freepik where you use the images.

You do not choose what format to download your images in on freepik. When you hit ‘Free Download’ it will automatically download a zip file which will contain both a .jpg and a .eps. The EPS is editable in any ‘vector graphics editor’, like Adobe Illustrator, and YouTube supports .jpg files.

3. Seeklogo.net

Key Points:

  • Logos from major brands
  • Great for channels that do product reviews

Seeklogo.net has a slightly more corporate slant than some of the other sites on this list. It has logos for a lot of major companies and brands available for download.

In the ‘search’ on Seeklogo.net, you can type in the name of a brand or industry and see if the well-known logo you’re looking for is available. This may be especially useful for people with sports related channels since they have a lot of logos for major teams.

I searched for YouTube – you never know when you might need the YouTube logo.

 YouTube Logo Icon on Seeklogo

Although the site does not advertise PNG in the list of formats on their front page, downloads do include PNG versions (which is useful if you need transparency and don’t have a program which can edit vector files, like .eps).

4. IconArchive.com

Key Points:

  • Site has an office/business slant.
  • Detailed search tool lets you sort by color, theme, etc.

IconArchive has a huge selection of icons with somewhat of an office/business slant. I searched for ‘flower’ and half the results were of file-folders with flowers on them.

 YouTube Logo Icon on IconArchive

Could be cool for a lifestyle video about school or work?

My favorite thing about IconArchive is its search features. It allows you to filter results by color, size (down to the specific resolution), category, background color, style, and a lot more.

 YouTube Logo Icon on IconArchive Editing

Color is under ‘Display’, meaning that it won’t filter out results that have different colors it’ll just list the color you select first.

The ‘Category’ filter is useful because there are some genres you probably recognize there, like ‘Lifestyle’. However, you should be careful not to over-filter. This site is pretty literal in how it categorizes. For example – there are no ‘flower’ images under ‘Lifestyle’.

Downloads are available in different sizes and formats including PNG. PNG is always a good option because it is supported by YouTube and includes transparent backgrounds.

Note that all of your different download buttons will be located underneath your image. They favor those ads that look like ‘download’ or ‘start now’ buttons, and the ads sit right next to the images on the right, so it’s easy to get confused and click on the ad.

5. Logaster.com

Key Points:

  • You’ll have to pay for larger images.
  • Focused more on businesses.
  • Incorporates your channel name.

Logaster is really a service for businesses – they make and sell business cards, letterheads, and other office-y things like that. However, they are still a good choice for YouTubers because they have a free logo creator. Sort of.

You actually have to pay $9.99 to get larger images and remove the watermark, but the process is free.

When you arrive on Logaster there’s a button right on their home page that says ‘Create a logo for free’. Click on it.

In Step 1 it’ll ask for your company name and an activity type. You just need to put in your channel name and choose something from the activity drop down that you focus on in your videos.

 YouTube Logo Icon on Logaster Start Window

My heart burns with the secret desire to be YouTube’s Neil Degrasse Tyson (it doesn’t really, but he is super cool) so I tried ‘Katie Does Science’ and ‘Science, Studies, Education’. Here’s what it came up with:

 YouTube Logo Icon on Logaster

There are 10 pages of suggestions!

You can see how, unless you have a short channel name, you’re probably not going to be able to use any of these as an icon, but a lot of them would look cool on a banner. There’s an ‘Edit Logo Concept’ button which allows you to make changes to the layout, but you can still only choose from preset layouts. For example, some logo concepts allow you to choose whether the icon is above your text or next to it.

After you click ‘save’ in the last step you’ll be prompted to provide an email address and password. Once you sign in, you’ll be able to download a small logo for free, or purchase the higher resolution image.

I personally wouldn’t recommend buying an image from here unless your channel is for your small business and you need things like branded business cards and letterhead. This site might be better for gathering inspiration than actually downloading a logo from.

6. Icons8.com

Key Points:

  • You need to link back to them to use their icons.
  • You can edit the colors on the site and even add details.
  • There’s a size limit on the free service (100x100px)

At Icons8 they have free and paid services. If you download an icon for free it will be a PNG file (which should be fine, YouTube supports PNG and it’s good for transparency) that is no larger than 100x100px. This is not ideal since YouTube recommends 800x800px for profile pictures, but it’s not necessarily a deal breaker either. Profile pictures render down to much smaller than that.

You will also need to link to Icons8 if you use their icons for free (i.e. in the ‘about’ section of your channel page).

To get started on Icons8, type something into the search bar on the home page that you think might work as an icon or as part of whatever graphics you have planned. I typed in ‘game’ for this one, since gaming is the biggest genre on YouTube. Here are a few of the results that came up:

 Gaming Logo Icon on Icons8

Lower down in the results there were different kinds of sports balls, hand-held gaming systems, playing cards, joy sticks, baseball caps and more.

After you find an icon you like, click on it and it will appear on the right side of your screen where you’ll be able to make a few changes (an editing screen will pop up once you start clicking on things). You can edit your colors, overlay small decals, add text, and add a border, change your background and adjust your size. Here’s the editing screen:

 Edit Gaming Logo Icon on Icons8

You can give your icon a pretty different look from its default. Check this out:

 Change Gaming Logo Icon background on Icons8

You cannot download your icon from the editing screen. You need to click Save, and then download it from the main display screen here:

 Donwload Gaming Logo Icon  on Icons8

You can change the size with that drop down menu, but you’ll be limited in your options if you don’t want to pay.

I downloaded my image and tried to see how it would look as an icon/profile picture. As you can see, it was pretty blurry in the preview:

 Add Gaming Logo Icon made with icons8 to YouTube

However, the preview is larger than the actual profile picture. Once I set it, it looked alright.

 Preview Gaming Logo Icon made with icons8 to YouTube

Looking for somewhere you can build your own icon/logo from scratch? Check out this list of logo makers .

After downloading the icons or logos, it is time to add them to your YouTube video. Here I recommend our Wondershare Filmora video editor . Below is a video tutorial about how to add a logo to video in Filmora . Remember to download the free trial version to test.

Download Filmora9 Win Version Download Filmora9 Mac Version

author avatar

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett

Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions

0

Whether you need YouTube icons and logos to use as pop-up graphics in your videos, to serve as your channel icon, to use as watermarks, or to liven up your channel art or video thumbnails – don’t worry. There are lots of places to get them.

We’ve made a list of 6 sites where you can download icons and logos for free for YouTub videos, and explained how they work.

You might also want to check out these YouTube channels offering free profile picture templates .

1. Flaticon.com

Key Points:

  • Great selection of icons/logos
  • It’s easy to change the colors before you download

I’m putting Flaticon.com right at the top of this list because it has something that really sets it apart from the other sites on this list – it lets you edit pre-made icons before you download them.

You start out on Flaticon by searching for a theme like beauty, gaming, flowers, or emojis. I searched for ‘birds’ and found these cuties.

 YouTube Logo Icon Download Site Flaticon

These aren’t all the birds on Flaticon, just a few. They had a huge selection in all the different searches I tried.

I clicked on the brown bird to open up the download screen, and then clicked into ‘Edit icon’. There may be a pop up that tells you editing tools are only available to registered users, but it’s wrong. Just close it and keep going, unless you want to register.

  Logo Icon on Flaticon

You can edit the colors in your icon just by clicking on the color you want to replace, and then clicking on the color in the color selector you want to replace it with. I made my birdie FLY.

 Edit Logo Icon on Flaticon

I never apologize for puns.

Once you like the look of your icon, just click Download. You will be prompted to choose a format. PNG is the most popular because it is supported the most places (including on YouTube), and because it allows for a transparent background.

After clicking on a format you will also be prompted to choose a size for your image. It’s always best to go with the largest image you can – its way easier to shrink things and keep them looking good than it is to have to enlarge them.

 download Logo Icon on Flaticon

Flaticon has a great selection, it’s free, and they make it really easy to edit your creations. I would strongly recommend this site to anyone in the market for an icon or logo.

Flaticon asks that you include an “Icon made by [author link] from <www.flaticon.com> ” somewhere (i.e. video description, channel ‘about’ section) when you use their icons for free.

2. Freepik.com

Key Points:

  • Good selection of icons.
  • No way to customise them on the site.
  • Attribution requried.

On freepik, you start off by searching for a theme (like the genre of your YouTube title or the topic of a video, i.e. ‘makeup’ or ‘music’). I searched for ‘cat’.

 download Logo Icon on Freepik

A few of the sets available on freepik. The crown icon means you need to be a paying Premium member, but most things are free.

You can’t edit on freepik, and in order to download for free you need to include an attribution/credit to freepik where you use the images.

You do not choose what format to download your images in on freepik. When you hit ‘Free Download’ it will automatically download a zip file which will contain both a .jpg and a .eps. The EPS is editable in any ‘vector graphics editor’, like Adobe Illustrator, and YouTube supports .jpg files.

3. Seeklogo.net

Key Points:

  • Logos from major brands
  • Great for channels that do product reviews

Seeklogo.net has a slightly more corporate slant than some of the other sites on this list. It has logos for a lot of major companies and brands available for download.

In the ‘search’ on Seeklogo.net, you can type in the name of a brand or industry and see if the well-known logo you’re looking for is available. This may be especially useful for people with sports related channels since they have a lot of logos for major teams.

I searched for YouTube – you never know when you might need the YouTube logo.

 YouTube Logo Icon on Seeklogo

Although the site does not advertise PNG in the list of formats on their front page, downloads do include PNG versions (which is useful if you need transparency and don’t have a program which can edit vector files, like .eps).

4. IconArchive.com

Key Points:

  • Site has an office/business slant.
  • Detailed search tool lets you sort by color, theme, etc.

IconArchive has a huge selection of icons with somewhat of an office/business slant. I searched for ‘flower’ and half the results were of file-folders with flowers on them.

 YouTube Logo Icon on IconArchive

Could be cool for a lifestyle video about school or work?

My favorite thing about IconArchive is its search features. It allows you to filter results by color, size (down to the specific resolution), category, background color, style, and a lot more.

 YouTube Logo Icon on IconArchive Editing

Color is under ‘Display’, meaning that it won’t filter out results that have different colors it’ll just list the color you select first.

The ‘Category’ filter is useful because there are some genres you probably recognize there, like ‘Lifestyle’. However, you should be careful not to over-filter. This site is pretty literal in how it categorizes. For example – there are no ‘flower’ images under ‘Lifestyle’.

Downloads are available in different sizes and formats including PNG. PNG is always a good option because it is supported by YouTube and includes transparent backgrounds.

Note that all of your different download buttons will be located underneath your image. They favor those ads that look like ‘download’ or ‘start now’ buttons, and the ads sit right next to the images on the right, so it’s easy to get confused and click on the ad.

5. Logaster.com

Key Points:

  • You’ll have to pay for larger images.
  • Focused more on businesses.
  • Incorporates your channel name.

Logaster is really a service for businesses – they make and sell business cards, letterheads, and other office-y things like that. However, they are still a good choice for YouTubers because they have a free logo creator. Sort of.

You actually have to pay $9.99 to get larger images and remove the watermark, but the process is free.

When you arrive on Logaster there’s a button right on their home page that says ‘Create a logo for free’. Click on it.

In Step 1 it’ll ask for your company name and an activity type. You just need to put in your channel name and choose something from the activity drop down that you focus on in your videos.

 YouTube Logo Icon on Logaster Start Window

My heart burns with the secret desire to be YouTube’s Neil Degrasse Tyson (it doesn’t really, but he is super cool) so I tried ‘Katie Does Science’ and ‘Science, Studies, Education’. Here’s what it came up with:

 YouTube Logo Icon on Logaster

There are 10 pages of suggestions!

You can see how, unless you have a short channel name, you’re probably not going to be able to use any of these as an icon, but a lot of them would look cool on a banner. There’s an ‘Edit Logo Concept’ button which allows you to make changes to the layout, but you can still only choose from preset layouts. For example, some logo concepts allow you to choose whether the icon is above your text or next to it.

After you click ‘save’ in the last step you’ll be prompted to provide an email address and password. Once you sign in, you’ll be able to download a small logo for free, or purchase the higher resolution image.

I personally wouldn’t recommend buying an image from here unless your channel is for your small business and you need things like branded business cards and letterhead. This site might be better for gathering inspiration than actually downloading a logo from.

6. Icons8.com

Key Points:

  • You need to link back to them to use their icons.
  • You can edit the colors on the site and even add details.
  • There’s a size limit on the free service (100x100px)

At Icons8 they have free and paid services. If you download an icon for free it will be a PNG file (which should be fine, YouTube supports PNG and it’s good for transparency) that is no larger than 100x100px. This is not ideal since YouTube recommends 800x800px for profile pictures, but it’s not necessarily a deal breaker either. Profile pictures render down to much smaller than that.

You will also need to link to Icons8 if you use their icons for free (i.e. in the ‘about’ section of your channel page).

To get started on Icons8, type something into the search bar on the home page that you think might work as an icon or as part of whatever graphics you have planned. I typed in ‘game’ for this one, since gaming is the biggest genre on YouTube. Here are a few of the results that came up:

 Gaming Logo Icon on Icons8

Lower down in the results there were different kinds of sports balls, hand-held gaming systems, playing cards, joy sticks, baseball caps and more.

After you find an icon you like, click on it and it will appear on the right side of your screen where you’ll be able to make a few changes (an editing screen will pop up once you start clicking on things). You can edit your colors, overlay small decals, add text, and add a border, change your background and adjust your size. Here’s the editing screen:

 Edit Gaming Logo Icon on Icons8

You can give your icon a pretty different look from its default. Check this out:

 Change Gaming Logo Icon background on Icons8

You cannot download your icon from the editing screen. You need to click Save, and then download it from the main display screen here:

 Donwload Gaming Logo Icon  on Icons8

You can change the size with that drop down menu, but you’ll be limited in your options if you don’t want to pay.

I downloaded my image and tried to see how it would look as an icon/profile picture. As you can see, it was pretty blurry in the preview:

 Add Gaming Logo Icon made with icons8 to YouTube

However, the preview is larger than the actual profile picture. Once I set it, it looked alright.

 Preview Gaming Logo Icon made with icons8 to YouTube

Looking for somewhere you can build your own icon/logo from scratch? Check out this list of logo makers .

After downloading the icons or logos, it is time to add them to your YouTube video. Here I recommend our Wondershare Filmora video editor . Below is a video tutorial about how to add a logo to video in Filmora . Remember to download the free trial version to test.

Download Filmora9 Win Version Download Filmora9 Mac Version

author avatar

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Dominating the Digital Space: 5 Tips for Video Visibility Victory

5 Tips to Get More Views with YouTube Optimization [Free Checklist]

Richard Bennett

Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions

0

We all want our videos to get a lot of views, and in turn, lead to more subscribers. In order to do so, we have to prepare it for success. If you are hoping to optimize a video after it has already been published to YouTube, then you aren’t going to get the best result, because much of optimization is done before the video is even shot.a

In this article, we will give youa checklist , which you should have with you at the very beginning of creating a YouTube video: the ideation stage. As you go through your process, check off each task. By doing so, you can ensure that you have given the video the best chance to rank high and be discovered.

How to Optimize Your Video to Rank Higher on YouTube?

  1. Keep Your Audience’s Attention
  2. Do Keyword Research
  3. Engage Your Audience
  4. Upload YouTube Video in Proper Length

1. Keep Your Audience’s Attention:

Even though your view count is going up, it doesn’t mean your audience is watching your video. And if they are not, then YouTube is going to consider your video less valuable and therefore, lowering its rank.

Audience Retention is an important metric to keep an eye on after every video you’ve published.

low-audience-retention

Before you start your next project, take a look back at the Audience Retention of your previous videos.

  1. Enter YouTube Studio in your channel
  2. Access to Analytics
  3. Select the video you want to review
  4. Click into engagement
  5. See where a dip in watch time

What is Good Audience Retention?

If you want to see how your Audience Retention is performing, the Average Percentage Viewed will give you a broad perspective. The higher the percentage, the more people are watching your entire video.

If you get above 60% Average Percentage Viewed, you should feel very proud. In our modern world with our short attention span, that is considered good retention.

audience-retention-one

In the example above, we see that on average, a viewer will only see 44% of the video. For the video below, we see that it only has 30% of the video viewed. Overall, the first video is performing better.

audience-retention-two

There is also a dip that happens at the beginning in the second example, which indicates that viewers are skipping forward and about 20% then deciding it’s not worth continuing. It’s good data to help you improve your introduction and the hook.

If there is important information that you are presenting at a given point and in the Audience Retention you see that only a small percentage of your viewers actually see it, then for the next video, you might want to position the details in a different point in the video.

How to Improve Audience Retention

Here are a few ways you can retain your audience’s attention if you noticed a drop in viewership:

- Film a hook (introduce your video to let the audience know what to expect)

- Add b-roll (having supplemental footage to cut to makes your video more interesting to watch)

- Have a co-host (Having someone on screen gives the video more dynamic interactions)

- Edit out the unimportant stuff

- Write a conclusion (having a conclusion prepared will allow you to transition from the content of the video to the call to action without the audience even knowing) See this example by PolyMatter below and notice how seamless their ending is.

If you have a video that is doing a good job retaining the audience, then replicate it. If there isn’t, keep experimenting with new structures. Improving audience retention is not simply important for your ranking, but it will affirm that you are building quality videos.

Knowing how to structure your video will allow you to be strategic as you build out your content.

2. Do Keyword Research:

Many viewers find YouTube videos via search, and if you aren’t using the appropriate keywords, then YouTube won’t be able to identify your content and display it for your viewers.

Where Do Keywords Appear on YouTube?

- Title: Have keywords at the beginning of the title and limit them up to approximately 60 characters so it appears in full in search.

- Tags: Include 10-15 tags from general keywords to more specific.

- Descriptions: Put important information and keywords at the beginning of the description so both searcher and the search engine understands what the video is about.

Why Keywords Matter

keyword arrangement is an integral part of YouTube optimization because the robots behind YouTube don’t associate the value of the actual video content with what the viewer is actually seeking. You should pay attention to the relevance of keywords.

Even when you add closed captions, it doesn’t mean the best keywords are present to the Youtube search engine when we speak.

That is why it is important to know your audience and what words and phrases they are going to use to search for your video.

Here is how you can see what keywords were used to find your video:

  1. Enter YouTube Studio in your channel
  2. Access Analytics
  3. Select Reach
  4. Click into Traffic Source
  5. Click Traffic Source: YouTube Search

traffic-source

If you want to find some new keywords for your upcoming video, you will need to do some research.

1. Enter Keywords You Want to Rank for In YouTube Search: This allows you to see what the most popular phrases are in the YouTube search engine.

search-for-keywords

2. Study the Competitors: See which videos are ranking high for your search term. Use a tool called VidIQ to see the keywords that the top videos are performing.

vidlq-tool

3. Search for Related Keywords and Evaluate Relevancy: A tool called Ubersuggest can help you find related keywords and allow you to identify the search volume, cost per click (aka CPC is used for determining the budget for paid search), and the competitiveness of the word or phrase.

ubersuggest

Search volume: The number of searches with that particular keyword. The higher the number the more popular it is. You should aim to use keywords with a high search volume.

Keyword competition score: This score is usually indicated by a number and it represents how difficult it is for a keyword to rank due to other pages already ranking for that word or phrase. You want to find a keyword with a low competition score.

Pro tip: The best combination is high search volume and low competition score. But if you can’t get that perfect mix, go for the low competitive score, as it will give you a better chance to rank, even if it isn’t searched as often.

4. Come Up With Content Related to Those Keywords: To come up with topic ideas around a keyword, you can use a tool called Answer the Public , which gives you all the most popular questions searched online.

answer-the-public

3. Engage Your Audience:

It’s been highly discussed on forums all over the Internet, and there appears to be a strong correlation between YouTube video ranking and the number of likes, dislikes, and comments the video received.

While YouTube itself might not be using the number of likes and comments to determine where your video rank, having high engagement allows your video to be discovered through other means.

Here is an example of how it would work:

- A YouTuber with 100,000 subscribers views your video and likes it

- Then your video might be visible to a fraction of those 100,000 subscribers.

- Boom! Domino effect!

- More people will see your video and like it, increasing your network of viewers and your watch time, which is one of the main factors that YouTube takes into consideration.

Get engagements with a call to action:

- Don’t be afraid to ask for an engagement at the beginning of the video to avoid fall off on retention.

- Encourage them to leave a comment or start a discussion by asking a question at the end of your video.

- Monitor comments and responds to them so you can build a relationship with your audience over time.

It’s all about creating a community and that is what YouTube encourages.

4. Upload YouTube Video in Proper Length:

YouTube puts a lot of weight on watch time, and in addition to that, it puts more weight on session watch time.

Session watch time is counted when people watch your video and then continue to watch others, it doesn’t have to be your own. The more time people spend watching YouTube videos, as a result of your content, the more likely YouTube will increase your ranking.

Since YouTube puts importance on time spent watching videos, the length of your video will play a key role.

If you have 5 videos and all of them are a minute long, a 100% watch through will only get you 5 minutes total.

However, if you have 1 video that is 20 minutes, and an average viewer only watches half of it, then you have an average watch time of over 10 minutes. That’s more than double what your five short videos can do. This longer video is worth more. However, if that 20-minute video is really boring and people drop off in the first minute, then it’s not any better than 1 of the 5 short videos.

If your format allows, go for a longer video instead of a shorter one. But the most important thing is that you can keep people watching your videos: so use end screen and playlist links to keep them engaged.

End screen: Pick related videos for your audience, so they know exactly what they should watch next. You can even create a background template for your end screens .

related-videos-for-your-audience

Playlist: If you have multiple videos that fit a specific topic, add them to a playlist so the viewer can enjoy them all in one viewing.

add-videos-of-the-same-topic-to-a-playlist

Key Takeaways:

  1. Use Audience Retention to better understand how to structure your video for the best results.
  2. Perform Keyword Research to find the keywords that your competitors are using and your audience is searching for.
  3. Increasing Subscribers gets your video in front of more people the moment it is published.
  4. Encourage Comments and respond to establish a relationship with your viewers.
  5. Ensure that Viewers Continue Watching videos on YouTube after they finish watching yours.

Other Things That Affects Your YouTube Ranking

Except for the above-mentioned factors, there are also other issues that affect the ranking of your YouTube video. YouTube has stated that the number of subscribers doesn’t play a key role in your video ranking.

For example, if a YouTuber has a million subscribers and then overnight they lose 100 thousand, a video they had ranking number 1 will still be ranked number 1.

However, the number of subscribers has a lot of indirect effects on your channel.

- Subscribers know the moment your video is published

- Subscribers will watch your video in the first week (YouTube will rank your video higher if they see a lift in the first week of publishing)

- YouTube put a higher value on subscribers than views and social shares, because it’s harder to fake subscribers

Growing subscribers take time and effort, and even though it shouldn’t be your main focus, there are tactics you can do to gain more subscribers .

Don’t miss a chance to optimize your YouTube video, download, and print out this checklist for your next video project. For more information on SEO(Search Engine Optimization) on YouTube, you can also read the following article.

How to Fast Rank Video Higher with Video SEO >>

10 Best YouTube Keyword Tools to Use with Bonus Tips>>

If you want to find a video editing solution that empowers your imagination and creativity yet takes less effort, please try this robust and user-friendly video editing software Wondershare Filmora. It provides special effects, stock photo & video, sound library, etc., which will definitely enhance your productivity and helps to make money by making videos much accessible.

Download Filmora9 Win Version Download Filmora9 Mac Version

author avatar

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett

Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions

0

We all want our videos to get a lot of views, and in turn, lead to more subscribers. In order to do so, we have to prepare it for success. If you are hoping to optimize a video after it has already been published to YouTube, then you aren’t going to get the best result, because much of optimization is done before the video is even shot.a

In this article, we will give youa checklist , which you should have with you at the very beginning of creating a YouTube video: the ideation stage. As you go through your process, check off each task. By doing so, you can ensure that you have given the video the best chance to rank high and be discovered.

How to Optimize Your Video to Rank Higher on YouTube?

  1. Keep Your Audience’s Attention
  2. Do Keyword Research
  3. Engage Your Audience
  4. Upload YouTube Video in Proper Length

1. Keep Your Audience’s Attention:

Even though your view count is going up, it doesn’t mean your audience is watching your video. And if they are not, then YouTube is going to consider your video less valuable and therefore, lowering its rank.

Audience Retention is an important metric to keep an eye on after every video you’ve published.

low-audience-retention

Before you start your next project, take a look back at the Audience Retention of your previous videos.

  1. Enter YouTube Studio in your channel
  2. Access to Analytics
  3. Select the video you want to review
  4. Click into engagement
  5. See where a dip in watch time

What is Good Audience Retention?

If you want to see how your Audience Retention is performing, the Average Percentage Viewed will give you a broad perspective. The higher the percentage, the more people are watching your entire video.

If you get above 60% Average Percentage Viewed, you should feel very proud. In our modern world with our short attention span, that is considered good retention.

audience-retention-one

In the example above, we see that on average, a viewer will only see 44% of the video. For the video below, we see that it only has 30% of the video viewed. Overall, the first video is performing better.

audience-retention-two

There is also a dip that happens at the beginning in the second example, which indicates that viewers are skipping forward and about 20% then deciding it’s not worth continuing. It’s good data to help you improve your introduction and the hook.

If there is important information that you are presenting at a given point and in the Audience Retention you see that only a small percentage of your viewers actually see it, then for the next video, you might want to position the details in a different point in the video.

How to Improve Audience Retention

Here are a few ways you can retain your audience’s attention if you noticed a drop in viewership:

- Film a hook (introduce your video to let the audience know what to expect)

- Add b-roll (having supplemental footage to cut to makes your video more interesting to watch)

- Have a co-host (Having someone on screen gives the video more dynamic interactions)

- Edit out the unimportant stuff

- Write a conclusion (having a conclusion prepared will allow you to transition from the content of the video to the call to action without the audience even knowing) See this example by PolyMatter below and notice how seamless their ending is.

If you have a video that is doing a good job retaining the audience, then replicate it. If there isn’t, keep experimenting with new structures. Improving audience retention is not simply important for your ranking, but it will affirm that you are building quality videos.

Knowing how to structure your video will allow you to be strategic as you build out your content.

2. Do Keyword Research:

Many viewers find YouTube videos via search, and if you aren’t using the appropriate keywords, then YouTube won’t be able to identify your content and display it for your viewers.

Where Do Keywords Appear on YouTube?

- Title: Have keywords at the beginning of the title and limit them up to approximately 60 characters so it appears in full in search.

- Tags: Include 10-15 tags from general keywords to more specific.

- Descriptions: Put important information and keywords at the beginning of the description so both searcher and the search engine understands what the video is about.

Why Keywords Matter

keyword arrangement is an integral part of YouTube optimization because the robots behind YouTube don’t associate the value of the actual video content with what the viewer is actually seeking. You should pay attention to the relevance of keywords.

Even when you add closed captions, it doesn’t mean the best keywords are present to the Youtube search engine when we speak.

That is why it is important to know your audience and what words and phrases they are going to use to search for your video.

Here is how you can see what keywords were used to find your video:

  1. Enter YouTube Studio in your channel
  2. Access Analytics
  3. Select Reach
  4. Click into Traffic Source
  5. Click Traffic Source: YouTube Search

traffic-source

If you want to find some new keywords for your upcoming video, you will need to do some research.

1. Enter Keywords You Want to Rank for In YouTube Search: This allows you to see what the most popular phrases are in the YouTube search engine.

search-for-keywords

2. Study the Competitors: See which videos are ranking high for your search term. Use a tool called VidIQ to see the keywords that the top videos are performing.

vidlq-tool

3. Search for Related Keywords and Evaluate Relevancy: A tool called Ubersuggest can help you find related keywords and allow you to identify the search volume, cost per click (aka CPC is used for determining the budget for paid search), and the competitiveness of the word or phrase.

ubersuggest

Search volume: The number of searches with that particular keyword. The higher the number the more popular it is. You should aim to use keywords with a high search volume.

Keyword competition score: This score is usually indicated by a number and it represents how difficult it is for a keyword to rank due to other pages already ranking for that word or phrase. You want to find a keyword with a low competition score.

Pro tip: The best combination is high search volume and low competition score. But if you can’t get that perfect mix, go for the low competitive score, as it will give you a better chance to rank, even if it isn’t searched as often.

4. Come Up With Content Related to Those Keywords: To come up with topic ideas around a keyword, you can use a tool called Answer the Public , which gives you all the most popular questions searched online.

answer-the-public

3. Engage Your Audience:

It’s been highly discussed on forums all over the Internet, and there appears to be a strong correlation between YouTube video ranking and the number of likes, dislikes, and comments the video received.

While YouTube itself might not be using the number of likes and comments to determine where your video rank, having high engagement allows your video to be discovered through other means.

Here is an example of how it would work:

- A YouTuber with 100,000 subscribers views your video and likes it

- Then your video might be visible to a fraction of those 100,000 subscribers.

- Boom! Domino effect!

- More people will see your video and like it, increasing your network of viewers and your watch time, which is one of the main factors that YouTube takes into consideration.

Get engagements with a call to action:

- Don’t be afraid to ask for an engagement at the beginning of the video to avoid fall off on retention.

- Encourage them to leave a comment or start a discussion by asking a question at the end of your video.

- Monitor comments and responds to them so you can build a relationship with your audience over time.

It’s all about creating a community and that is what YouTube encourages.

4. Upload YouTube Video in Proper Length:

YouTube puts a lot of weight on watch time, and in addition to that, it puts more weight on session watch time.

Session watch time is counted when people watch your video and then continue to watch others, it doesn’t have to be your own. The more time people spend watching YouTube videos, as a result of your content, the more likely YouTube will increase your ranking.

Since YouTube puts importance on time spent watching videos, the length of your video will play a key role.

If you have 5 videos and all of them are a minute long, a 100% watch through will only get you 5 minutes total.

However, if you have 1 video that is 20 minutes, and an average viewer only watches half of it, then you have an average watch time of over 10 minutes. That’s more than double what your five short videos can do. This longer video is worth more. However, if that 20-minute video is really boring and people drop off in the first minute, then it’s not any better than 1 of the 5 short videos.

If your format allows, go for a longer video instead of a shorter one. But the most important thing is that you can keep people watching your videos: so use end screen and playlist links to keep them engaged.

End screen: Pick related videos for your audience, so they know exactly what they should watch next. You can even create a background template for your end screens .

related-videos-for-your-audience

Playlist: If you have multiple videos that fit a specific topic, add them to a playlist so the viewer can enjoy them all in one viewing.

add-videos-of-the-same-topic-to-a-playlist

Key Takeaways:

  1. Use Audience Retention to better understand how to structure your video for the best results.
  2. Perform Keyword Research to find the keywords that your competitors are using and your audience is searching for.
  3. Increasing Subscribers gets your video in front of more people the moment it is published.
  4. Encourage Comments and respond to establish a relationship with your viewers.
  5. Ensure that Viewers Continue Watching videos on YouTube after they finish watching yours.

Other Things That Affects Your YouTube Ranking

Except for the above-mentioned factors, there are also other issues that affect the ranking of your YouTube video. YouTube has stated that the number of subscribers doesn’t play a key role in your video ranking.

For example, if a YouTuber has a million subscribers and then overnight they lose 100 thousand, a video they had ranking number 1 will still be ranked number 1.

However, the number of subscribers has a lot of indirect effects on your channel.

- Subscribers know the moment your video is published

- Subscribers will watch your video in the first week (YouTube will rank your video higher if they see a lift in the first week of publishing)

- YouTube put a higher value on subscribers than views and social shares, because it’s harder to fake subscribers

Growing subscribers take time and effort, and even though it shouldn’t be your main focus, there are tactics you can do to gain more subscribers .

Don’t miss a chance to optimize your YouTube video, download, and print out this checklist for your next video project. For more information on SEO(Search Engine Optimization) on YouTube, you can also read the following article.

How to Fast Rank Video Higher with Video SEO >>

10 Best YouTube Keyword Tools to Use with Bonus Tips>>

If you want to find a video editing solution that empowers your imagination and creativity yet takes less effort, please try this robust and user-friendly video editing software Wondershare Filmora. It provides special effects, stock photo & video, sound library, etc., which will definitely enhance your productivity and helps to make money by making videos much accessible.

Download Filmora9 Win Version Download Filmora9 Mac Version

author avatar

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett

Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions

0

We all want our videos to get a lot of views, and in turn, lead to more subscribers. In order to do so, we have to prepare it for success. If you are hoping to optimize a video after it has already been published to YouTube, then you aren’t going to get the best result, because much of optimization is done before the video is even shot.a

In this article, we will give youa checklist , which you should have with you at the very beginning of creating a YouTube video: the ideation stage. As you go through your process, check off each task. By doing so, you can ensure that you have given the video the best chance to rank high and be discovered.

How to Optimize Your Video to Rank Higher on YouTube?

  1. Keep Your Audience’s Attention
  2. Do Keyword Research
  3. Engage Your Audience
  4. Upload YouTube Video in Proper Length

1. Keep Your Audience’s Attention:

Even though your view count is going up, it doesn’t mean your audience is watching your video. And if they are not, then YouTube is going to consider your video less valuable and therefore, lowering its rank.

Audience Retention is an important metric to keep an eye on after every video you’ve published.

low-audience-retention

Before you start your next project, take a look back at the Audience Retention of your previous videos.

  1. Enter YouTube Studio in your channel
  2. Access to Analytics
  3. Select the video you want to review
  4. Click into engagement
  5. See where a dip in watch time

What is Good Audience Retention?

If you want to see how your Audience Retention is performing, the Average Percentage Viewed will give you a broad perspective. The higher the percentage, the more people are watching your entire video.

If you get above 60% Average Percentage Viewed, you should feel very proud. In our modern world with our short attention span, that is considered good retention.

audience-retention-one

In the example above, we see that on average, a viewer will only see 44% of the video. For the video below, we see that it only has 30% of the video viewed. Overall, the first video is performing better.

audience-retention-two

There is also a dip that happens at the beginning in the second example, which indicates that viewers are skipping forward and about 20% then deciding it’s not worth continuing. It’s good data to help you improve your introduction and the hook.

If there is important information that you are presenting at a given point and in the Audience Retention you see that only a small percentage of your viewers actually see it, then for the next video, you might want to position the details in a different point in the video.

How to Improve Audience Retention

Here are a few ways you can retain your audience’s attention if you noticed a drop in viewership:

- Film a hook (introduce your video to let the audience know what to expect)

- Add b-roll (having supplemental footage to cut to makes your video more interesting to watch)

- Have a co-host (Having someone on screen gives the video more dynamic interactions)

- Edit out the unimportant stuff

- Write a conclusion (having a conclusion prepared will allow you to transition from the content of the video to the call to action without the audience even knowing) See this example by PolyMatter below and notice how seamless their ending is.

If you have a video that is doing a good job retaining the audience, then replicate it. If there isn’t, keep experimenting with new structures. Improving audience retention is not simply important for your ranking, but it will affirm that you are building quality videos.

Knowing how to structure your video will allow you to be strategic as you build out your content.

2. Do Keyword Research:

Many viewers find YouTube videos via search, and if you aren’t using the appropriate keywords, then YouTube won’t be able to identify your content and display it for your viewers.

Where Do Keywords Appear on YouTube?

- Title: Have keywords at the beginning of the title and limit them up to approximately 60 characters so it appears in full in search.

- Tags: Include 10-15 tags from general keywords to more specific.

- Descriptions: Put important information and keywords at the beginning of the description so both searcher and the search engine understands what the video is about.

Why Keywords Matter

keyword arrangement is an integral part of YouTube optimization because the robots behind YouTube don’t associate the value of the actual video content with what the viewer is actually seeking. You should pay attention to the relevance of keywords.

Even when you add closed captions, it doesn’t mean the best keywords are present to the Youtube search engine when we speak.

That is why it is important to know your audience and what words and phrases they are going to use to search for your video.

Here is how you can see what keywords were used to find your video:

  1. Enter YouTube Studio in your channel
  2. Access Analytics
  3. Select Reach
  4. Click into Traffic Source
  5. Click Traffic Source: YouTube Search

traffic-source

If you want to find some new keywords for your upcoming video, you will need to do some research.

1. Enter Keywords You Want to Rank for In YouTube Search: This allows you to see what the most popular phrases are in the YouTube search engine.

search-for-keywords

2. Study the Competitors: See which videos are ranking high for your search term. Use a tool called VidIQ to see the keywords that the top videos are performing.

vidlq-tool

3. Search for Related Keywords and Evaluate Relevancy: A tool called Ubersuggest can help you find related keywords and allow you to identify the search volume, cost per click (aka CPC is used for determining the budget for paid search), and the competitiveness of the word or phrase.

ubersuggest

Search volume: The number of searches with that particular keyword. The higher the number the more popular it is. You should aim to use keywords with a high search volume.

Keyword competition score: This score is usually indicated by a number and it represents how difficult it is for a keyword to rank due to other pages already ranking for that word or phrase. You want to find a keyword with a low competition score.

Pro tip: The best combination is high search volume and low competition score. But if you can’t get that perfect mix, go for the low competitive score, as it will give you a better chance to rank, even if it isn’t searched as often.

4. Come Up With Content Related to Those Keywords: To come up with topic ideas around a keyword, you can use a tool called Answer the Public , which gives you all the most popular questions searched online.

answer-the-public

3. Engage Your Audience:

It’s been highly discussed on forums all over the Internet, and there appears to be a strong correlation between YouTube video ranking and the number of likes, dislikes, and comments the video received.

While YouTube itself might not be using the number of likes and comments to determine where your video rank, having high engagement allows your video to be discovered through other means.

Here is an example of how it would work:

- A YouTuber with 100,000 subscribers views your video and likes it

- Then your video might be visible to a fraction of those 100,000 subscribers.

- Boom! Domino effect!

- More people will see your video and like it, increasing your network of viewers and your watch time, which is one of the main factors that YouTube takes into consideration.

Get engagements with a call to action:

- Don’t be afraid to ask for an engagement at the beginning of the video to avoid fall off on retention.

- Encourage them to leave a comment or start a discussion by asking a question at the end of your video.

- Monitor comments and responds to them so you can build a relationship with your audience over time.

It’s all about creating a community and that is what YouTube encourages.

4. Upload YouTube Video in Proper Length:

YouTube puts a lot of weight on watch time, and in addition to that, it puts more weight on session watch time.

Session watch time is counted when people watch your video and then continue to watch others, it doesn’t have to be your own. The more time people spend watching YouTube videos, as a result of your content, the more likely YouTube will increase your ranking.

Since YouTube puts importance on time spent watching videos, the length of your video will play a key role.

If you have 5 videos and all of them are a minute long, a 100% watch through will only get you 5 minutes total.

However, if you have 1 video that is 20 minutes, and an average viewer only watches half of it, then you have an average watch time of over 10 minutes. That’s more than double what your five short videos can do. This longer video is worth more. However, if that 20-minute video is really boring and people drop off in the first minute, then it’s not any better than 1 of the 5 short videos.

If your format allows, go for a longer video instead of a shorter one. But the most important thing is that you can keep people watching your videos: so use end screen and playlist links to keep them engaged.

End screen: Pick related videos for your audience, so they know exactly what they should watch next. You can even create a background template for your end screens .

related-videos-for-your-audience

Playlist: If you have multiple videos that fit a specific topic, add them to a playlist so the viewer can enjoy them all in one viewing.

add-videos-of-the-same-topic-to-a-playlist

Key Takeaways:

  1. Use Audience Retention to better understand how to structure your video for the best results.
  2. Perform Keyword Research to find the keywords that your competitors are using and your audience is searching for.
  3. Increasing Subscribers gets your video in front of more people the moment it is published.
  4. Encourage Comments and respond to establish a relationship with your viewers.
  5. Ensure that Viewers Continue Watching videos on YouTube after they finish watching yours.

Other Things That Affects Your YouTube Ranking

Except for the above-mentioned factors, there are also other issues that affect the ranking of your YouTube video. YouTube has stated that the number of subscribers doesn’t play a key role in your video ranking.

For example, if a YouTuber has a million subscribers and then overnight they lose 100 thousand, a video they had ranking number 1 will still be ranked number 1.

However, the number of subscribers has a lot of indirect effects on your channel.

- Subscribers know the moment your video is published

- Subscribers will watch your video in the first week (YouTube will rank your video higher if they see a lift in the first week of publishing)

- YouTube put a higher value on subscribers than views and social shares, because it’s harder to fake subscribers

Growing subscribers take time and effort, and even though it shouldn’t be your main focus, there are tactics you can do to gain more subscribers .

Don’t miss a chance to optimize your YouTube video, download, and print out this checklist for your next video project. For more information on SEO(Search Engine Optimization) on YouTube, you can also read the following article.

How to Fast Rank Video Higher with Video SEO >>

10 Best YouTube Keyword Tools to Use with Bonus Tips>>

If you want to find a video editing solution that empowers your imagination and creativity yet takes less effort, please try this robust and user-friendly video editing software Wondershare Filmora. It provides special effects, stock photo & video, sound library, etc., which will definitely enhance your productivity and helps to make money by making videos much accessible.

Download Filmora9 Win Version Download Filmora9 Mac Version

author avatar

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett

Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions

0

We all want our videos to get a lot of views, and in turn, lead to more subscribers. In order to do so, we have to prepare it for success. If you are hoping to optimize a video after it has already been published to YouTube, then you aren’t going to get the best result, because much of optimization is done before the video is even shot.a

In this article, we will give youa checklist , which you should have with you at the very beginning of creating a YouTube video: the ideation stage. As you go through your process, check off each task. By doing so, you can ensure that you have given the video the best chance to rank high and be discovered.

How to Optimize Your Video to Rank Higher on YouTube?

  1. Keep Your Audience’s Attention
  2. Do Keyword Research
  3. Engage Your Audience
  4. Upload YouTube Video in Proper Length

1. Keep Your Audience’s Attention:

Even though your view count is going up, it doesn’t mean your audience is watching your video. And if they are not, then YouTube is going to consider your video less valuable and therefore, lowering its rank.

Audience Retention is an important metric to keep an eye on after every video you’ve published.

low-audience-retention

Before you start your next project, take a look back at the Audience Retention of your previous videos.

  1. Enter YouTube Studio in your channel
  2. Access to Analytics
  3. Select the video you want to review
  4. Click into engagement
  5. See where a dip in watch time

What is Good Audience Retention?

If you want to see how your Audience Retention is performing, the Average Percentage Viewed will give you a broad perspective. The higher the percentage, the more people are watching your entire video.

If you get above 60% Average Percentage Viewed, you should feel very proud. In our modern world with our short attention span, that is considered good retention.

audience-retention-one

In the example above, we see that on average, a viewer will only see 44% of the video. For the video below, we see that it only has 30% of the video viewed. Overall, the first video is performing better.

audience-retention-two

There is also a dip that happens at the beginning in the second example, which indicates that viewers are skipping forward and about 20% then deciding it’s not worth continuing. It’s good data to help you improve your introduction and the hook.

If there is important information that you are presenting at a given point and in the Audience Retention you see that only a small percentage of your viewers actually see it, then for the next video, you might want to position the details in a different point in the video.

How to Improve Audience Retention

Here are a few ways you can retain your audience’s attention if you noticed a drop in viewership:

- Film a hook (introduce your video to let the audience know what to expect)

- Add b-roll (having supplemental footage to cut to makes your video more interesting to watch)

- Have a co-host (Having someone on screen gives the video more dynamic interactions)

- Edit out the unimportant stuff

- Write a conclusion (having a conclusion prepared will allow you to transition from the content of the video to the call to action without the audience even knowing) See this example by PolyMatter below and notice how seamless their ending is.

If you have a video that is doing a good job retaining the audience, then replicate it. If there isn’t, keep experimenting with new structures. Improving audience retention is not simply important for your ranking, but it will affirm that you are building quality videos.

Knowing how to structure your video will allow you to be strategic as you build out your content.

2. Do Keyword Research:

Many viewers find YouTube videos via search, and if you aren’t using the appropriate keywords, then YouTube won’t be able to identify your content and display it for your viewers.

Where Do Keywords Appear on YouTube?

- Title: Have keywords at the beginning of the title and limit them up to approximately 60 characters so it appears in full in search.

- Tags: Include 10-15 tags from general keywords to more specific.

- Descriptions: Put important information and keywords at the beginning of the description so both searcher and the search engine understands what the video is about.

Why Keywords Matter

keyword arrangement is an integral part of YouTube optimization because the robots behind YouTube don’t associate the value of the actual video content with what the viewer is actually seeking. You should pay attention to the relevance of keywords.

Even when you add closed captions, it doesn’t mean the best keywords are present to the Youtube search engine when we speak.

That is why it is important to know your audience and what words and phrases they are going to use to search for your video.

Here is how you can see what keywords were used to find your video:

  1. Enter YouTube Studio in your channel
  2. Access Analytics
  3. Select Reach
  4. Click into Traffic Source
  5. Click Traffic Source: YouTube Search

traffic-source

If you want to find some new keywords for your upcoming video, you will need to do some research.

1. Enter Keywords You Want to Rank for In YouTube Search: This allows you to see what the most popular phrases are in the YouTube search engine.

search-for-keywords

2. Study the Competitors: See which videos are ranking high for your search term. Use a tool called VidIQ to see the keywords that the top videos are performing.

vidlq-tool

3. Search for Related Keywords and Evaluate Relevancy: A tool called Ubersuggest can help you find related keywords and allow you to identify the search volume, cost per click (aka CPC is used for determining the budget for paid search), and the competitiveness of the word or phrase.

ubersuggest

Search volume: The number of searches with that particular keyword. The higher the number the more popular it is. You should aim to use keywords with a high search volume.

Keyword competition score: This score is usually indicated by a number and it represents how difficult it is for a keyword to rank due to other pages already ranking for that word or phrase. You want to find a keyword with a low competition score.

Pro tip: The best combination is high search volume and low competition score. But if you can’t get that perfect mix, go for the low competitive score, as it will give you a better chance to rank, even if it isn’t searched as often.

4. Come Up With Content Related to Those Keywords: To come up with topic ideas around a keyword, you can use a tool called Answer the Public , which gives you all the most popular questions searched online.

answer-the-public

3. Engage Your Audience:

It’s been highly discussed on forums all over the Internet, and there appears to be a strong correlation between YouTube video ranking and the number of likes, dislikes, and comments the video received.

While YouTube itself might not be using the number of likes and comments to determine where your video rank, having high engagement allows your video to be discovered through other means.

Here is an example of how it would work:

- A YouTuber with 100,000 subscribers views your video and likes it

- Then your video might be visible to a fraction of those 100,000 subscribers.

- Boom! Domino effect!

- More people will see your video and like it, increasing your network of viewers and your watch time, which is one of the main factors that YouTube takes into consideration.

Get engagements with a call to action:

- Don’t be afraid to ask for an engagement at the beginning of the video to avoid fall off on retention.

- Encourage them to leave a comment or start a discussion by asking a question at the end of your video.

- Monitor comments and responds to them so you can build a relationship with your audience over time.

It’s all about creating a community and that is what YouTube encourages.

4. Upload YouTube Video in Proper Length:

YouTube puts a lot of weight on watch time, and in addition to that, it puts more weight on session watch time.

Session watch time is counted when people watch your video and then continue to watch others, it doesn’t have to be your own. The more time people spend watching YouTube videos, as a result of your content, the more likely YouTube will increase your ranking.

Since YouTube puts importance on time spent watching videos, the length of your video will play a key role.

If you have 5 videos and all of them are a minute long, a 100% watch through will only get you 5 minutes total.

However, if you have 1 video that is 20 minutes, and an average viewer only watches half of it, then you have an average watch time of over 10 minutes. That’s more than double what your five short videos can do. This longer video is worth more. However, if that 20-minute video is really boring and people drop off in the first minute, then it’s not any better than 1 of the 5 short videos.

If your format allows, go for a longer video instead of a shorter one. But the most important thing is that you can keep people watching your videos: so use end screen and playlist links to keep them engaged.

End screen: Pick related videos for your audience, so they know exactly what they should watch next. You can even create a background template for your end screens .

related-videos-for-your-audience

Playlist: If you have multiple videos that fit a specific topic, add them to a playlist so the viewer can enjoy them all in one viewing.

add-videos-of-the-same-topic-to-a-playlist

Key Takeaways:

  1. Use Audience Retention to better understand how to structure your video for the best results.
  2. Perform Keyword Research to find the keywords that your competitors are using and your audience is searching for.
  3. Increasing Subscribers gets your video in front of more people the moment it is published.
  4. Encourage Comments and respond to establish a relationship with your viewers.
  5. Ensure that Viewers Continue Watching videos on YouTube after they finish watching yours.

Other Things That Affects Your YouTube Ranking

Except for the above-mentioned factors, there are also other issues that affect the ranking of your YouTube video. YouTube has stated that the number of subscribers doesn’t play a key role in your video ranking.

For example, if a YouTuber has a million subscribers and then overnight they lose 100 thousand, a video they had ranking number 1 will still be ranked number 1.

However, the number of subscribers has a lot of indirect effects on your channel.

- Subscribers know the moment your video is published

- Subscribers will watch your video in the first week (YouTube will rank your video higher if they see a lift in the first week of publishing)

- YouTube put a higher value on subscribers than views and social shares, because it’s harder to fake subscribers

Growing subscribers take time and effort, and even though it shouldn’t be your main focus, there are tactics you can do to gain more subscribers .

Don’t miss a chance to optimize your YouTube video, download, and print out this checklist for your next video project. For more information on SEO(Search Engine Optimization) on YouTube, you can also read the following article.

How to Fast Rank Video Higher with Video SEO >>

10 Best YouTube Keyword Tools to Use with Bonus Tips>>

If you want to find a video editing solution that empowers your imagination and creativity yet takes less effort, please try this robust and user-friendly video editing software Wondershare Filmora. It provides special effects, stock photo & video, sound library, etc., which will definitely enhance your productivity and helps to make money by making videos much accessible.

Download Filmora9 Win Version Download Filmora9 Mac Version

author avatar

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Also read:

  • Title: "2024 Approved Discovering 6 Distinct Icon and Logo Providers"
  • Author: Steven
  • Created at : 2024-05-25 18:35:20
  • Updated at : 2024-05-26 18:35:20
  • Link: https://youtube-clips.techidaily.com/2024-approved-discovering-6-distinct-icon-and-logo-providers/
  • License: This work is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0.
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"2024 Approved Discovering 6 Distinct Icon and Logo Providers"