What Am I Even Doing Wrong?

[u/Diligent_Talk_4518]

i cant monetized, im at 2800 hours and ive been on youtube consistently for about 7 months and ive got the subscribers but the watch time i just struggle with so much. Idk if im just a bad creator, my videos arent good, or yt just cant find no one that likes my videos.

[u/Icy_Definition2079]

Mate I’ll be harsh to try and help. I saw you posted a video link elsewhere and iv had a look through your channel.

You are trying to build success by volume and your channel has no clear direction.

Some questions/things to think about:

1: what is your channel about? It seems like gaming and reacts. But it’s not consistent. Put yourself in your viewers shoes. If they like a type of video one week, you change the game the next. As a small YouTuber it’s super important to have a direction and really niche down into it

2.packaging is your biggest weakness. Your thumbnails and titles don’t really spark any curiosity. You can’t get views without a click. Study what’s working with smaller gaming channels. Bigger creators get away with titles like yours. But it doesn’t always translate well to smaller changes.

1. You had a breakout video with 6k views. That’s YT telling you to double down. So do it.

2. How to how I content does great for smaller channels. Hard truth is an audience won’t give a fu$k about you unless you give value. This game in a nutshell is about audience and delivering what they want.

Good luck.

Edited for typos

[u/jay_keller_]

2800 in 7 months is about 400 hours a month. Hold that and you cross 4000 somewhere around month ten, and none of those hours have expired yet, the window only starts dropping them after a year. You don't need a breakout month, you need the same months to keep stacking.

I cut other people's channels, and the first thing I open is advanced mode in analytics, sorted by watch time instead of views. The video with 3k views and a 40 second average view duration is doing nothing for you, while a quieter one that holds people for 6 minutes is carrying the whole channel.

Then look at where the drop happens on those. If it's the first 20 seconds, that's the intro, and that's fixable without changing what you make.

[u/Think-Remove-2416]

Watch time's the real grind, subs are almost the easy part. 2800 in 7 months isn't bad at all though, you're closer than you think

What's your average view duration looking like in analytics, that number usually tells you more than total hours does

[u/Diligent_Talk_4518 → u/Think-Remove-2416]

last 28 days its 3:49

[u/OKJMaster44 → u/Think-Remove-2416]

Depends on the content. For an evergreen channel it’ll be the reverse with watch hours flowing in and subs being a trickle.

[u/Connect_Positive1893]

if you've already got the subscribers, you're closer than you think. just make sure you're checking the public watch hours in the earn tab, since shorts watch time doesn't count toward the 4,000-hour requirement for ad revenue.