Want to know whether your views are coming from YouTube searches? or from the embedded video on your blog? or on someone else’s blog?

Using the totally free and totally easy YouTube insights, those analytics are at your fingertips. Just follow the steps below.

1.) Sign in to your YouTube channel and click “Account” under your menu options in the top right corner of the screen.

2.) Click “Insights” on the horizontal navigation bar near the top of the screen.

3.) Under the “My Videos” heading, you’ll see a list of your videos.  Select one and YouTube will provide you with statistics for that video alone, as opposed to statistics for the whole channel.

4.) After choosing a single video, click on “Discovery” (found on the lower left side of the screen).  Then, you’ll be able to view all the stats regarding where and how often viewers watched your video.  For more detailed info just click the hyperlinks (seen on the right in the screencap below).

So, why do this?  Well, because you can track the performance of videos in various locations.  For example, if you discover that 90% of the views for one of your popular videos are coming from the embedded player on a blog, perhaps you could post more videos on that blog.  Or, if you notice that some videos seem to be drawing a lot of traffic from YouTube searches, you can take a look at what keywords viewers are using to find and watch that video and adjust other video keywords accordingly.

So, now that you’re equipped with a little knowledge about where viewers watch your YouTube videos, be sure to subscribe to the 12 Stars Media channel and our e-mail list (use the form on the top right of this page) so you’ll get more YouTube tips and tricks.

Jim Louderback, CEO of Revision3 Internet Television, posted this week “There, I Said It: Screw Viral Videos” and we couldn’t agree more.

If there’s anything we’re learning from experience in social media, it’s that deeper, longer lasting relationships with viewers, visitors, and commenters matter most. It’s that whole quality versus quantity concept. Heard of it? But, not surprisingly, Louderback says “online video creators, advertisers, and producers have an unhealthy fascination with viral videos, and that obsession is dragging down the entire industry.”

I like how Louderback reminded us, though, that “successful producers bind an audience to their creation, building an insatiable hunger for the next installment, next episode, next post.” If you think of it in terms of your favorite television program, you might have a favorite episode or one that really stands out (representing the outstanding or viral video), but what keeps you tuning in week after week is the continuity, character development, and that good ol’ “what’s going to happen next?” feeling.  Same goes with online video.

“Ten predictable episodic shows that deliver a consistent 100,000 views an episode is far easier to plan for an monetize than a channel that has a one-in-100 chance of catching fire — and a 99-in-100 chance of bombing,” says Louderback. For similar reasons, although admittedly none of our video productions have yet reached the 100,000 view mark, we constantly educate our clients in the strange paradox of quality versus quantity of viewers and quality versus quantity of video production. From our perspective, high quality viewers and high quantity of online video is the secret recipe.

“So what’s an advertiser to do? Stop chasing viral, and start looking closely at online video that delivers repeatable, measurable and sustainable views,” says Louderback.  And we agree.

In putting on some of our Media for Hire antics, we gave two 140 Character Conference attendees the opportunity to tell us what brought them out to Scotty’s Brewhouse last week for the #140conf (as it’s called on twitter).

Let’s see how they did.

First up – Tim Hashko, of YouGo Network…
 

 
 
Great Job!  And now, Daniel Herndon of Redwall Live and Forkout…
 
 

 
 
Yikes, better luck next time Daniel.  But hey, it sounds like you got some tasty food at Scotty’s so that’s always a plus (Scotty’s Dill Chips are our favorite).

Watch out for an upcoming episode  Media for Hire with more interviews of Indianapolis social media folk!

Okay so, I’ve gone back to this blog post at least ten times in the last month to copy the very mysterious, yet deliciously helpful, code that allows me to easily generate YouTube video thumbnails for use in our blogs.  In the author’s own words…

“This could be useful to display thumbnails with links in your sidebar, or to replace the YouTube embed code with a video within your RSS feed. Attempting to write your own YouTube thumbnail generator could be quite a task.

The good news is that you don’t actually have to generate a thumbnail, YouTube actually has several waiting for you:

Here’s the video – notice the video id?

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?SgGVitTU9F8

Here are the images in a couple sizes and frames, note the video id is embedded in the URL:

• http://img.youtube.com/vi/SgGVitTU9F8/0.jpg
• http://img.youtube.com/vi/SgGVitTU9F8/1.jpg
• http://img.youtube.com/vi/SgGVitTU9F8/2.jpg

Our friend and client, Douglas Karr, first showed us how it was done. You can read the whole post on the Marketing Tech Blog, and you should definitely subscribe to the blog for lots more helpful tips like this one.

Last week we attended our first 140 Characters Conference at Scotty’s Brewhouse in downtown Indianapolis. Jeff Pulver, founder of the 140 Characters Conference, came with a purpose – to meet people who’s lives are being affected by the emerging real-time internet and to recruit “140 ambassadors.”

Check out the video below…
 

 
We love shooting interviews and capturing the energy of fun events, especially social media events, especially social media events with Scotty’s Dill Chips. So, should you or anyone you know every have the need for some video coverage of an event… you know who to call.

We recently hosted a contest on the facebook page for our reality series Media for Hire (click here if you’ve never heard of it). How did we get over 60 comments on one post (300% more than any other previous post) and increased traffic to our facebook page by over 700%? One simple word…

Influence.

We hosted a contest for “Social Media Top Gun” in which our fans could nominate and vote for someone to win the bragging rights (that’s right, no prize at all other than bragging rights). We asked several of the most influential people in our social media community to participate and voila!   Comments and “likes” started pouring in and in less than 24 hours we had received three times as many comments as any other previous post.

The contest originally stemmed from our Media for Hire episode involving a friendly challenge between Chad Richards and me during an in-flight refueling mission on board a KC-135 Stratotanker.  We were invited to attend the flight, not really to compete for “Social Media Top Gun,” but to learn about how Grissom Air Reserve Base is using social media for crisis management and to help promote the social media footprint of the 434th Air Refueling Wing.

Dave Woodson (pictured top right) won the contest, but we don’t think we came out too shabby either. We netted over 25 page “likes” and brought in 700% more traffic than the previous week.  Here’s an interview with the “Social Media Top Gun” himself during this year’s Blog Indiana conference.

Lesson to be learned – find people with influence to help you boost your social media traffic and interactivity (and a little competition never hurts either).

Be sure to “like” our Media for Hire facebook page yourself if you haven’t already done so.  Who knows, you may become the next “Social Media Top Gun”!

Two more interviews from Blog Indiana 2010.

In the first, Amy Stark interviews Nathan Hand of School on Wheels.

 
Then Jon Bausman of Ricker’s Stores and Josh Humble of TKO Graphix share their experiences with Blog Indiana 2010.
 

Here you’ll find some of the first video posted from Blog Indiana 2010.

The first is a clip detailing the efforts of Bg Kahuna as he searches for the answer to the weekend’s most difficult question – “What is a Blog?”

Check it out below…
 

 
The second is a more serious interview, during which Robby Slaughter of Slaughter Development interviews Paul Poteet immediately following the latter’s keynote session.  Robby gets the scoop on Paul’s experience with failure (fitting, since Paul discussed getting fired numerous times during his keynote and since Robby has just recently released a book entitled “Failure: The Secret to Success”).
 

 
Subscribe to our e-mails using the form on the top right so you don’t miss out on the rest of the great Blog Indiana video to come.

I found a cool tool called quoteURL that allowed me to embed some of my favorite tweets that occurred during my YouTube session at Blog Indiana 2010.

Why?

Well, for a few reasons.

1.) I’d like to take another opportunity to thank these folks publicly for attending my session or viewing the live stream.  So, thanks!

2.) I wanted to use the new tool quoteURL because I thought it looked nifty.

3.) If you are interested in having me speak, you can see how much fun we had during my session.  E-mail me for info about having me speak about YouTube.

Subscribe to our e-mail list right up there (top right) or check back Monday for a link to my presentation slides.

1. 
   AroundIndy Videographer Rocky Walls’ YouTube session will make you “flip” at 4 pm at Blog #Indiana @RockyWalls Photo: http://yfrog.com/n3nvzj #BIN2010 21 Aug 2010 from TweetDeck
2. 
   cassdull Ready to hear @rockywalls (aka Maverick) talk about YouTube marketing! 21 Aug 2010 from HootSuite
3. 
   iupress @RockyWalls promises to throw t-shirts during his session. #BIN2010 21 Aug 2010 from HootSuite
4. 
   jessica_journey 2nd largest search engine in the world? YouTube @rockywalls #BIN2010 21 Aug 2010 from HootSuite
5. 
   gregorycross RT @12StarsMedia Currently streaming @rockywalls presenting “Why YouTube is Social Media Too?” @ http://www.blogindiana.tv #BIN2010 #BINtv 21 Aug 2010 from Touiteur
6. 
   cassdull 2 billion views on Youtube per day – nearly 2x primetime audience of all 3 major networks combined @RockyWalls #bin2010 21 Aug 2010 from HootSuite
7. 
   nathan_hand @RockyWalls ‘value to viewers + ease of sharing = viral’ #bin2010 21 Aug 2010 from HootSuite
8. 
   jlisak Good equation. RT @jessica_journey: What are the 2 things that make something go viral? Value/interest + easy 2 share @rockywalls #BIN2010 21 Aug 2010 from HootSuite
9. 
   pamelareilly1 Would take 60 days to watch all the content that will be unloaded during this #BIN2010 session. Yowza! Per @rockywalls of @12StarsMedia 21 Aug 2010 from UberTwitter
10. 
    iupress I’m the recipient of one of @RockyWalls‘s t-shirts. Woot! #BIN2010 21 Aug 2010 from HootSuite
11. 
    jessica_journey Thanks for the #free t-shirt! SCORE @rockywalls #BIN2010 21 Aug 2010 from HootSuite
12. 
    nathan_hand The more you tell people how to do something, the more (and more often) they’ll pay you to do it instead (via @RockyWalls) #bin2010 21 Aug 2010 from HootSuite
13. 
    jessica_journey Introduce your staff in a YouTube video! @rockywalls #BIN2010 21 Aug 2010 from HootSuite
14. 
    timhashko listening to @RockyWalls – great job! 21 Aug 2010 from HootSuite
15. 
    cassdull @RockyWalls thinks you should like him bc he’s cool. Decide for yourself. #bin2010 http://twitpic.com/2gxbmy 21 Aug 2010 from Echofon
16. 
    timhashko thanks for the shout out, @RockyWalls! @IndyProv DID get quite a few views for #ISBF #bintv #bin2010 21 Aug 2010 from HootSuite
17. 
    dauble Love this quote: “Are you mowing what I’m growing?” #rockywalls #bin2010 21 Aug 2010 from web
18. 
    edeckers @gregorycross Yes, I like to see @RockyWalls on video too. #Bin2010 21 Aug 2010 from TweetDeck in reply to gregorycross
19. 
    gregorycross RT @dauble Love this quote: “Are you mowing what I’m growing?” @rockywalls #bin2010 / he’s got lots more, I know we share office space lol 21 Aug 2010 from Touiteur
20. 
    hust0058 @rockywalls Great session at #BIN2010 via #BINTV My big takeaway – YouTube Insights… I had no idea. Thanks 21 Aug 2010 from web
21. 
    AroundIndy Enjoyed @RockyWalls presentation at Blog #Indiana conference from the comfort of my den via #bintv #bin2010. Thanks for a good show, Rocky! 21 Aug 2010 from TweetDeck

— this quote was brought to you by quoteurl

Megan O’Neill, of SocialTimes.com, recently did a great blog post that lists 5 goals every video maker should have in mind when making video. 

Here are two of the goals Megan mentions in her blog post:

Hold Viewers Attention Until The End Of Your Video

Once your users have clicked “Play” you have only won half the battle.  You still need to keep your viewers attention so that they will watch your video all the way through to the end.  You want your viewers to be entertained and captivated from start to finish.  This can be done in several ways, including with humor, drama, shock and just plain interesting content.

Remember that when it comes to online video content, viewers are used to short snippets.  Although you can upload a fifteen-minute video to YouTube, a viewer might not be willing to sit through your quarter-of-an-hour masterpiece as something that is only a minute or two long.  Try to squeeze as much information as you can into as short a clip as possible.

Scott suggests giving your video a trial run amongst your friends and co-workers.  You can upload your video as private or unlisted, share it with a few people and ask for feedback.  Good questions to ask your guinea pigs is whether the clip held their attention, whether they think anything could be left out, and if they can think of any ways that you could improve your video and make it more appealing.

Inspire Action

This final goal applies to online video campaigns that are designed to promote a product or service or that have some kind of conversion goal in mind.  Do you want your viewers to purchase a product?  Do you want them to sign a petition, visit a website or fill out a form?  If so, then it is incredibly important that you make this clear and inspire your viewers to engage in these actions.

Let’s say your objective is to get your viewers to sign an anti-fur petition.  At the end of your video let your viewers know about the petition and where they can go to sign it.  You can also include a link to the petition in the video description or on the website where the video is displayed.  You don’t want your viewers to have to do any more work that in absolutely necessary so tell them flat out and clearly what you want them to do and how they can do it.  Otherwise you will be left with a lot of views and no results.

Have you thought about these inherent goals when creating your own online videos?  Has keeping them in mind lead to more successful online video campaigns?

Read the rest of blog post here: http://www.socialtimes.com/2010/08/online-video-goals/