Evasion Techniques for YouTube Bans

How to Avoid and Reverse Strikes on Your YouTube Channel

Richard Bennett

Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions

0

Do you monetize your videos? Or, do you like to Livestream? These are two perks of having a YouTube account in good standing. You can lose these privileges, have your ability to post videos frozen, and even have your account terminated if you start accumulating strikes.

If you receive a strike, you will usually be able to get rid of it. This article will show you how.

Table of Content:

1. Copyright Strikes

2. Wrongful Copyright Strikes

3. Community Guidelines Strikes

There are two types of strikes: Community Guideline Strikes and Copyright Strikes. Your account and all your videos will be deleted if you get three of either one of these types of strikes, but YouTube is fair about how these strikes are given out and how you can reverse them.

1. Copyright Strikes

You get a copyright strike when you use media in your video which someone else owns the copyrights to. Music, clips, photographs, and sound effects are examples of the kinds of media you may use that could be owned by someone else.

The most obvious way to earn a copyright strike is to repost content which you did not create, i.e. clips from a television show or a popular song. If you know that the content you got a strike for was not yours and did not fall under ‘fair use ’, then there are two ways you can resolve it.

1. You can complete YouTube’s simple course on copyright infringement (Copyright School ) and wait three months. Copyright strikes expire in three months so long as you complete the course (they will not expire if you don’t take the course).

2. you can contact the holder of the copyright and ask them to retract their claim. You will probably have to offer to delete your video. Keep in mind that it is completely up to the rights holder whether you deleting your video is enough for them to retract their claim. They are allowed to say ‘no’.

Deleting your video, especially if you do so without contacting the rights holder, will not automatically reverse your copyright strike.

The majority of copyright strikes that you as a YouTube creator receive – if you receive any – will not be as black and white as ‘someone else owns it, you shouldn’t have used it’. If you know that you have a license to use the song or other media you got the strike for, or feel like your use of a clip falls under ‘fair use’, then your path to reversing the strike will be different.

2. Wrongful Copyright Strikes

YouTube’s system for detecting copyright infringement is automated. This means that you can get a copyright strike without actually breaking any rules. These strikes are generally easy to reverse.

For creators, the most common instance of this is being flagged for using copyrighted music. When you download royalty-free music – whether you download it for free or pay for it – you might not realize that that music is still copyrighted to someone else and can still be flagged by YouTube’s system.

If this has happened to you, reversing it is simple.

1. Submit a counter-notification through the form provided and include either your licensing information or a link to where it can be found online.

2. After you submit your counter-notification, the copyright holder will have 10 business days to respond. Since in this scenario the rights holder will know they have allowed their content to be licensed out, there should be no conflict and your video will be reinstated.

‘Fair use’ is another thing YouTube’s system has no way of detecting. ‘Fair use’ means that you are using content that you do not own, and which you do not have a license to use, but that you are using it in a way that is legally protected. Satire, criticism, education, and news reporting are areas that may be protected by fair use, although every situation is different.

There is no situation in which crediting a rights holder, adding a disclaimer, or simply not monetizing your video will make it fair use.

To reverse a copyright strike where you believe your video should be protected as ‘fair use’, submit a counter-notification through the web form YouTube provides. The rights holder will have 10 business days to provide YouTube with evidence that they have initiated a court action against your content. There is a chance that they will not agree with you about the ‘fair use’ status of your video. You could be in for a bit of a fight.

If your account has been suspended for accumulating multiple strikes, you will no longer be able to access the online counter-notification form and will have to send a free-form counter-notification. Information on that can be found here .

3. Community Guidelines Strikes

Most video creators – people who post vlogs, travel videos, and various kinds of tutorials – will never receive this type of strike. Sexual content, hateful content, threats, and scams are among the things you could post which would result in a community guidelines strike. Creators, in general, are not interested in posting cruel or graphic content.

The only thing some video creators might have to be careful of is misleading metadata. You can get community guidelines to strike for intentionally using the title, tags, and description of your video to build up an expectation of the content your video does not deliver on. For example, if you post a personal vlog and title it ‘Call of Duty Review’ to try and capitalize on people who might be searching for gaming videos then you might receive a strike.

Blatantly using keywords that have nothing to do with your content is not something you can do accidentally, but it is possible to be misleading in your metadata without trying to be dishonest. YouTube is a very competitive place, and many creators are turning towards title strategies which could be considered ‘clickbait’. If you say in your title that you had a baby, but reveal in your actual video that ‘had a baby’ meant ‘wrote a new song’, will that get you a community guidelines strike? Probably not, but it can be a thin line.

In general, just don’t mention anything in your title or tags which you do not talk about in your video.

Community Guidelines strikes expire after three months. As long as you only have one strike, it will not affect your channel or what you can do on YouTube. If you receive a second strike within the three months of your first strike, you will lose the ability to post videos for two weeks. If you receive a third strike before either of your previous strikes has expired, your account will be terminated.

Have you experienced a copyright strike against your YouTube channel? Let us know what happened in the comments.

Create Original Videos with Excellent Video Editor

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

Do you monetize your videos? Or, do you like to Livestream? These are two perks of having a YouTube account in good standing. You can lose these privileges, have your ability to post videos frozen, and even have your account terminated if you start accumulating strikes.

If you receive a strike, you will usually be able to get rid of it. This article will show you how.

Table of Content:

1. Copyright Strikes

2. Wrongful Copyright Strikes

3. Community Guidelines Strikes

There are two types of strikes: Community Guideline Strikes and Copyright Strikes. Your account and all your videos will be deleted if you get three of either one of these types of strikes, but YouTube is fair about how these strikes are given out and how you can reverse them.

1. Copyright Strikes

You get a copyright strike when you use media in your video which someone else owns the copyrights to. Music, clips, photographs, and sound effects are examples of the kinds of media you may use that could be owned by someone else.

The most obvious way to earn a copyright strike is to repost content which you did not create, i.e. clips from a television show or a popular song. If you know that the content you got a strike for was not yours and did not fall under ‘fair use ’, then there are two ways you can resolve it.

1. You can complete YouTube’s simple course on copyright infringement (Copyright School ) and wait three months. Copyright strikes expire in three months so long as you complete the course (they will not expire if you don’t take the course).

2. you can contact the holder of the copyright and ask them to retract their claim. You will probably have to offer to delete your video. Keep in mind that it is completely up to the rights holder whether you deleting your video is enough for them to retract their claim. They are allowed to say ‘no’.

Deleting your video, especially if you do so without contacting the rights holder, will not automatically reverse your copyright strike.

The majority of copyright strikes that you as a YouTube creator receive – if you receive any – will not be as black and white as ‘someone else owns it, you shouldn’t have used it’. If you know that you have a license to use the song or other media you got the strike for, or feel like your use of a clip falls under ‘fair use’, then your path to reversing the strike will be different.

2. Wrongful Copyright Strikes

YouTube’s system for detecting copyright infringement is automated. This means that you can get a copyright strike without actually breaking any rules. These strikes are generally easy to reverse.

For creators, the most common instance of this is being flagged for using copyrighted music. When you download royalty-free music – whether you download it for free or pay for it – you might not realize that that music is still copyrighted to someone else and can still be flagged by YouTube’s system.

If this has happened to you, reversing it is simple.

1. Submit a counter-notification through the form provided and include either your licensing information or a link to where it can be found online.

2. After you submit your counter-notification, the copyright holder will have 10 business days to respond. Since in this scenario the rights holder will know they have allowed their content to be licensed out, there should be no conflict and your video will be reinstated.

‘Fair use’ is another thing YouTube’s system has no way of detecting. ‘Fair use’ means that you are using content that you do not own, and which you do not have a license to use, but that you are using it in a way that is legally protected. Satire, criticism, education, and news reporting are areas that may be protected by fair use, although every situation is different.

There is no situation in which crediting a rights holder, adding a disclaimer, or simply not monetizing your video will make it fair use.

To reverse a copyright strike where you believe your video should be protected as ‘fair use’, submit a counter-notification through the web form YouTube provides. The rights holder will have 10 business days to provide YouTube with evidence that they have initiated a court action against your content. There is a chance that they will not agree with you about the ‘fair use’ status of your video. You could be in for a bit of a fight.

If your account has been suspended for accumulating multiple strikes, you will no longer be able to access the online counter-notification form and will have to send a free-form counter-notification. Information on that can be found here .

3. Community Guidelines Strikes

Most video creators – people who post vlogs, travel videos, and various kinds of tutorials – will never receive this type of strike. Sexual content, hateful content, threats, and scams are among the things you could post which would result in a community guidelines strike. Creators, in general, are not interested in posting cruel or graphic content.

The only thing some video creators might have to be careful of is misleading metadata. You can get community guidelines to strike for intentionally using the title, tags, and description of your video to build up an expectation of the content your video does not deliver on. For example, if you post a personal vlog and title it ‘Call of Duty Review’ to try and capitalize on people who might be searching for gaming videos then you might receive a strike.

Blatantly using keywords that have nothing to do with your content is not something you can do accidentally, but it is possible to be misleading in your metadata without trying to be dishonest. YouTube is a very competitive place, and many creators are turning towards title strategies which could be considered ‘clickbait’. If you say in your title that you had a baby, but reveal in your actual video that ‘had a baby’ meant ‘wrote a new song’, will that get you a community guidelines strike? Probably not, but it can be a thin line.

In general, just don’t mention anything in your title or tags which you do not talk about in your video.

Community Guidelines strikes expire after three months. As long as you only have one strike, it will not affect your channel or what you can do on YouTube. If you receive a second strike within the three months of your first strike, you will lose the ability to post videos for two weeks. If you receive a third strike before either of your previous strikes has expired, your account will be terminated.

Have you experienced a copyright strike against your YouTube channel? Let us know what happened in the comments.

Create Original Videos with Excellent Video Editor

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

Do you monetize your videos? Or, do you like to Livestream? These are two perks of having a YouTube account in good standing. You can lose these privileges, have your ability to post videos frozen, and even have your account terminated if you start accumulating strikes.

If you receive a strike, you will usually be able to get rid of it. This article will show you how.

Table of Content:

1. Copyright Strikes

2. Wrongful Copyright Strikes

3. Community Guidelines Strikes

There are two types of strikes: Community Guideline Strikes and Copyright Strikes. Your account and all your videos will be deleted if you get three of either one of these types of strikes, but YouTube is fair about how these strikes are given out and how you can reverse them.

1. Copyright Strikes

You get a copyright strike when you use media in your video which someone else owns the copyrights to. Music, clips, photographs, and sound effects are examples of the kinds of media you may use that could be owned by someone else.

The most obvious way to earn a copyright strike is to repost content which you did not create, i.e. clips from a television show or a popular song. If you know that the content you got a strike for was not yours and did not fall under ‘fair use ’, then there are two ways you can resolve it.

1. You can complete YouTube’s simple course on copyright infringement (Copyright School ) and wait three months. Copyright strikes expire in three months so long as you complete the course (they will not expire if you don’t take the course).

2. you can contact the holder of the copyright and ask them to retract their claim. You will probably have to offer to delete your video. Keep in mind that it is completely up to the rights holder whether you deleting your video is enough for them to retract their claim. They are allowed to say ‘no’.

Deleting your video, especially if you do so without contacting the rights holder, will not automatically reverse your copyright strike.

The majority of copyright strikes that you as a YouTube creator receive – if you receive any – will not be as black and white as ‘someone else owns it, you shouldn’t have used it’. If you know that you have a license to use the song or other media you got the strike for, or feel like your use of a clip falls under ‘fair use’, then your path to reversing the strike will be different.

2. Wrongful Copyright Strikes

YouTube’s system for detecting copyright infringement is automated. This means that you can get a copyright strike without actually breaking any rules. These strikes are generally easy to reverse.

For creators, the most common instance of this is being flagged for using copyrighted music. When you download royalty-free music – whether you download it for free or pay for it – you might not realize that that music is still copyrighted to someone else and can still be flagged by YouTube’s system.

If this has happened to you, reversing it is simple.

1. Submit a counter-notification through the form provided and include either your licensing information or a link to where it can be found online.

2. After you submit your counter-notification, the copyright holder will have 10 business days to respond. Since in this scenario the rights holder will know they have allowed their content to be licensed out, there should be no conflict and your video will be reinstated.

‘Fair use’ is another thing YouTube’s system has no way of detecting. ‘Fair use’ means that you are using content that you do not own, and which you do not have a license to use, but that you are using it in a way that is legally protected. Satire, criticism, education, and news reporting are areas that may be protected by fair use, although every situation is different.

There is no situation in which crediting a rights holder, adding a disclaimer, or simply not monetizing your video will make it fair use.

To reverse a copyright strike where you believe your video should be protected as ‘fair use’, submit a counter-notification through the web form YouTube provides. The rights holder will have 10 business days to provide YouTube with evidence that they have initiated a court action against your content. There is a chance that they will not agree with you about the ‘fair use’ status of your video. You could be in for a bit of a fight.

If your account has been suspended for accumulating multiple strikes, you will no longer be able to access the online counter-notification form and will have to send a free-form counter-notification. Information on that can be found here .

3. Community Guidelines Strikes

Most video creators – people who post vlogs, travel videos, and various kinds of tutorials – will never receive this type of strike. Sexual content, hateful content, threats, and scams are among the things you could post which would result in a community guidelines strike. Creators, in general, are not interested in posting cruel or graphic content.

The only thing some video creators might have to be careful of is misleading metadata. You can get community guidelines to strike for intentionally using the title, tags, and description of your video to build up an expectation of the content your video does not deliver on. For example, if you post a personal vlog and title it ‘Call of Duty Review’ to try and capitalize on people who might be searching for gaming videos then you might receive a strike.

Blatantly using keywords that have nothing to do with your content is not something you can do accidentally, but it is possible to be misleading in your metadata without trying to be dishonest. YouTube is a very competitive place, and many creators are turning towards title strategies which could be considered ‘clickbait’. If you say in your title that you had a baby, but reveal in your actual video that ‘had a baby’ meant ‘wrote a new song’, will that get you a community guidelines strike? Probably not, but it can be a thin line.

In general, just don’t mention anything in your title or tags which you do not talk about in your video.

Community Guidelines strikes expire after three months. As long as you only have one strike, it will not affect your channel or what you can do on YouTube. If you receive a second strike within the three months of your first strike, you will lose the ability to post videos for two weeks. If you receive a third strike before either of your previous strikes has expired, your account will be terminated.

Have you experienced a copyright strike against your YouTube channel? Let us know what happened in the comments.

Create Original Videos with Excellent Video Editor

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

Do you monetize your videos? Or, do you like to Livestream? These are two perks of having a YouTube account in good standing. You can lose these privileges, have your ability to post videos frozen, and even have your account terminated if you start accumulating strikes.

If you receive a strike, you will usually be able to get rid of it. This article will show you how.

Table of Content:

1. Copyright Strikes

2. Wrongful Copyright Strikes

3. Community Guidelines Strikes

There are two types of strikes: Community Guideline Strikes and Copyright Strikes. Your account and all your videos will be deleted if you get three of either one of these types of strikes, but YouTube is fair about how these strikes are given out and how you can reverse them.

1. Copyright Strikes

You get a copyright strike when you use media in your video which someone else owns the copyrights to. Music, clips, photographs, and sound effects are examples of the kinds of media you may use that could be owned by someone else.

The most obvious way to earn a copyright strike is to repost content which you did not create, i.e. clips from a television show or a popular song. If you know that the content you got a strike for was not yours and did not fall under ‘fair use ’, then there are two ways you can resolve it.

1. You can complete YouTube’s simple course on copyright infringement (Copyright School ) and wait three months. Copyright strikes expire in three months so long as you complete the course (they will not expire if you don’t take the course).

2. you can contact the holder of the copyright and ask them to retract their claim. You will probably have to offer to delete your video. Keep in mind that it is completely up to the rights holder whether you deleting your video is enough for them to retract their claim. They are allowed to say ‘no’.

Deleting your video, especially if you do so without contacting the rights holder, will not automatically reverse your copyright strike.

The majority of copyright strikes that you as a YouTube creator receive – if you receive any – will not be as black and white as ‘someone else owns it, you shouldn’t have used it’. If you know that you have a license to use the song or other media you got the strike for, or feel like your use of a clip falls under ‘fair use’, then your path to reversing the strike will be different.

2. Wrongful Copyright Strikes

YouTube’s system for detecting copyright infringement is automated. This means that you can get a copyright strike without actually breaking any rules. These strikes are generally easy to reverse.

For creators, the most common instance of this is being flagged for using copyrighted music. When you download royalty-free music – whether you download it for free or pay for it – you might not realize that that music is still copyrighted to someone else and can still be flagged by YouTube’s system.

If this has happened to you, reversing it is simple.

1. Submit a counter-notification through the form provided and include either your licensing information or a link to where it can be found online.

2. After you submit your counter-notification, the copyright holder will have 10 business days to respond. Since in this scenario the rights holder will know they have allowed their content to be licensed out, there should be no conflict and your video will be reinstated.

‘Fair use’ is another thing YouTube’s system has no way of detecting. ‘Fair use’ means that you are using content that you do not own, and which you do not have a license to use, but that you are using it in a way that is legally protected. Satire, criticism, education, and news reporting are areas that may be protected by fair use, although every situation is different.

There is no situation in which crediting a rights holder, adding a disclaimer, or simply not monetizing your video will make it fair use.

To reverse a copyright strike where you believe your video should be protected as ‘fair use’, submit a counter-notification through the web form YouTube provides. The rights holder will have 10 business days to provide YouTube with evidence that they have initiated a court action against your content. There is a chance that they will not agree with you about the ‘fair use’ status of your video. You could be in for a bit of a fight.

If your account has been suspended for accumulating multiple strikes, you will no longer be able to access the online counter-notification form and will have to send a free-form counter-notification. Information on that can be found here .

3. Community Guidelines Strikes

Most video creators – people who post vlogs, travel videos, and various kinds of tutorials – will never receive this type of strike. Sexual content, hateful content, threats, and scams are among the things you could post which would result in a community guidelines strike. Creators, in general, are not interested in posting cruel or graphic content.

The only thing some video creators might have to be careful of is misleading metadata. You can get community guidelines to strike for intentionally using the title, tags, and description of your video to build up an expectation of the content your video does not deliver on. For example, if you post a personal vlog and title it ‘Call of Duty Review’ to try and capitalize on people who might be searching for gaming videos then you might receive a strike.

Blatantly using keywords that have nothing to do with your content is not something you can do accidentally, but it is possible to be misleading in your metadata without trying to be dishonest. YouTube is a very competitive place, and many creators are turning towards title strategies which could be considered ‘clickbait’. If you say in your title that you had a baby, but reveal in your actual video that ‘had a baby’ meant ‘wrote a new song’, will that get you a community guidelines strike? Probably not, but it can be a thin line.

In general, just don’t mention anything in your title or tags which you do not talk about in your video.

Community Guidelines strikes expire after three months. As long as you only have one strike, it will not affect your channel or what you can do on YouTube. If you receive a second strike within the three months of your first strike, you will lose the ability to post videos for two weeks. If you receive a third strike before either of your previous strikes has expired, your account will be terminated.

Have you experienced a copyright strike against your YouTube channel? Let us know what happened in the comments.

Create Original Videos with Excellent Video Editor

Richard Bennett

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

Follow @Richard Bennett

Finding Inner Voice: How to Confidently Share Stories Online

8 Tips on How to Vlog Confidently Like Popular YouTubers

Richard Bennett

Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions

0

For most people, vlogging is not something that comes naturally. Like any skill, it takes practice to improve. When someone is good at vlogging, they make it look easy.

When we watch the most popular YouTubers, the traits that make them successful are often invisible, because we are so consumed by their vlog. In this article, I’ll highlight 8 tips from the most accomplished vloggers on the Internet, so that you can vlog confidently and make the best YouTube videos.

1. Be Authentic

People opt to watch vlogs because they want to see something real.

Vlogging is about honesty, telling a story that is truthful and showing your personality. The most popular vloggers are likable because they don’t deceive the audience, they befriend them. Vloggers treat their audience with respect and that comes from being honest.

There will be an urge for you to mimic other vloggers, talking and acting the way they do, but savvy YouTube viewers will be able to see your faux personality pretty quickly.

Don’t focus on your image, but instead focus on your voice. What makes you different? That is how you will build a proper reputation.

2. Tell A Story

A vlog is not an assortment of footage haphazardly put together. A successful vlog must have a story: a conflict told with a beginning, middle, and end.

When you are casually telling a story to a friend, you are not thinking about the structure or the plot. You are focused on what happened and you want to communicate it as accurately as you can. While vlogging, you should approach it much the same way. Ad-libbing is fine. Stumbling is fine. Going back and repeating a part of the story is fine. By simply getting your story on camera, you now have all the pieces.

Once all the pieces of the story are captured — including your storytelling, b-roll, and other supportive footage — you must now cut out all the irrelevant or repetitive parts and edit it so it can be enjoyed as one cohesive tale.

Take a look at this example from Tiffany Alvord and notice how there are jump cuts both to skip information that can be assumed by the audience and add the tension to the story she’s telling.

3. Surprise and Delight Your Audience

There is a saying that a great ending to a story is that it is surprising, yet inevitable .

The ending needs to be justified even if there is a twist. Everything before that had worked to build up the tension and when it concludes it needs to be logical. However, the ending cannot be something that the audience can guess. Remember those mystery movies where you know who the murderer is after the first few scenes? Yeah… those aren’t satisfying. A good story ends with a surprise, and with everything prior leading up to it.

The gold standard example of a surprising, yet inevitable end is Casey Neistat’s bike lane video. Everything in the video is leading up to the end, but when you watch it the first time it’s unexpected, and that’s why it’s so good.

4. Be Inviting

A common trait of successful vloggers is that they are welcoming. They share their passion and encourage others to join in. Vlogging is about being a guide. It doesn’t matter if you are leading a tour of your home or showing your viewer an interesting new skill, it is important for you to approach the whole process with open arms.

Unlike being invited to a party, there is no obligation when it comes to YouTube. Your viewers can continue to live vicariously through you or they may be inspired by your experience and dare to try it themselves.

The opposite of inviting is rejecting, and when you are a vlogger, you don’t want to reject anyone from enjoying your videos.

5. Compose the Shot

Vlogging is a visual medium, and while the story is important, what is captured in the frame will play an impactful role in the video as well.

In a way, every vlogger needs to have a director’s eye for cinematography. I’m not saying that you need to be Wes Anderson to be an awesome vlogger, but knowing what is in the frame with you, the angle of the shot, the movement of the camera, and the quality of light will help the product look better.

The great thing about vlogging is that you will get a lot of practice framing shots, so I encourage you to learn the basics of video editing .

Check out this example from Rosanna Pansino , where she gives a tour of her bedroom.

The camera follows her fluidly throughout the video, but it is her eyes that guide both the camera moves and what she wants our attention to be directed to. Don’t hesitate to let the viewer know what you want them to see.

6. Be Prepared

While you can pick up a camera and start vlogging on the fly, being prepared enables you to produce the best video possible. Take a few minutes before you hit record simply to outline the key points you want to talk about and how the video will end, ensuring that after filming you haven’t forgotten a crucial part.

Additionally, knowing what to say makes you a better host for your vlog. Watch your favorite vlogger, I bet when they are speaking on camera, their speech is not littered with umms and ahhs…

Good preparation includes having all your gear ready for filming when you need it. There is nothing worse than being set to shoot and running out of battery or memory.

Take a look at Ashley Nichole in this vlog and notice that although she sounds spontaneous, it is also evident that she knows what she is going to talk about next.

7. Be Expressive

Remember those teachers that drone on and on, without adding any expression or passion to what they are lecturing? While they might have been perfectly suitable as teachers, they wouldn’t make good vloggers.

If you speak on camera in a monotone voice, you are not being expressive. Your facial and body language will match your lackluster performance. Even if you are talking about something you are excited about, if your demeanor doesn’t match that, then the video is going to be lifeless. Vlogging is a presentation, a performance. There needs to be energy.

Consider your audience: they are coming home from school or work, where there were classes and meetings, and the last thing they want to watch is a video of your speaking without energy.

Want to see a vlogger that is awesome at being expressive on camera? Check out Emma Chamberlain , if you haven’t already. Every word she says in her video is layered with emotion. We know exactly how she feels.

8. Stay Organized

The same way you should prepare before filming, it’s also important to be organized comes the editing phase. Editing is arguably the most time-consuming part of the vlogging process, so have a system for categorizing and finding your footages.

This is especially important when you have multiple video and audio files and if you are capturing footage over a number of days or in different locations.

Additionally, while filming your vlog, you are going to mess up. It’s also helpful to add a cue after you messed up, this can be a sound cue that causes the levels to spike (clapping or snapping your fingers work) or a video cue such as a dramatic gesture to the camera. When skipping through your footage to find the part where you messed up, later on, it’s easier to have a mark to help you locate it.

Vlogging is hard, so don’t make more work for yourself. Learn little tricks to make life easier for yourself at every step.

The more organized you are the more attention you can put into the creative aspect of vlogging, and less time finding a video file or syncing audio to video.

There you have it, 8 tips to help you vlog like the pros. Anyone can vlog. But only until you point a camera at yourself in public for the first time, do you realize how uncomfortable vlogging can be.

Even filming yourself in your room with the door closed — and nobody is in the house with you — can be a challenge for beginning vloggers. If you find watching your first few videos to be cringy, don’t be discouraged. There are fears of vlogging, but you can overcome them .

Take a look at some of the first videos from popular YouTubers and you can see that everyone had a starting point.

Do you have any vlogging tricks of your own? Leave a comment below.

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, which will definitely enhance your productivity and helps you to make money by making videos much easier.

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

For most people, vlogging is not something that comes naturally. Like any skill, it takes practice to improve. When someone is good at vlogging, they make it look easy.

When we watch the most popular YouTubers, the traits that make them successful are often invisible, because we are so consumed by their vlog. In this article, I’ll highlight 8 tips from the most accomplished vloggers on the Internet, so that you can vlog confidently and make the best YouTube videos.

1. Be Authentic

People opt to watch vlogs because they want to see something real.

Vlogging is about honesty, telling a story that is truthful and showing your personality. The most popular vloggers are likable because they don’t deceive the audience, they befriend them. Vloggers treat their audience with respect and that comes from being honest.

There will be an urge for you to mimic other vloggers, talking and acting the way they do, but savvy YouTube viewers will be able to see your faux personality pretty quickly.

Don’t focus on your image, but instead focus on your voice. What makes you different? That is how you will build a proper reputation.

2. Tell A Story

A vlog is not an assortment of footage haphazardly put together. A successful vlog must have a story: a conflict told with a beginning, middle, and end.

When you are casually telling a story to a friend, you are not thinking about the structure or the plot. You are focused on what happened and you want to communicate it as accurately as you can. While vlogging, you should approach it much the same way. Ad-libbing is fine. Stumbling is fine. Going back and repeating a part of the story is fine. By simply getting your story on camera, you now have all the pieces.

Once all the pieces of the story are captured — including your storytelling, b-roll, and other supportive footage — you must now cut out all the irrelevant or repetitive parts and edit it so it can be enjoyed as one cohesive tale.

Take a look at this example from Tiffany Alvord and notice how there are jump cuts both to skip information that can be assumed by the audience and add the tension to the story she’s telling.

3. Surprise and Delight Your Audience

There is a saying that a great ending to a story is that it is surprising, yet inevitable .

The ending needs to be justified even if there is a twist. Everything before that had worked to build up the tension and when it concludes it needs to be logical. However, the ending cannot be something that the audience can guess. Remember those mystery movies where you know who the murderer is after the first few scenes? Yeah… those aren’t satisfying. A good story ends with a surprise, and with everything prior leading up to it.

The gold standard example of a surprising, yet inevitable end is Casey Neistat’s bike lane video. Everything in the video is leading up to the end, but when you watch it the first time it’s unexpected, and that’s why it’s so good.

4. Be Inviting

A common trait of successful vloggers is that they are welcoming. They share their passion and encourage others to join in. Vlogging is about being a guide. It doesn’t matter if you are leading a tour of your home or showing your viewer an interesting new skill, it is important for you to approach the whole process with open arms.

Unlike being invited to a party, there is no obligation when it comes to YouTube. Your viewers can continue to live vicariously through you or they may be inspired by your experience and dare to try it themselves.

The opposite of inviting is rejecting, and when you are a vlogger, you don’t want to reject anyone from enjoying your videos.

5. Compose the Shot

Vlogging is a visual medium, and while the story is important, what is captured in the frame will play an impactful role in the video as well.

In a way, every vlogger needs to have a director’s eye for cinematography. I’m not saying that you need to be Wes Anderson to be an awesome vlogger, but knowing what is in the frame with you, the angle of the shot, the movement of the camera, and the quality of light will help the product look better.

The great thing about vlogging is that you will get a lot of practice framing shots, so I encourage you to learn the basics of video editing .

Check out this example from Rosanna Pansino , where she gives a tour of her bedroom.

The camera follows her fluidly throughout the video, but it is her eyes that guide both the camera moves and what she wants our attention to be directed to. Don’t hesitate to let the viewer know what you want them to see.

6. Be Prepared

While you can pick up a camera and start vlogging on the fly, being prepared enables you to produce the best video possible. Take a few minutes before you hit record simply to outline the key points you want to talk about and how the video will end, ensuring that after filming you haven’t forgotten a crucial part.

Additionally, knowing what to say makes you a better host for your vlog. Watch your favorite vlogger, I bet when they are speaking on camera, their speech is not littered with umms and ahhs…

Good preparation includes having all your gear ready for filming when you need it. There is nothing worse than being set to shoot and running out of battery or memory.

Take a look at Ashley Nichole in this vlog and notice that although she sounds spontaneous, it is also evident that she knows what she is going to talk about next.

7. Be Expressive

Remember those teachers that drone on and on, without adding any expression or passion to what they are lecturing? While they might have been perfectly suitable as teachers, they wouldn’t make good vloggers.

If you speak on camera in a monotone voice, you are not being expressive. Your facial and body language will match your lackluster performance. Even if you are talking about something you are excited about, if your demeanor doesn’t match that, then the video is going to be lifeless. Vlogging is a presentation, a performance. There needs to be energy.

Consider your audience: they are coming home from school or work, where there were classes and meetings, and the last thing they want to watch is a video of your speaking without energy.

Want to see a vlogger that is awesome at being expressive on camera? Check out Emma Chamberlain , if you haven’t already. Every word she says in her video is layered with emotion. We know exactly how she feels.

8. Stay Organized

The same way you should prepare before filming, it’s also important to be organized comes the editing phase. Editing is arguably the most time-consuming part of the vlogging process, so have a system for categorizing and finding your footages.

This is especially important when you have multiple video and audio files and if you are capturing footage over a number of days or in different locations.

Additionally, while filming your vlog, you are going to mess up. It’s also helpful to add a cue after you messed up, this can be a sound cue that causes the levels to spike (clapping or snapping your fingers work) or a video cue such as a dramatic gesture to the camera. When skipping through your footage to find the part where you messed up, later on, it’s easier to have a mark to help you locate it.

Vlogging is hard, so don’t make more work for yourself. Learn little tricks to make life easier for yourself at every step.

The more organized you are the more attention you can put into the creative aspect of vlogging, and less time finding a video file or syncing audio to video.

There you have it, 8 tips to help you vlog like the pros. Anyone can vlog. But only until you point a camera at yourself in public for the first time, do you realize how uncomfortable vlogging can be.

Even filming yourself in your room with the door closed — and nobody is in the house with you — can be a challenge for beginning vloggers. If you find watching your first few videos to be cringy, don’t be discouraged. There are fears of vlogging, but you can overcome them .

Take a look at some of the first videos from popular YouTubers and you can see that everyone had a starting point.

Do you have any vlogging tricks of your own? Leave a comment below.

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, which will definitely enhance your productivity and helps you to make money by making videos much easier.

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

For most people, vlogging is not something that comes naturally. Like any skill, it takes practice to improve. When someone is good at vlogging, they make it look easy.

When we watch the most popular YouTubers, the traits that make them successful are often invisible, because we are so consumed by their vlog. In this article, I’ll highlight 8 tips from the most accomplished vloggers on the Internet, so that you can vlog confidently and make the best YouTube videos.

1. Be Authentic

People opt to watch vlogs because they want to see something real.

Vlogging is about honesty, telling a story that is truthful and showing your personality. The most popular vloggers are likable because they don’t deceive the audience, they befriend them. Vloggers treat their audience with respect and that comes from being honest.

There will be an urge for you to mimic other vloggers, talking and acting the way they do, but savvy YouTube viewers will be able to see your faux personality pretty quickly.

Don’t focus on your image, but instead focus on your voice. What makes you different? That is how you will build a proper reputation.

2. Tell A Story

A vlog is not an assortment of footage haphazardly put together. A successful vlog must have a story: a conflict told with a beginning, middle, and end.

When you are casually telling a story to a friend, you are not thinking about the structure or the plot. You are focused on what happened and you want to communicate it as accurately as you can. While vlogging, you should approach it much the same way. Ad-libbing is fine. Stumbling is fine. Going back and repeating a part of the story is fine. By simply getting your story on camera, you now have all the pieces.

Once all the pieces of the story are captured — including your storytelling, b-roll, and other supportive footage — you must now cut out all the irrelevant or repetitive parts and edit it so it can be enjoyed as one cohesive tale.

Take a look at this example from Tiffany Alvord and notice how there are jump cuts both to skip information that can be assumed by the audience and add the tension to the story she’s telling.

3. Surprise and Delight Your Audience

There is a saying that a great ending to a story is that it is surprising, yet inevitable .

The ending needs to be justified even if there is a twist. Everything before that had worked to build up the tension and when it concludes it needs to be logical. However, the ending cannot be something that the audience can guess. Remember those mystery movies where you know who the murderer is after the first few scenes? Yeah… those aren’t satisfying. A good story ends with a surprise, and with everything prior leading up to it.

The gold standard example of a surprising, yet inevitable end is Casey Neistat’s bike lane video. Everything in the video is leading up to the end, but when you watch it the first time it’s unexpected, and that’s why it’s so good.

4. Be Inviting

A common trait of successful vloggers is that they are welcoming. They share their passion and encourage others to join in. Vlogging is about being a guide. It doesn’t matter if you are leading a tour of your home or showing your viewer an interesting new skill, it is important for you to approach the whole process with open arms.

Unlike being invited to a party, there is no obligation when it comes to YouTube. Your viewers can continue to live vicariously through you or they may be inspired by your experience and dare to try it themselves.

The opposite of inviting is rejecting, and when you are a vlogger, you don’t want to reject anyone from enjoying your videos.

5. Compose the Shot

Vlogging is a visual medium, and while the story is important, what is captured in the frame will play an impactful role in the video as well.

In a way, every vlogger needs to have a director’s eye for cinematography. I’m not saying that you need to be Wes Anderson to be an awesome vlogger, but knowing what is in the frame with you, the angle of the shot, the movement of the camera, and the quality of light will help the product look better.

The great thing about vlogging is that you will get a lot of practice framing shots, so I encourage you to learn the basics of video editing .

Check out this example from Rosanna Pansino , where she gives a tour of her bedroom.

The camera follows her fluidly throughout the video, but it is her eyes that guide both the camera moves and what she wants our attention to be directed to. Don’t hesitate to let the viewer know what you want them to see.

6. Be Prepared

While you can pick up a camera and start vlogging on the fly, being prepared enables you to produce the best video possible. Take a few minutes before you hit record simply to outline the key points you want to talk about and how the video will end, ensuring that after filming you haven’t forgotten a crucial part.

Additionally, knowing what to say makes you a better host for your vlog. Watch your favorite vlogger, I bet when they are speaking on camera, their speech is not littered with umms and ahhs…

Good preparation includes having all your gear ready for filming when you need it. There is nothing worse than being set to shoot and running out of battery or memory.

Take a look at Ashley Nichole in this vlog and notice that although she sounds spontaneous, it is also evident that she knows what she is going to talk about next.

7. Be Expressive

Remember those teachers that drone on and on, without adding any expression or passion to what they are lecturing? While they might have been perfectly suitable as teachers, they wouldn’t make good vloggers.

If you speak on camera in a monotone voice, you are not being expressive. Your facial and body language will match your lackluster performance. Even if you are talking about something you are excited about, if your demeanor doesn’t match that, then the video is going to be lifeless. Vlogging is a presentation, a performance. There needs to be energy.

Consider your audience: they are coming home from school or work, where there were classes and meetings, and the last thing they want to watch is a video of your speaking without energy.

Want to see a vlogger that is awesome at being expressive on camera? Check out Emma Chamberlain , if you haven’t already. Every word she says in her video is layered with emotion. We know exactly how she feels.

8. Stay Organized

The same way you should prepare before filming, it’s also important to be organized comes the editing phase. Editing is arguably the most time-consuming part of the vlogging process, so have a system for categorizing and finding your footages.

This is especially important when you have multiple video and audio files and if you are capturing footage over a number of days or in different locations.

Additionally, while filming your vlog, you are going to mess up. It’s also helpful to add a cue after you messed up, this can be a sound cue that causes the levels to spike (clapping or snapping your fingers work) or a video cue such as a dramatic gesture to the camera. When skipping through your footage to find the part where you messed up, later on, it’s easier to have a mark to help you locate it.

Vlogging is hard, so don’t make more work for yourself. Learn little tricks to make life easier for yourself at every step.

The more organized you are the more attention you can put into the creative aspect of vlogging, and less time finding a video file or syncing audio to video.

There you have it, 8 tips to help you vlog like the pros. Anyone can vlog. But only until you point a camera at yourself in public for the first time, do you realize how uncomfortable vlogging can be.

Even filming yourself in your room with the door closed — and nobody is in the house with you — can be a challenge for beginning vloggers. If you find watching your first few videos to be cringy, don’t be discouraged. There are fears of vlogging, but you can overcome them .

Take a look at some of the first videos from popular YouTubers and you can see that everyone had a starting point.

Do you have any vlogging tricks of your own? Leave a comment below.

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, which will definitely enhance your productivity and helps you to make money by making videos much easier.

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

For most people, vlogging is not something that comes naturally. Like any skill, it takes practice to improve. When someone is good at vlogging, they make it look easy.

When we watch the most popular YouTubers, the traits that make them successful are often invisible, because we are so consumed by their vlog. In this article, I’ll highlight 8 tips from the most accomplished vloggers on the Internet, so that you can vlog confidently and make the best YouTube videos.

1. Be Authentic

People opt to watch vlogs because they want to see something real.

Vlogging is about honesty, telling a story that is truthful and showing your personality. The most popular vloggers are likable because they don’t deceive the audience, they befriend them. Vloggers treat their audience with respect and that comes from being honest.

There will be an urge for you to mimic other vloggers, talking and acting the way they do, but savvy YouTube viewers will be able to see your faux personality pretty quickly.

Don’t focus on your image, but instead focus on your voice. What makes you different? That is how you will build a proper reputation.

2. Tell A Story

A vlog is not an assortment of footage haphazardly put together. A successful vlog must have a story: a conflict told with a beginning, middle, and end.

When you are casually telling a story to a friend, you are not thinking about the structure or the plot. You are focused on what happened and you want to communicate it as accurately as you can. While vlogging, you should approach it much the same way. Ad-libbing is fine. Stumbling is fine. Going back and repeating a part of the story is fine. By simply getting your story on camera, you now have all the pieces.

Once all the pieces of the story are captured — including your storytelling, b-roll, and other supportive footage — you must now cut out all the irrelevant or repetitive parts and edit it so it can be enjoyed as one cohesive tale.

Take a look at this example from Tiffany Alvord and notice how there are jump cuts both to skip information that can be assumed by the audience and add the tension to the story she’s telling.

3. Surprise and Delight Your Audience

There is a saying that a great ending to a story is that it is surprising, yet inevitable .

The ending needs to be justified even if there is a twist. Everything before that had worked to build up the tension and when it concludes it needs to be logical. However, the ending cannot be something that the audience can guess. Remember those mystery movies where you know who the murderer is after the first few scenes? Yeah… those aren’t satisfying. A good story ends with a surprise, and with everything prior leading up to it.

The gold standard example of a surprising, yet inevitable end is Casey Neistat’s bike lane video. Everything in the video is leading up to the end, but when you watch it the first time it’s unexpected, and that’s why it’s so good.

4. Be Inviting

A common trait of successful vloggers is that they are welcoming. They share their passion and encourage others to join in. Vlogging is about being a guide. It doesn’t matter if you are leading a tour of your home or showing your viewer an interesting new skill, it is important for you to approach the whole process with open arms.

Unlike being invited to a party, there is no obligation when it comes to YouTube. Your viewers can continue to live vicariously through you or they may be inspired by your experience and dare to try it themselves.

The opposite of inviting is rejecting, and when you are a vlogger, you don’t want to reject anyone from enjoying your videos.

5. Compose the Shot

Vlogging is a visual medium, and while the story is important, what is captured in the frame will play an impactful role in the video as well.

In a way, every vlogger needs to have a director’s eye for cinematography. I’m not saying that you need to be Wes Anderson to be an awesome vlogger, but knowing what is in the frame with you, the angle of the shot, the movement of the camera, and the quality of light will help the product look better.

The great thing about vlogging is that you will get a lot of practice framing shots, so I encourage you to learn the basics of video editing .

Check out this example from Rosanna Pansino , where she gives a tour of her bedroom.

The camera follows her fluidly throughout the video, but it is her eyes that guide both the camera moves and what she wants our attention to be directed to. Don’t hesitate to let the viewer know what you want them to see.

6. Be Prepared

While you can pick up a camera and start vlogging on the fly, being prepared enables you to produce the best video possible. Take a few minutes before you hit record simply to outline the key points you want to talk about and how the video will end, ensuring that after filming you haven’t forgotten a crucial part.

Additionally, knowing what to say makes you a better host for your vlog. Watch your favorite vlogger, I bet when they are speaking on camera, their speech is not littered with umms and ahhs…

Good preparation includes having all your gear ready for filming when you need it. There is nothing worse than being set to shoot and running out of battery or memory.

Take a look at Ashley Nichole in this vlog and notice that although she sounds spontaneous, it is also evident that she knows what she is going to talk about next.

7. Be Expressive

Remember those teachers that drone on and on, without adding any expression or passion to what they are lecturing? While they might have been perfectly suitable as teachers, they wouldn’t make good vloggers.

If you speak on camera in a monotone voice, you are not being expressive. Your facial and body language will match your lackluster performance. Even if you are talking about something you are excited about, if your demeanor doesn’t match that, then the video is going to be lifeless. Vlogging is a presentation, a performance. There needs to be energy.

Consider your audience: they are coming home from school or work, where there were classes and meetings, and the last thing they want to watch is a video of your speaking without energy.

Want to see a vlogger that is awesome at being expressive on camera? Check out Emma Chamberlain , if you haven’t already. Every word she says in her video is layered with emotion. We know exactly how she feels.

8. Stay Organized

The same way you should prepare before filming, it’s also important to be organized comes the editing phase. Editing is arguably the most time-consuming part of the vlogging process, so have a system for categorizing and finding your footages.

This is especially important when you have multiple video and audio files and if you are capturing footage over a number of days or in different locations.

Additionally, while filming your vlog, you are going to mess up. It’s also helpful to add a cue after you messed up, this can be a sound cue that causes the levels to spike (clapping or snapping your fingers work) or a video cue such as a dramatic gesture to the camera. When skipping through your footage to find the part where you messed up, later on, it’s easier to have a mark to help you locate it.

Vlogging is hard, so don’t make more work for yourself. Learn little tricks to make life easier for yourself at every step.

The more organized you are the more attention you can put into the creative aspect of vlogging, and less time finding a video file or syncing audio to video.

There you have it, 8 tips to help you vlog like the pros. Anyone can vlog. But only until you point a camera at yourself in public for the first time, do you realize how uncomfortable vlogging can be.

Even filming yourself in your room with the door closed — and nobody is in the house with you — can be a challenge for beginning vloggers. If you find watching your first few videos to be cringy, don’t be discouraged. There are fears of vlogging, but you can overcome them .

Take a look at some of the first videos from popular YouTubers and you can see that everyone had a starting point.

Do you have any vlogging tricks of your own? Leave a comment below.

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, which will definitely enhance your productivity and helps you to make money by making videos much easier.

Richard Bennett

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

Follow @Richard Bennett

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