Transcription
Let me guess, you've clicked on this video because you're worried that your channel might have died. Your views have completely dropped, engagement has disappeared, and YouTube isn't recommending your videos anymore. And now you need to know whether or not it's possible to save it.
While most small YouTubers don't even realize their channel is dying until it's way too late, don't panic because in this video, I'll show you exactly how to revive a dead channel in just a few easy steps. So, how do YouTube channels actually die? The truth is, YouTube doesn't just kill channels instantly for no reason. A channel will gradually decline over time due to a combination of things like poor content performance, audience disengagement, wrong audience signals, or creator inconsistency. Unless you've had your channel removed by YouTube for things like copyright strikes or community guideline warnings, you can always revive a dead channel, but it's going to take a lot of planning and execution.
So, if you're unsure whether or not your channel is actually dead, I've created a really quick checklist you can use to diagnose this. So, here's four signs your channel might be on its way out:
Sign number one: Your last 5 to 10 videos got way fewer views than your subscriber count.
Sign number two: Your old videos used to get views, but your new ones barely get any.
Sign number three: YouTube has stopped recommending your videos to new viewers.
And sign number four: Your current subscribers aren't engaging with any of your new content.
Now, if any of these sound familiar to you, then make sure to listen up and stay to the end of the video because I'll give you a proven process you can use to revive your channel and bring it back to life.
So then, once you've come to the realization that your channel is currently dead or dying, the most common question I get asked in this scenario is, "Should I start a new channel or should I try to revive the old one?" And the answer to this question depends on a few different factors, and let me explain why.
So, I would always suggest keeping your old channel and reviving it if you have at least 500 active subscribers, your old content is still relevant to your new content, you have a few videos with a decent amount of views (a thousand plus, let's say), and your channel has a good reputation with no strikes or copyright infringements.
However, I would always suggest starting up a new channel and getting rid of the old one if you're completely switching niches and your old content doesn't match your new niche, your past videos were really low quality and didn't get many views in the first place, if you have a large number of inactive subscribers who don't engage with your content, and if you have any strikes or copyright infringements. Any of those guys, and I would suggest probably starting a new channel.
So, before you decide whether or not to start a new one, think about those questions first. I know it can be tough having to let go of something you've worked hard for already, but sometimes, in order to grow, you just have to start again.
Now, if you still don't know whether or not to start a new channel, comment down below your reasons why, and I'll do my best to help.
Okay, then. So, if you've decided to keep your old channel, the very first step of reviving it is going to be by reoptimizing both your actual account and your old videos. And you still need to do this with old videos, even if you set them to private or unlisted.
Now, this is because both your account and your old videos create what we call channel data, and this data constantly throws signals to the algorithm about who you are and what your content is about. If these signals are firing the wrong data, then this could be why your channel isn't growing. So, what we're going to essentially do here is trigger a refresh. You're going to show YouTube that you're starting again and creating a new path for your old account.
So, what do I mean by reoptimizing your content and why should you do it? Well, again, the reason I say why is because your old content is still throwing signals to the algorithm, so we need to change those signals. The easiest way to change them is to go in and amend your titles, descriptions, hashtags, and tags. It sounds like a lot, but ChatGPT can make it really easy.
Okay, then. So, all we're going to want to do is go through our old content and simply just reoptimize it. And all you literally have to do is go into an old video. So, obviously, I'm in my travel channel now. Let's say, uh, I wanted to reoptimize this one. So, this was "Exploring Modern Mumbai This Surprised Us." ChatGPT is your best friend here. So, all we're going to do, I've pre-filled this out already. So, this prompt is: "My current YouTube channel isn't growing, and in an attempt to revive it, I'm going to need to reoptimize my old content. Below is the title and description of one of my videos. This was in the travel niche. I want you to please reoptimize both the title and the description to help me get more views." So, all you want to do is copy the title, paste it in there, and then copy the description and go down here and paste that there.
So, so now I've given the title and the description. Let's see what ChatGPT gives us now. So, here we have a brand new title. We've got "Inside Mumbai's Most Luxurious Side." So, that's actually a really good title. I like that title. And then we've got an optimized description. We've got "Mumbai" – loads of keywords of Mumbai here. That's perfect because the video was a Mumbai. It'll give us some brand new hashtags down here too, which is also good. So, all we need to do is, I would copy this title, change it there, copy this description, let's say all of those, including the hashtags, because the hashtags are some of the most optimized bits, paste that in there. And then for the tags down below, I'm going to copy this title, go to Rapid Tags, use a tag generator, paste the title in here. And then I'm going to copy all of these tags, completely get rid of those, copy all of them, paste them in there. And then I have a brand new, reoptimized video that's guaranteed to get views.
Now, here where I have the actual prompt, if you wanted to change niches, where I've said "this was in a travel niche," just be like, "this was in a travel niche, but now I want to target this niche, so please reoptimize for this niche instead." If you want this actual prompt, just pause the video here and note it down, uh, and then you can use it too. So, all you need to do, guys, is go through all of your old videos, do this to every single one, and it's going to trigger a massive refresh and bring in so many new views to that new niche you want to target.
Now, you'll also, more likely than not, really need to improve the quality of your thumbnails. Now, I've banged on about targets on thumbnails so much throughout my YouTube journey, but I can't stress just how important they really actually are. And I know that being a small YouTuber without any graphic design experience makes coming up with good thumbnails hard to grasp, but I always use a tool like one of ten to help me with thumbnail ideas, which makes it a lot easier.
Let's say I was in my travel channel and I was going to the Philippines, but I wasn't sure what type of thumbnails worked well for Philippine videos. Up here, I'd just paste in "Philippines," and then I'd go here to thumbnail search, and then all of these here give me so much inspiration for types of thumbnails that work well for Philippine videos. As you can see, like, all of these are huge outliers, which means these videos performed 11.1 times better than a channel's average. So, these thumbnails are really clickable.
Now, if I liked a particular type of thumbnail here, let's say this one, "My Best Moment Exploring Philippines by World Nomad," I could hover over here, click on thumbnails, and now it's going to give me similar thumbnails to that exact one. So, now I've got all of these. I can take so much inspiration from this to then create my own thumbnails going forward. So, what I do now is go through all of these really cool Philippines thumbnails and save them to the Philippines thumbnails bookmark space. So, I really like this one too. That's a cool one. Let's say this one's also a really cool one. Philippines thumbnails. So, I now have a whole mood board where I can take inspiration from viral thumbnails that all have performed significantly better than a channel average, and it just makes making your own thumbnails so much easier because you just take inspiration directly from these guys and take them into your own journey.
So, if you do need to trigger a refresh when it comes to your own thumbnails, guys, just look at what's working and model yours around that.
All right, then. So, once you've gone through all of your old content, I would now suggest quickly updating your actual account information. And you can do this by simply just updating your channel tags, description, and your username in line with the channel that you want to become.
So, channel tags are these things here. Now, if you've already done this, I'm going to need you to go in and redo them anyway. But for those of you who don't even know they exist, it could be the reason you're not getting any views. Now, your channel tags should look like this: very detailed and targeted towards a specific niche.
Now, to find your channel tags, go to Studio, click on settings, and then click on channel. Now, it's essential that you fill these out and be as thorough as possible because these tags essentially tell YouTube what your channel is about and who the algorithm should show your content to. Now, you have up to 500 characters worth of info to give about your target niche. You can either fill these out yourself using tags that directly relate to the channel, or if you're struggling to know what to write, just use a tag generator like Rapid Tags. Just put your niche in the top here, and it will spit out some tags related to that niche. You can then put these in here, and the algorithm will then know exactly who to push your videos in front of.
Now, this then brings us on to your channel description. This area here is massively underused by most small channels, but it gives you plenty of real estate for some SEO optimization. Just like your channel tags, this section here is going to need a bit of a refresh. Now, again, your description tells YouTube who you are and what your channel is about and will ultimately help the algorithm in showing your content to the right audience and get you some more views.
So, to access this, head to YouTube Studio, click on customization, and then scroll down here to description. The best way to do this is literally just by describing what your channel is about, describing the niche you're in, and then adding some keywords in there too. Now, if you need any help, of course, you can ask ChatGPT to write one for you.
And lastly, let's look at your name and your username. Now, this is the last section of which we're going to refresh. I understand that some people are quite picky with what their username is, which is understandable, but one really simple trick you can use is by having your niche keywords in either your name or your username.
Now, for me, my username on this channel is "Digital Wealth Club" because I teach all things digital wealth. And on my travel channel, it had the keyword "travel" in it. And on my old short space channel, it clearly stated "nature facts." Now, I don't know what your username is currently, but if you want to give your old channel some new life, I would always suggest you update it and just make sure to include a keyword of your niche in there too, if you can.
Now that your account and your old content have been reoptimized, it's now time to plan ahead, and you should start by doing some heavy market research and idea validation. This is where you look out into the niche and see what's working and what's not working and which channels are seeing success.
Now, obviously, we want to create videos that do well, but the fact that your channel was dying means that those videos you were producing originally weren't doing that well. So, we now need to do things a bit differently. We want thousands and thousands of views on every video we post, otherwise, like, what's the point, right? So, to restart your channel, you're going to want to take your idea validation a little bit differently.
Now, the cheat code to finding viral ideas is by searching for successful creators in your niche, going onto their profiles, and clicking on the popular tab. Look at all of their successful videos and make a note of them in a Word document. Now, the more you do this, the more viral ideas you'll have built up over time that you can use for your own channel. Or again, you could use a paid service like One of Ten, which is basically the number one viral video AI tool that scans every single video on the platform ever uploaded to YouTube and picks out the most viral ones. Like, if I typed in "YouTube growth" to the search bar, all of these videos come up. Here are outliers, which are videos that have performed significantly better than a channel's average view count. So, I would accumulate all of these different viral ideas which works for shorts too, and then create my own version of them for my own channel. If it works for them, it's pretty much guaranteed to work for me too, and it's a great method of reviving a dead channel.
Now, links to all these tools will be in the description below if you're interested.
So, the final step of reviving your dead channel is now creating a regimented posting plan. As I mentioned at the start, one of the biggest reasons that channels die is because the creators are simply too inconsistent. So, now we need to prioritize a strict plan going forward. You need to be ultra-consistent and gain some new momentum.
If you're just posting shorts, I would try to aim for at least one short per day for at least a month. Or, if this is too much, just try one short every other day and do this for as long as you can without burning out. But if your channel is mainly long-form videos, then I would try to aim for at least two long-form videos every week for at least a couple of months. Choose specific posting days, like Wednesdays and Fridays, for example, and stick to it. Make sure you don't ever miss a day for the first couple of months. Be as strict as you possibly can and stick to your posting schedule. YouTube loves consistency, and the algorithm will prioritize your channel as a result, which of course will lead to more recommendations, and obviously, your subscribers will love the regular content too.
Now, another great thing to do is just take your long-form YouTube videos and turn them into shorts. That way, you're not creating any more work, you're just getting more reach on the content you've already made. Now, it's obviously well-documented that shorts have the ability to bring in huge amounts of views. All of the biggest creators on YouTube will turn their long-form videos into shorts. And the latest AI tool behind it all is Nexus Clips. It's an AI tool that basically analyzes your videos, picks the best segments out, and then creates up to five viral shorts from a single long-form video.
Now, I use it to repurpose all of my horizontal videos into vertical videos that can instantly upload to shorts. It also has features on there such as facial recognition and can even add subtitles automatically. So, I suggest give an AI tool like that a go, just to repurpose your long forms into your short forms.
Then, once you've had a couple of months or so of regular posting, you can then look at all of the new data in your YouTube Studio analytics and start figuring out what's working and what's not working. You'll have enough data to take with you on your journey going forward.
Now, if you want any more help, or if you want to work with me one-to-one, I would suggest signing up to my Academy using the "Dan the Creator" link in the description below. The Academy is honestly the most exciting thing to come out of 2025 so far, and I promise you, you won't regret joining.
So, thanks very much for watching. Hope you enjoyed it. I look forward to having you in my Academy.