There is a lot of content out there on the internet about how to build an audience for your YouTube channel – but few places tell you what exactly it takes to engage with your community day in and day out. Here are some free Youtube tools for creators so you can quickly grow your following, post more engaging videos, and keep working towards your goal.
So what kind of tools do you need? I created a list for you with essentials. But actually, from my experience working with everyone from part-time vloggers to full-time content creators, these are must-have YouTube tools for creators.
Tubebuddy
Tubebuddy is a free browser extension (for Firefox and Chrome) that works as an all-in-one content marketing and promotion tool. It automatically integrates with YouTube and assists you with managing your channel.
Tubebuddy allows you to test your tags, titles, descriptions and thumbnails, and figure out which ones improve the performance of your channel. You can keep a track of each video’s rankings in both YouTube and Google searches.
TubeBuddy’s scheduling feature determines when you want to publish videos on your channel. Besides, it allows you to set a specific date and time to remove videos from certain playlists on the channel.
Tubebuddy also lets you update videos in bulk, which means if you have a hundred videos, you can change all the descriptions simultaneously.
Recommended reading: TubeBuddy Review (And How To Grow Your Channel With It…)
SocialBlade
Easily the most well known third-party YouTube tool is SocialBlade. Its free live sub count tool was rendered sort of useless for larger YouTube channels when the platform decided to round out subscriber numbers instead of giving an exact count. However, the tool’s top YouTuber lists, daily video view count, and estimated channel earnings still work great. To top it off, those features are free.
Credit: Socialblade
vidIQ
This tool for creators offers a free and easy way to monitor and track a YouTube channel’s audience analytics. It provides detailed reports on who is watching which kinds of content, making it easier for you to produce relevant content for your channel’s audience.
You can access a suite of keyword rankings and tag management tools, identify influencers, manage video comments and run a comparison with competing channels. With the free vidIQ Google Chrome extension, you can see the top tags and keywords used by rival channels.
Other features offered by the tool include SEO analytics based on keywords searched by viewers, Demographic metrics which document the estimated age and gender statistics of the viewer accounts, traffic metrics which allow a creator to understand where the traffic is majorly redirected from and engagement metrics, on both YouTube and Facebook.
Recommended reading: vidIQ Chrome Extension Review (And Walkthrough…)
Google Analytics
This is a free web service that allows you to link your YouTube channels free of cost to its platform and obtain statistics on channel performance. It provides detailed reports on metrics such as traffic sources and bounce rate that will help you understand your audience thoroughly.
Although there is some overlap between YouTube Studio Analytics and Google Analytics, the former is designed to deliver information on internal channel performance and the latter measures external traffic and offsite marketing activities.
The two platforms, when combined, give you a comprehensive view of your channel’s performance.
YouTube Search Autosuggest
This is a highly useful tool from YouTube to ease up the search experience for users. As you start typing your search query, YouTube will present a list of suggestions that can help you find relevant videos faster.
This is also a great way to get new ideas for your video content. The suggested terms that YouTube shows are an indicator that viewers are looking for content related to those terms. You can thus consider creating video content based on those suggestions.
Tubebuddy
Tubebuddy is a free browser extension (for Firefox and Chrome) that works as an all-in-one content marketing and promotion tool. It automatically integrates with YouTube and assists you with managing your channel.
Tubebuddy allows you to test your tags, titles, descriptions and thumbnails, and figure out which ones improve the performance of your channel. You can keep a track of each video’s rankings in both YouTube and Google searches.
TubeBuddy’s scheduling feature determines when you want to publish videos on your channel. Besides, it allows you to set a specific date and time to remove videos from certain playlists on the channel.
Tubebuddy also lets you update videos in bulk, which means if you have a hundred videos, you can change all the descriptions simultaneously.
Recommended reading: TubeBuddy Review (And How To Grow Your Channel With It…)Google Analytics
This is a free web service that allows you to link your YouTube channels free of cost to its platform and obtain statistics on channel performance. It provides detailed reports on metrics such as traffic sources and bounce rate that will help you understand your audience thoroughly.
Although there is some overlap between YouTube Studio Analytics and Google Analytics, the former is designed to deliver information on internal channel performance and the latter measures external traffic and offsite marketing activities.
The two platforms, when combined, give you a comprehensive view of your channel’s performance.
4. Bit.ly
The links to your YouTube channel and videos can be long and unappealing. Therefore, to keep your URL slugs short, neat and tidy, we recommend using Bit.ly.
You can track the use of your bit.ly links on their dashboard, including the browsers, platforms and countries that have accessed it which can help you in promoting your content accordingly as well as modify it to cater to the audience.
Its paid version (at $29 per month) also gives you a free custom domain, allowing you to create and share over 1,500 branded links for your YouTube channel.
YouTube Search Filters
Filters allow users to refine their search when looking for videos on YouTube. To use this feature, click on the Filters drop-down menu under the search box after typing in your search query.
There are multiple filters you can set. For instance, you can filter by content type – video, film or playlist. You can also filter based on the date of upload, duration of the content and video quality (HD, with or without closed captions, and others).
Vidooly
A video analytics, market research, and intelligence tool, Vidooly, is for the nerdy creator. It can reveal insights about the popular creators in your category, the money they might be making from their YouTube videos, and identifying the best practices they might be following.
It’s primarily meant for the Indian market and delivers video performance insights for both Facebook and YouTube. But you can give its 14-day free trial a try!https://dfad2bf21b7f71af9fe10e117725acfd.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html
Canva
Canva allows you to create thousands of unique and attractive banners, posters, ads, social media graphics and more. You can use the tool to design the perfect thumbnail for your YouTube video.You can also take a snapshot of the video and enhance it with design and text elements.
Having an attractive thumbnail is a significant factor in getting more viewers to click on your video. Canva can help you turn around beautiful designs with its drag-and-drop feature.
Best of all, Canva is free to use. However, you can opt for a premium paid version to gain access to its extensive photo and video library.https://dfad2bf21b7f71af9fe10e117725acfd.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html
The paid tool also allows brand customization, resizing designs for different platforms (e.g., in case, you want to use the thumbnail across social media), and exporting designs into gifs. Canva is priced at $12.95 per month per user.
Alternative: Stencil
Another lesser-known (but robust) graphic design tool you can use is Stencil. Like Canva, it also has pre-made templates, a library of fonts, a user intuitive drag and drop image editor, and royalty free images.
But:
Its free version is more generous – you can save and upload up to 10 images per month. Indeed its paid version is also more affordable than Canva when you opt for the annual plan.
3Play Media
Having accurate video transcriptions is a critical factor in promoting your video among those who speak a different language or might have difficulty hearing the audio.
3Play Media is a service that provides high-quality transcriptions, closed captioning, audio descriptions and translations at a competitive price. It has a team of thousands of transcriptionists that can process large volumes of data quickly and the accuracy and quality of their output is among the top in the industry.https://dfad2bf21b7f71af9fe10e117725acfd.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html
Adobe Premier Pro
This tool allows you to edit video footage in any file format, from HD to virtual reality. Its new feature called, Adobe Sensei, keeps important content in focus throughout your video through intelligent reframing.
It also comes with an all-in-one app called Premium Rush that lets you edit your videos from desktop, mobile, and tablet. So you can film and edit a video on your Smartphone and even share it on social media!
Adobe Premiere Pro can also be integrated easily with other editing apps and services for photos and videos such as Adobe Photoshop, After Effects, Adobe Stock and Adobe Audition.https://dfad2bf21b7f71af9fe10e117725acfd.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html
Alternative: iMovies
iMovie is a free video editor application for macOS and iOS. The tool offers many of the same features such as Premiere Pro and allows you to split clips, detach audio, add soundtracks, fade audio in and out, crop the video to zoom in and add transitions between clips among others. The tool is convenient for those who work on MacBooks or iPhone.
Conclusion
If you’re a content creator, you might know how challenging it is to find, reach, and build your audience. Presently, 300 hours of video are uploaded to the platform every minute, and the number of hours spent watching YouTube videos grows by 60% every year.
You saw few of the best YouTube tools available in the market in this article. Now I want you to experiment and find out the ones that fit your channel’s requirements.