Introduction
If you are a gaming content creator, there is no doubt that you have wondered how you can grow your gaming channel on YouTube. YouTube might seem like the pinnacle for content creators, but as with any platform, it has its own set of difficulties as well.
The main thing about YouTube that many people get so frustrated with is really just competition. There are so many content creators making videos on YouTube these days that it might seem impossible to stand out and grow your subscribers. Which leads us to the question posed in the title of the video – is YouTube worth it at all for gaming content creators?
This article is here for you. We are going to outline some benefits of YouTube, as well as some difficulties, and tell you whether you should quit YouTube. Spoiler alert: The answer to this is no, BUT there are several things you should be aware of to actually succeed on YouTube and beyond as a gaming creator.
YouTube For Gaming Creators
YouTube offers many options for gaming creators, and understanding how to succeed on YouTube is a complicated area in and of itself. For the purposes of having a general understanding of YouTube as a gaming creator, it’s best to look at two things – live streaming and uploading content.
Livestreaming
Perhaps you think of Twitch when you think of live streaming a game. However, YouTube has a very large audience for live video as well. YouTube actually shut down it’s dedicated YouTube Gaming app, but still offers a large subsection of YouTube for gaming live streamers, and for audience members to find them.
If you can create a dedicated community of subscribers, live streaming on YouTube can still be quite a powerful tool.
Uploading
When most people think YouTube, they think about creating and uploading videos. This is where, as a gaming creator, you can truly let your skills and creativity shine. You can edit your gaming clips together in unique and interesting ways, and even put a lot of your own commentary and perspectives on the situation. You can set yourself apart with interesting, engaging content that really ropes your audience in. Uploaded videos can be as polished as you want, and you should really try to cater directly to your audience.
However, that “audience” factor is where the problems with YouTube really start to arise. The main impediment to success in this area is with the immense amount of competition you will face from other creators. There are so many gaming content creators that upload excellent content, that it can seem impossible to stand out, and will lead you back to the main question asked of this article.
If the content on your channel isn’t being seen, should you quit YouTube?
Is It Worth It?
The short answer is, no, you shouldn’t abandon YouTube as a gaming creator. There is simply too big of an opportunity on YouTube to abandon it fully. There really is no harm in continuing to to make and publish your live content on YouTube, in the hopes that you beat the odds and begin to grow a large audience. However, it is important that you understand that the odds are certainly stacked against you, and YouTube might not be the best strategy if you are looking to grow.
That doesn’t mean that you should get down on yourself and simply give up, there are lots of strategies for success outside of only relying on Youtube. You need to assess what type of gaming content creator you want to be. You need to find where your audience is and how to reach them.
That being said, where do you start if YouTube isn’t your best option? In the section below, we will cover a strategy that we think is one of the best ways to find out where you should share your gaming content for more success – diversification.
Diversification
If you know anything about business strategy, you have surely heard about diversification. The idea of spreading out your efforts so that you don’t have all your eggs in one basket, so to speak. This also heavily applies to being a gaming content creator, specifically in deciding which platform to share content.
With diversification, you try to share your content in as many ways as possible. Not only does this allow your content to reach more people, it allows you to see which platform has the features to better allow your content to grow, and you can monitor your view count on each. Try sharing your content among many different platforms, including Twitch, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, Reddit, Twitter, and more! It’s not to say that all of these will be successful, so much as it will show you where you can have the best chance at success.
Restream.io
A great tool for diversifying your platform offerings is Restream.io. Restream allows you to stream to multiple different platforms at once. If you are looking for a way to diversify your live streaming, then this is a great opportunity, as it greatly simplifies this process. You can even monitor the analytics of each stream to see which was more successful.
Conclusion
Starting out as a gaming content creator these days is tough, we’re not going to sugar-coat it. You will be facing a ton of stiff competition, and you are reliant on a number of different platforms to achieve the success that you know you deserve.
There is no sure path to success, but as we have stated in this article, there are ways to increase your chances of success. This includes making great video content that meets your niche, and sharing it in as many places possible so that you can pinpoint the opportunities for the most success.
We posed a question in the title of this article, and the answer is definitely that you should not quit YouTube. YouTube is still a great place for streaming video games, and there are still many gaming creators who grow on YouTube with great success. You just need to be aware of the limitations as well, you need to find other ways to reach your audience outside of just YouTube. You can’t rely on a single platform for all your success, as powerful as that platform may be.