**View Time manipulation **( YT EXPERTS GET IN HERE NOW!!!)

[JBrewster]

Hello,

In my niche along with other typical vlogs I noticed that many many channels would put a "catchy title" and what should be only a 2 minute video is actually a 15-20 minute video with the whole subject of the video being toward the end at like the 14:00 or 18:30 mark (example) and its show brief that its ALMOST CLICKBAIT.

EXAMPLE: a 20 min video title will be "we found a pink dolphin". The video just shows random activities of the vlogger like shopping, joking around, and other irrelevant stuff for the first 17 mins, then at the 18:30 mark it will actually show a brief meeting with a pink dolphin for like 5 or 10 seconds seconds.

Now a lot of times someone in the comments will actually post the timestamp for other people to click on so they do not waste their time OR users will just skip over the useless content themselves to the timestamp they actually clicked for. Either way this manipulates users to click over 95% of the video OR they will just watch the whole thing.

When a user clicks to later in the video, the red marking of the video (at the bottom of the youtube player that the user can control of) shows the rest of the video as being watched when really the users/sucriber did not watch it (although there still are users who do in fact waste their time with the whole video from the beginning)

It seems like the video owners purposely try to get their subscribers to do this

If a user were to in fact skip over the video towards the end, does that 18 mins of a 20 min video count towards VIEW TIME??

This is very difficult question/post so please answer only if you have hard evidence. If you are interested you may also post but please do not attempt to answer if you are not sure.

 

[Cheapsmmseller]

i'm interested to know this too

 

[PrivateSMM]

No, it will not count as watch time. youtubers keeps the good content to the end of videos for many reasons, in longer videos, more youtube ads will appear = more money. teasing and forcing viewers to see the the whole video will improve the overall channel metrics and score too.

 

[JBrewster]

No, it will not count as watch time. youtubers keeps the good content to the end of videos for many reasons, in longer videos, more youtube ads will appear = more money. teasing and forcing viewers to see the the whole video will improve the overall channel metrics and score too.

Ok that makes sense, but you sort of contradicted yourself.

1. HOW will the ads be viewed if the viewer SKIPS over most of the video,

and
2. If they skipped over it, how have they watched the whole video.

Unless you are implying that the channel owners HOPE that the subscriber will just watch the whole video without skipping?

 

[PrivateSMM]

Ok that makes sense, but you sort of contradicted yourself.

1. HOW will the ads be viewed if the viewer SKIPS over most of the video,

and
2. If they skipped over it, how have they watched the whole video.

Unless you are implying that the channel owners HOPE that the subscriber will just watch the whole video without skipping?

i did not contradicted myself. Actually, a lot of people will just watch the whole video. this method is widely used by youtubers.

 

[JBrewster]

i did not contradicted myself. Actually, a lot of people will just watch the whole video. this method is widely used by youtubers.

I suppose. But this is surprising that people will actually waste their time with most of the garbage that is in these vlogs. BTW do you have any references? Your explanation is acceptable but as I promised, I want to make sure everything visiting this threat is presented with evidence.

All other factual responses are welcome.

 

[Cyberars]

ok, those tactics are not new, just like on your local daily 20:00 o'clock TV news, they will show some PROMO before the actual broadcast and highlight some interesting news items, usually they will bring those items at the end of the show, this is how to push retention old-school style...

in the technical aspect, if you drill down to what actually is sent to youtube during a view session (using tools to analyze the requests) you will find that youtube have a "stopwatch" counter that will start as soon as the video start to play, so if you watched 1 min and then skipped forward and watched another 2 minutes at the end of the video, they will know that in TOTAL you spent 3 minutes on that video.

 

[JBrewster]

ok, those tactics are not new, just like on your local daily 20:00 o'clock TV news, they will show some PROMO before the actual broadcast and highlight some interesting news items, usually they will bring those items at the end of the show, this is how to push retention old-school style...

in the technical aspect, if you drill down to what actually is sent to youtube during a view session (using tools to analyze the requests) you will find that youtube have a "stopwatch" counter that will start as soon as the video start to play, so if you watched 1 min and then skipped forward and watched another 2 minutes at the end of the video, they will know that in TOTAL you spent 3 minutes on that video.

So this if this is the case, then can we assume that that the channel owners are just depending on the suscribers to not skip forward?

 

[HustleTong]

does that 18 mins of a 20 min video count towards VIEW TIME??

Never. It won't work that way.

 

[JBrewster]

Never. It won't work that way.

So then what do you suppose the whole intention of the youtuber is?

 

[JBrewster]

The responses in this threat are ok. But none of the responders (although had great explanations) cited a source or provided any evidence to their claims. If someone could do so, please fell free to reply and answer the og post.

 

[thevideoguy]

Hello,

In my niche along with other typical vlogs I noticed that many many channels would put a "catchy title" and what should be only a 2 minute video is actually a 15-20 minute video with the whole subject of the video being toward the end at like the 14:00 or 18:30 mark (example) and its show brief that its ALMOST CLICKBAIT.

EXAMPLE: a 20 min video title will be "we found a pink dolphin". The video just shows random activities of the vlogger like shopping, joking around, and other irrelevant stuff for the first 17 mins, then at the 18:30 mark it will actually show a brief meeting with a pink dolphin for like 5 or 10 seconds seconds.

The title being about the most interesting part of the vlog is to increase click through rate. Most vlogs are boring so the most accurate title describing the vlog would probably yeild lower click through rate.

The video structure may be to increase average view duration, and the length may be to increase ad breaks.

When a user clicks to later in the video, the red marking of the video (at the bottom of the youtube player that the user can control of) shows the rest of the video as being watched when really the users/sucriber did not watch it (although there still are users who do in fact waste their time with the whole video from the beginning)

No it doesn't. The red bar is showing where the user left of when they watched the video, if they click back on it it'll start playing from that part. It doesn't show total watch time. User doesn't need to know how long they watched for, but showing them where they ended their session is a helpful feature.

If a user were to in fact skip over the video towards the end, does that 18 mins of a 20 min video count towards VIEW TIME??

This is very difficult question/post so please answer only if you have hard evidence. If you are interested you may also post but please do not attempt to answer if you are not sure.

It's a very easy question to answer, and the answer is; no.

If someone clicks on a 20 minute video, watches the first and last 10 seconds then the watch time is 20 seconds, not 20 minutes.

Hope that helps

 

[speedyallan77]

The title being about the most interesting part of the vlog is to increase click through rate. Most vlogs are boring so the most accurate title describing the vlog would probably yeild lower click through rate.

The video structure may be to increase average view duration, and the length may be to increase ad breaks.


No it doesn't. The red bar is showing where the user left of when they watched the video, if they click back on it it'll start playing from that part. It doesn't show total watch time. User doesn't need to know how long they watched for, but showing them where they ended their session is a helpful feature.


It's a very easy question to answer, and the answer is; no.

If someone clicks on a 20 minute video, watches the first and last 10 seconds then the watch time is 20 seconds, not 20 minutes.

Hope that helps

if a user jumped towards 90 percentage to the end of the video will it count as 90 percent retention even tho they jumped towards the end and skipped the beginning parts.

 

[JBrewster]

The title being about the most interesting part of the vlog is to increase click through rate. Most vlogs are boring so the most accurate title describing the vlog would probably yeild lower click through rate.

The video structure may be to increase average view duration, and the length may be to increase ad breaks.


No it doesn't. The red bar is showing where the user left of when they watched the video, if they click back on it it'll start playing from that part. It doesn't show total watch time. User doesn't need to know how long they watched for, but showing them where they ended their session is a helpful feature.


It's a very easy question to answer, and the answer is; no.

If someone clicks on a 20 minute video, watches the first and last 10 seconds then the watch time is 20 seconds, not 20 minutes.

Hope that helps

if a user jumped towards 90 percentage to the end of the video will it count as 90 percent retention even tho they jumped towards the end and skipped the beginning parts.

Ok So there are TWO RESPONSES that OPPOSE EACH OTHER!. neither have given citations. so who is right?

 

[ledaponey]

Ok So there are TWO RESPONSES that OPPOSE EACH OTHER!. neither have given citations. so who is right?

probably none of them

 

[JBrewster]

probably none of them

Its either one or the other. one of them have to be right.
What would your answer be?

 

[klique]

Haven't gone thru the whole thread, but I did read the OP.

It doesn't work like that my friend.

 

[ledaponey]

Its either one or the other. one of them have to be right.
What would your answer be?

From my own perspective using micro workers (where most of them trick you moving the progress bar to the end) it doesn’t work that way, probably they count more time than the total watch time you actually viewed as CyberArs said, but they will not count as full watch time.

In that way it would be pretty easy to automate a botnet by scrapping the pinned comment and make it click the time link. If that’s true, with just a bot you’ll be able to send like 100x times more views than you’d be supposed to send (at least if those bots are actually watching remotely the video).

I’ll give it a try on a test channel and post an update

 

[JBrewster]

Haven't gone thru the whole thread, but I did read the OP.

It doesn't work like that my friend.

Thanks for the response..so then if it doesent work like that...WHY do these channel owners try to pull this off?

 

[JBrewster]

From my own perspective using micro workers (where most of them trick you moving the progress bar to the end) it doesn’t work that way, probably they count more time than the total watch time you actually viewed as CyberArs said, but they will not count as full watch time.

In that way it would be pretty easy to automate a botnet by scrapping the pinned comment and make it click the time link. If that’s true, with just a bot you’ll be able to send like 100x times more views than you’d be supposed to send (at least if those bots are actually watching remotely the video).

I’ll give it a try on a test channel and post an update

Yes please do and let us know