B&W hat YT strategy for maximum views with no possibility of banning channel

This thread is only for the YT portion of the strategy. Other portions asked elsewhere.

Videos ready to go. Quality is very high. Initial tests show way above average sharing potential. Looking to do everything possible to get the ball rolling as fast as possible so long as:

1) The YT channel, artist site, and home IP can never be endangered, and no strategy can ever be allowed to harm artist reputation.

2) That's it. No other rules. Looking to hit the ground running and then some using everything that works.

So, YT channel is set up, links are active, artist site is almost ready (needs mailchimp opt-in, etc) I have recently started using tube assist (on a mac). So far, subbing other channels isn't doing anything at all. I'm wondering if the whole concept doesn't work anymore (like they can't see my featured video anymore).

Also using BuzzBundle to oversee various personas, scrape for YT comments on related artist pages, etc. Comments on related artist pages don't appear to be sending anyone my way either.

While a lot of the black hat stuff appears to me to be a waste of time or counterproductive in the long run, it does appear that pumping the YT view count is still vital.

So, correct me if I am wrong, but would the basic strategy be to unlist the video, then pump the views to 10k or so while tossing in as many social signals as possible, as many links as possible, lots of social shares, posts to reddit, etc.... then flipping the switch to public once the ball is rolling?

If so, while I can provide some of that momentum, getting to 10k while unlisted would need a push. I absolutely cannot have the vid yanked or channel suspended, so very concerned about getting this right.

I am currently deciding whether or not to use VEVO. If I do, they take over my YT channel entirely, and I am not allowed to have any bumpers, or any other channels anywhere on YT with the same content which hampers my marketing, but also potentially provides views via the VEVO app which could be significant.

However, being on vevo also means I can't turn off monitization, so I'm wondering whether that means I cannot pump view count without significant chance of ban.

Just repeating what I've been able to find. Feel free to correct me.

Anyway, what else should I be doing? Does it still work to scrape user comments on related vids and email them with link of vid and semi-personalized non-spammy introduction? Am I missing something else about how to use Tube Assist? Anything else I should know about purchasing views? Better strategy that involves more social signals and more organic appearance?

This is just one portion of a larger strategy. TONS of time, effort, and money have already gone into making the highest quality content possible, just on here to try to maximize my reach on YT as the majors have more unfair advantages than I care to count, and I don't have a couple hundred grand to spend on purchasing radio play like they do. I'm just trying to be realistic about how YT ranks vids. The first time I saw Gangnam Style, it wasn't because someone shared it with me. YT's algos put it front and center. Just looking to level the playing field so real people can make up their own minds once they've seen it. They do have to be given the opportunity to see it first, though.

Thanks.

You said this well. The highest quality content is posible the higher video traffic will be. Very nice research you did there.

Unlisted method only requires some views so after making your videos public it have a chance to appear on the YT's first page for some regions. You should boost your video with likes, comments all other stuff and most of the views after making it public.
Vevo won't provide you many views at all, I've seen many artist who had less than 100k views on Vevo. The only point of using Vevo is that they are paying higher than YT or any partnership network.
If you are talking about YT messages to the people from comments then this won't work because very few people on youtube are currently checking their inbox. Also there is no notification for the new inbox nor even easy way to access your inbox. And even if some would check those PMs I'm pretty sure that it will go to spam as it always happens for me.

hmm.. thx. I was excited researching Tube Assist, but I'm just not so sure that stuff really works any more. All the scraping in the world won't help if I can't convert them into followers. So far with one test vid, zero out of nearly 2k that I subbed to subbed back... and it's not because they didn't like the vid. Zero saw it despite it being featured. Something definitely misfiring there.

I can, of course, do the natural linking, out to a few blogs, Reddit and the like for some social signals that happens as a result of me letting people know about release, but if it is useful to pump the viewcount, how do I best make sure that it has the most organic footprint and add any other links and such beyond my natural efforts? Any target number before making public?

What about keywords? Music video market is super saturated with heavily backed multi-million view instant sensations. Ranking within YT would require quite a bit more than 300 views, no?


Edited to say: My ONLY reason for going with VEVO would be if they could provide more views, get on Lift program, or something similar. Don't care about the CPC, and most of the Vevo aggregators (you can't sign up directly) take a cut anyway. I'm looking at this like any ad revenue from the vids themselves is just gravy. I'm more concerned about being able to funnel the true fans into mailing list to pump upcoming releases, etc. Also, Vevo won't allow bumpers, so I'm missing ability to put live links at the end and a whole sales pitch after vid ends.

I'm going native on FB too which has ZERO ad revenue, but again... whatever gets the most eyeballs. This will "dilute" the viewcount, but in the end, I believe it will lead to greater views (autoplay and so on). So... if Vevo can't deliver more eyeballs, then they're just a liability that limits my choices in how to do branding and present my channel.

You can use YT private messages but it can't give you millions of views. YT doesn't allow send more than 10 messages per day from one single account. Just imagine that you need 50,000 YT accounts to send 500,000 messages per day during a week for example. Click per PM is about 0.15-0.35. Of course, some people will share it in their FB and Twitter. It's a good way for direct marketing. We use and offer promotion in comments and top comments. It's faster and cheaper. Replies to top comments are good also.

Hmmm... Hadn't thought of replies to top comments. Makes sense since it's up top and people will see it, but I guess it's just a link then? Will look into today.

Yeah, I've got most of the FB stuff set up and working on TW now. Definitely planning on a bit of FB low budget paid promotion, but I was under the impression YT wasn't worth it for sponsored content (that requires a TON of views to turn a profit). Realistically here, take whatever itunes revenue can be generated, and double it to cover what comes in from all other streaming and such combined, and there's the total income... so can't exactly be paying per click prices unless somehow laser targeted to music video sharing mavericks.