Is having lots of views a ranking factor?

Hi,

i have done a little experiment with youtube and pay per click traffic and noticed something.
I did this on a youtube channel that i have who is fairly new with not that much daily views where i promoted a few of my video's for a certain period of time. When i promote a video it suddenly gets a lot more recommended to other people by youtube. The more traffic i sent to a video the more views it receives from youtube search traffic and recommended video's.

The results where something like this:

Video gets 0-5 views per day organically.
I sent some traffic to the video
20 bought views = 5 views from youtube extra than normal
50 bought views = 25 views from youtube extra
100 bought views = 100 views from youtube extra

But now that i think about it, this wouldn't be unlogic. Youtube tries to show people what they find interesting and video's that improve total watch time. If suddenly lots of people start to view a certain video, it must be interesting. Or at least at that moment.

Like for example, a while back Julian Assange was arrested. You could see a spike in views on video's about him because everyone starts to google it. How can Youtube know that? They use this mechanism in their algorithm. Just show video's more that are suddenly interesting to people.

Basically an increase in views will cause a positive feedback loop.
Same when you stop sending traffic to a video, it creates a negative feedback loop.
I found video's to perform very bad when i send loads of traffic and then suddenly quit. They seem to get a few days or even a week less traffic then normal. But this could be my own bias, i need more data to get more accurate results.

There is many different factor. Having lots of views can have a positive effect on ranking but you need to consider other factors. Channel age, title tags optimization and like-dislike ratio etc. I did lots of tests to understand the algorithm in the last few years. I need to mention their algorithm always change and not depend on logic at this time.

Back in the day (2006-2012) views were the most important factor. Over time Youtube probably realized that this can be easily manipulated and started to focus more on Watch time and Engagement on a video. I would go that far and say that the view count does not a big impact at all. Now the 2 most important factors are watch time and engagement:

Example: For a 10 Minute Video, you always wanna have your watch time over 5 minutes and have a high engagement on your video (lots of shares, lots of mentions on other social platforms, lots of comments and interactions in the comment section) - Youtube has fixed the HR Views so you are not able to buy them from official panels at the moment.

What you have to ask yourself is the following question:

How can i attract my potential viewer?
How can i keep the viewer and make him not click away after watching the video for 30 seconds?

To attract your potential viewer you need to have a very good thumbnail that stands out from your competition - Do play around with some settings, make your thumbnail more colorful and include some highlighters in there (faces, humans, etc. - Something that is eyecatching to the viewer) - Once you have that you need to check if your title is top notch - If it isn't, do something against it. Include your targetting keyword in it, but do not make it to long. Again, try, test and try again, if you failed.

To keep your viewer interested in your content you need to focus more on quality then quantity of videos. Simple videos that are text to speech and explain something just do not make it in the Youtube Scene anymore, they will get buried in the dead algorythm of Youtube. Use high quality images, videos and if possible your own voice if you are making explanation videos for example - See what keeps your viewers interested in your content and check your analytics on your good performing videos daily. Check the watchtime, check the time and see when users mostly click away from your video. See what is happening in the video, when the user clicks away. Learn from your mistake and try to make a better video next time. And as always, learn, adapt, go with time, try again if you failed and always check your analytics.

HR views are ranking factor of course.

It's all about audience retention