Popularising a legitimate YT channel

Hey everyone,
A very good friend of mine, who happens to be absolutely 'ripped' (national bodybuilding competitor), is starting a fitness YouTube channel and I said I'd ask around and see if anyone has any advice for someone starting out promoting a totally legitimate YouTube channel with frequent, real content.

He's already a fully qualified personal trainer with numerous qualifications and has a body to match so I'm not concerned about people doubting the legitimacy of his workout videos etc, but I was wondering if anyone had any tips for getting started and boosting viewership for a legitimate YouTube channel?

I'm more than aware of how he can monetize things if his channel gains a decent subscription / viewer count, so not looking for replies suggesting promoting supplements etc, but rather how he can legitimately and genuinely increase viewers, subscribers, etc.

I've offered to handle onpage SEO for his videos as a favour, and he's going to be producing multiple videos per week.
So far I've come up with the following:

1. Viewer-creator relationship is vital: He'll be responding to comments from viewers and helping them out as much as he can.
2. Onpage SEO plays a part: I'm handling this, but he needs to make sure he's hitting keywords in his descriptions, tags, etc.
3. Quality descriptions: Nobody likes a video with a blank description, so we're outsourcing video description writing to a popular fitness blogger
4. No early monetization: It's idiotic to push out affiliate links and bullshit. He's trying to build a legitimate, popular, channel. Money can come later.

Does anyone else have any more advice? Would love to hear it.

Cheers,
JFoulds

Shout outs from other prominent Youtube channels in the niche. If he has a legit channel this shouldn't be a problem. Also, do Reddit fitness subs.

somedevil said:

Shout outs from other prominent Youtube channels in the niche. If he has a legit channel this shouldn't be a problem. Also, do Reddit fitness subs.

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Good idea for the Reddit subs. Only issue with YouTube account channel shoutouts is that's going to be relatively hard with a new channel, I imagine. Most of these things are done on a tit-for-tat basis, and with very few followers initially he'll struggle to get an endorsement from any with many followers.

JFoulds said:

Good idea for the Reddit subs. Only issue with YouTube account channel shoutouts is that's going to be relatively hard with a new channel, I imagine. Most of these things are done on a tit-for-tat basis, and with very few followers initially he'll struggle to get an endorsement from any with many followers.

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To be honest he will have to keep trying to get shout outs- if he has great content then someone or the other will gibve him a shoutout. Also he can offer to pay for shoutouts on YT, IG, Twit etc.

As I am sure you already know that this is a very competitive niche on youtube, so this project is going to take time and money. Now that I have told you what you probably already know here is what I have done to get exposure.
-Buy news releases to get exposure to these videos. This will get quality backlinks to the videos (as long as they are quality videos) and if possible a news release where you can embed the video would be even better.
-Treat the youtube channel like a website and the videos like pages to the site. What I mean by this is go get quality backlinks to the channel and the videos. The news releases will help but for this niche you are going to have to go get/buy links.

Let me know if you have any questions
-JC

Many thanks to both of you!
JFoulds

You need an investment to grow a channel with real audience because youtube is oversaturated nowdays however it's a good way to invest money and time if you have a quality content.

Reddit is a great idea, also buying ads that will divert people to the channel too.

Cheers for the advice guys, please keep it coming if anyone has anything.
Investment is no problem.

Buzz me on Skype , i can Help You Out!

Many thanks to both of you!