A Guide to Attention Grabbing Youtube Titles & Thumbnails
How FaZe Teeqo made me realize I’m a Title/Thumbnail noob.
It amazes me how a tiny little thumbnail can make or break a video.
Seriously, you can post the same damn video on two consecutive days and see huge differences in performances based on the thumbnail and titles used on each.
Although this seems somewhat self explanatory, it’s a pretty big hangup for most content creators. Even myself.
Story time.
When we’re not making content and resources to help aspiring gamers/creators grow, we’re helping already established gamers do the exact same thing. This week the Dojo crew had the pleasure of facilitating a collaboration between RSK Dubai and FaZe Blaziken.
We went out to the FaZe house in Newport, helped set up, and then quietly snuck off into a corner to get some work done while RSK and Blaziken were shooting.
I was uploading a video where Ninja described how he got his start in streaming.
“Ninja’s beginnings? How Ninja Got Started on Twitch?”.
I rattled off title ideas and sifted through images struggling to come up with the profound title/thumbnail combination I hoped for. FaZe Cheo saw my frustrations and thought he’d recruit some help, “Teeqo, can you help Reza out with a title and thumbnail”.
This when I became blatantly aware of the mastery that Teeqo and the other FaZe members have achieved when it comes to creating content on their platform of choice: Youtube.
You have to keep in mind that some of these guys (Apex included), have been creating a Youtube video EVERY DAY for years. That means that every day they:
1. come up with a concept for a video
2. record it
3. edit it
4. write a title
5. generate a thumbnail.
I’m not going to tally it up but I’m sure that’s thousands of hours spent merely contemplating the best way to display their content to grab attention.
But I digress..
Teeqo walked over and asked me what the video was about.
“It’s basically just Ninja talking about how he got his start on Twitch”, I said.
“Call it, ‘THE HISTORY OF NINJA’”, and use a thumbnail with his face making an expression his fans are used to, that background is too dull as well, put some bright colors in there.”
This may not seem profound, but after spending 20 minutes trying to think of cool title that said exactly that, I was pretty impressed. Teeqo did my job in 2 minutes.
I bring that up to highlight something I feel isn’t discussed enough.
Creating content is HARD.
Writing compelling titles is HARD.
Creating attention grabbing thumbnails is HARD.
We’re constantly spun the narrative that these, “Youtube Celebrities”, catch a lucky break and basically live their lives casually putting out videos whenever they feel like it. It’s hard for people trapped in a 9–5 they don’t enjoy to admit to themselves that the only difference between themselves and the people making a comfortable living off of their passions is hard work (not luck).
Creating quality content on a regular basis is difficult, it’s creatively taxing and most will find themselves quickly out of ideas and brain-dead. That’s why it’s so important to construct a daily routine, you can learn about the routine that’s allowed FaZe Apex to amass his audience here.
So don’t get discouraged when you can’t think up a revolutionary title for the video you’re about to drop, or if you’re having trouble figuring out what to use in the thumbnail.
It’s hard.
Now, I don’t mean you shouldn’t worry about that stuff. Like I said, thumbnails and titles can make or break a video. They’re pivotal to your contents success. If you’re struggling, try one of Apex’s solutions to overcoming creative block (Lesson 5 in his course).
After I hit my own creative block the other day, I spoke to a few successful content creators and put together this list of simple tips to make better titles and thumbnails.
A large part of the reason that I made this, and brought up the story about Teeqo, is so that you can start to look at this as more of a process. Create a routine for creating, and creating becomes less difficult.
Thumbnails
- Contrast: Use High contrast to accentuate the focal point of the thumbnail.
- Relevancy: Connect your Thumbnail to your title i.e. “I GOT A NEW GAME”, coupled with a thumbnail of a video game case with a question mark over it.
Note: I hear a lot of debate between using bright/contrasting colors vs having a well designed thumbnail. Some Youtubers sacrifice design excellence for attention grabbing colors, you don’t have to. If you prefer to use cool stills from your videos as the thumbnail- go for it. Just make sure that whatever that still is that it’s interesting, and don’t forget to touch it up!
- Consistency: Do you have a brand? You should (here’s why), and it should be shown constantly throughout your thumbnails. Keep consistent branding throughout videos of the same classification or in the same series.
- Emotion: It’s popular for thumbnails to show a closeup of someones face, if you use this style- make sure there is emotion. Don’t put up a selfie of you blankly staring off into space. If the video is a montage of the best game of your life, show some damn excitement!
- MOST TRAFFIC IS MOBILE: This is so often forgotten, design for small screens people. It’s truly amazing that you created such a intricate and detailed graphic but no one is going to be able to see it off of their iPhone screen. Try editing your thumbnails in the size they show up on mobile
- The 15 Second Rule: Your Title, your thumbnail, and the first 15 seconds of your video HAVE to be relevant to each other.
- Pro Tip: If your video is educational, put text in the thumbnail
- Pro Tip: If your video is entertainment use more graphics
Advanced Tactic
- Make a FB advertising campaign with two thumbnails you want to test against each other and see what gets the most clicks paired with the title of your video.
Titles
- Tease a story. Don’t put spoilers in your title.
- Beg the question of what’s going to happen in the video
- Go to your favorite news or media source and scroll through the headlines. Click on the first article that grabs your attention and reverse engineer it’s title for your video.
- Use the Google Keyword Tool to look for popular keywords and phrases that describe what’s going on in your video- and make sure to check out our SEO checklist if any of this is sounding unfamiliar to you.
- If the content is instructional- the title must state the value or benefit of watching your video. If this was a video, we could title it, “Simple Hacks for Getting More Views on Youtube”
- If it’s more of a narrative: tease part of the story in a way that will entice people to want to know what happened next. These titles work best when accompanied with thumbnail that ties into it.
Quick Title Formats
- How To BLANK
- BLANK Vs. BLANK
- This BLANK is Insane!/Remarkable!/Epic!
- Lists, “10 Legend of Zelda Easter Eggs You Missed”
- Do you make these BLANK mistakes?
- Are You Ever BLANK?
- I Just Wanted A BLANK!
- How BLANK improved my BLANK
- They Laughed When BLANK
I hope you enjoyed our guide on titles and thumbnails! At the Dojo we’re all about helping gamers and creators reach their full potential online. We want to help you turn your passion into a living and do so by taking information from the best and distilling it into actionable steps for our members to follow. If you have any additional questions or comments please feel free to comment or reach out!
