Why Authors Need a YouTube Channel

YouTube is one of many social media platforms that authors can use to promote their book and reach out to their fans. There are readers who frequent twitter, to read 240-character book opinions; readers who frequent Instagram and Facebook, to share and discover aesthetic pictures of books; and readers who haunt YouTube, preferring to watch videos and interact with fellow fans through the comments section.

As an author, it’s important to use at least a few of these social media platforms to engage with your fanbase—because you need to go where your fans are. And YouTube is the second most-used social media platform in the world, with over 2 billion users.

In this article, we will be discussing the many benefits of using YouTube as a way to promote your book and to achieve brand recognition.

01. You Can Build Your Readership

YouTube is one of the largest search engines, second only to Google—and literally everybody is on YouTube, whether they use it regularly or not. By having a well-designed YouTube channel with regularly uploaded videos, you are increasing your chances of being discovered by Google and being directed to users looking for similar content (especially since YouTube is owned by Google).

When you consistently upload quality content and get more subscribers, you also build a new fanbase—these new subscribers would automatically be compelled to seek out your book and read your story for themselves. YouTube, therefore, gives you maximum exposure and helps you reach new fans from across the world.

02. You Get Increased Reader Engagement

You can give them an insight into the writer-life. Let them have a glimpse of your bad days with messy hair and zero writing, of the chaotic moments when your kids go feral, of your cat strutting over to your table and snuggling atop your laptop as you struggle to complete a sentence.

This will portray the human behind the books. Readers love knowing that their favorite authors are also flawed human beings experiencing burnouts and laziness. This will compel them to interact more with you by commenting on, liking, sharing, and subscribing to your videos. You can even ask viewers to sign-up to your email newsletter and receive the latest updates about your books.

03. You Get to be a Part of AuthorTube

AuthorTube is a sub-community of authors within YouTube, where authors create useful content related to book marketing, promoting, and editing. They also share unique writing advice, tutorials, prompts, etc., for readers, and some of these channels have over a 100k subscribers. By uploading engaging and useful videos for readers, and by subscribing to these existing channels by other authors (and commenting on their posts), you can gradually become a part of AuthorTube.

04. No Cost to Create and Upload Videos

When you try promoting your book on other platforms like Instagram and Facebook, you often have to make payments, especially if you want to reach many people through advertising. Promoting on YouTube, on the other hand, is completely free. While YouTube does offer you the option to purchase ads, you can create a channel, upload videos, engage with your fanbase and even be discovered by search engines without spending any amount of money.

05. You Can Monetize Your YouTube Channel

While creating a YouTube channel will help you sell your book and find more readers, you can even opt to monetize your YouTube videos through the advertising revenue to generate a small income. Besides this, you can also link your channel to a Patreon account, or promote the services and products of other YouTubers by sharing affiliate links.

If you’re looking to create a YouTube channel to promote your book, make sure to go through the YouTube videos of other authors, like The Creative Penn by New York Times and USA Today best-selling author Joanna Penn, where she shares helpful advice on self-publishing, writing, etc.