eevBLAB 105 - Does the Youtube Bell Notification MATTER?

[EEVblog]

Does the Youtube Bell Notification actually matter? What percentage of views come from notifications? The answer may surprise you!

[Bud]

This means the bell notification concept does not work from engagement perspective and Youtube should scrap it.

[Per Hansson]

Dave, your channel is the only one where I for a short time enabled the "bell" notification, but I quickly turned it off when I realized my shoephone then throws me a notification whenever a new video is up.
I'm sorry I really like your videos but dropping everything I'm doing just to watch one of them is not my cup of tea.
Another fun anecdote is that when videos do go up for prime the performance is usually complete crap because it has not yet propagated though all Youtube cache servers.
So you might be forced watching some degraded crap version instead of the 1080p or 4K version.
Another way to see it is I watch Youtube when I have some free time, not like in commercial TV of the 90's when it airs...
I guess 99% of your viewers are the same, following these stats...

[EEVblog]

This means the bell notification concept does not work from engagement perspective and Youtube should scrap it.

Yep, I wouldn't against that. Although I guess the FIRST! people will have a problem with that.

[Ranayna]

So if you use the app, hitting the bell would give you a push notification for any new videos on a channel, if it works correctly?
Jeez, that would annoy me like hell, i already get enough crap from work alone as notifications on my phone...
I also do not use the app though, even on the iPad i just use the webplayer. And i never even watch on the phone.

I am subbed on YT to EEVBlog, one of the few i'm actually subbed to. I reliably get the new videos on the YT mainpage, when they are released. The latest one, #1520, was posted first here in the forum though, correct? Because i saw the thread on monday, but only yesterday the video showed up on the mainpage, with "released 15 minutes ago".

I have mentioned it elswhere already, but for me as a pure watcher, it appears to me that subscribing to a channel does not really seem to matter, as long as i primarily use the YT mainpage to get new videos.
For example i am not subscribed to Thunderf00t, but is still see his new videos there. The same with several channels i regularly watch, but have not subscribed.
On the other hand, channels i have subscribed to, but do not regularly watch, do not appear on the mainpage anymore. It even seems to be somewhat selective for a single channel. A particular channel i'm subscribed to regularly releases a video every monday. It also releases more videos, but these are very irregular, and i rarely watch these. Only the monday video regularly appears on the mainpage.

So essentially the subscription is little more than a bookmark with a small purple dot for new activity.

[tszaboo]

I was surprised that how many ppl actually used that feature on my channel. But the way I see it, nothing matters on youtube anymore. When I upload a video and it gets less impressions than my subscriber count, its just really demotivating. People actually said they are interested in my content, yet, they are never shown the video that I upload. Because the algorithm.

[golden_labels]

This means the bell notification concept does not work from engagement perspective and Youtube should scrap it.

That does not follow. It may be useless to the content creators,⁽¹⁾ but there is nothing that tells how it affects quality of data delivered by Alphabet to its customers. It may be worthless, but there is nothing to tell us about it. It’s not a problem either: whether it works or not is relevant only to the owners. It seems management believes it brings money and, considering Goofle’s data experts are among the finest, there is no reason to think they are wrong.

To me the takeaway is rather that content creators should see statistics about their viewers and rethink, if it makes sense to urge viewers to click the bell. It would be nicer, if more creators were as open as Dave is.

As for me, to shed some light on how it looks from audience perspective: I pay for the content on Patreon, get video notifications through YouTube’s RSS feed and watch them in mpv.

⁽¹⁾ Sample size 1, with neither audience nor channel representative of the entire YouTube population.

[Poe]

So why do content creators push so hard to hit the bell icon if it does not create more views?  Is it because the algorithm heavily weighs early views and discounts later views?  The influencers want as many customers as possible to all view video as early as possible, right?

[thm_w]

I have mentioned it elswhere already, but for me as a pure watcher, it appears to me that subscribing to a channel does not really seem to matter, as long as i primarily use the YT mainpage to get new videos.

Yes, which is why I would recommend bookmarking the subscription feed instead of the main page. Then it will matter.

https://www.youtube.com/feed/subscriptions

[EEVblog]

So why do content creators push so hard to hit the bell icon if it does not create more views?  Is it because the algorithm heavily weighs early views and discounts later views?  The influencers want as many customers as possible to all view video as early as possible, right?

Yes. If The Algorithm see that your video gets immediate enegement after release then it will treat it more favourabaly.

[The Soulman]

So why do content creators push so hard to hit the bell icon if it does not create more views?  Is it because the algorithm heavily weighs early views and discounts later views?  The influencers want as many customers as possible to all view video as early as possible, right?

Yes. If The Algorithm see that your video gets immediate enegement after release then it will treat it more favourabaly.

Interesting, would announcing a video ahead of time help with that?

[wilfred]

The question for me is why do the other 99% click the notification bell in the first place if they are not going to respond by watching?

I once during the early stages of the Covid-19 lockdowns we had, subscribed to a channel called Bad Obsession Motorsport because they had an interesting project underway. I've since unsubscribed because they produce new videos so infrequently on the project. I suppose being unsubscribed wouldn't matter if I clicked the notification bell because if they ever did notify me I might still watch. But I don't want to have a huge (more than 100) subscription list. Nor do I want to be receiving frequent notifications. I'll do only as much as is convenient for me.

Coincidentally, or ironically, they made an update a few months ago talking about why the project was apparently stalled. And I wasn't notified. So perhaps I'll continue not clicking the bell.

I don't like being prompted or reminded to subscribe and click the bell because I am reminded that as far as YT is concerned I'm the product.

[thm_w]

I don't like being prompted or reminded to subscribe and click the bell because I am reminded that as far as YT is concerned I'm the product.

I don't care if someone says "please subscribe", no different than an ad saying "please buy".

But you can install and contribute to: https://sponsor.ajay.app/ as thats one of the filters.

[Ranayna]

I have mentioned it elswhere already, but for me as a pure watcher, it appears to me that subscribing to a channel does not really seem to matter, as long as i primarily use the YT mainpage to get new videos.

Yes, which is why I would recommend bookmarking the subscription feed instead of the main page. Then it will matter.

https://www.youtube.com/feed/subscriptions

The thing is: I quite often find new interesting channels by browsing the main page.
But nonetheless, thank you, i have to admit i was not aware of the subscription feed