Jason Pantana

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Every Video Needs A Thumbnail (YouTube, LinkedIn, IGTV, IG Reels, Facebook, etc.)

๐„๐•๐„๐‘๐˜ ๐•๐ˆ๐ƒ๐„๐Ž ๐๐„๐„๐ƒ๐’ ๐€ ๐‘ป๐‘ฏ๐‘ผ๐‘ด๐‘ฉ๐‘ต๐‘จ๐‘ฐ๐‘ณโ€ผ๏ธ (That is, a still image that acts as a preview of your video.) YouTube, LinkedIn, IGTV, IG Reels, Facebook, and more!

Whenever you upload โฌ†๏ธ a videoโ€”no matter whereโ€”the social platform monitors how often the video is shown to potential viewers versus how often those potential viewers opt to watch the video. ๐˜๐˜ช๐˜ฅ๐˜ฆ๐˜ฐ๐˜ด ๐˜ต๐˜ฉ๐˜ข๐˜ต ๐˜จ๐˜ฆ๐˜ต ๐˜ท๐˜ช๐˜ฆ๐˜ธ๐˜ฆ๐˜ฅ ๐˜ข๐˜ณ๐˜ฆ ๐˜ณ๐˜ฆ๐˜ธ๐˜ข๐˜ณ๐˜ฅ๐˜ฆ๐˜ฅ ๐˜ข๐˜ญ๐˜จ๐˜ฐ๐˜ณ๐˜ช๐˜ต๐˜ฉ๐˜ฎ๐˜ช๐˜ค๐˜ข๐˜ญ๐˜ญ๐˜บ, ๐˜ข๐˜ฏ๐˜ฅ ๐˜ต๐˜ฉ๐˜ถ๐˜ด, ๐˜ด๐˜ฉ๐˜ฐ๐˜ธ๐˜ฏ ๐˜ต๐˜ฐ ๐˜ข ๐˜ธ๐˜ช๐˜ฅ๐˜ฆ๐˜ณ ๐˜ข๐˜ถ๐˜ฅ๐˜ช๐˜ฆ๐˜ฏ๐˜ค๐˜ฆ.

The difference often boils down to the thumbnailโ€”even if itโ€™s only viewable for half a second. The thumbnail is, for lack of a better term, pure โ€œclickbait.โ€ Its purpose is to entice viewers to choose to watch the video. Make โ€˜em irresistible to click! (But also, they should be relevant to the vid because if someone clicks to watch and then bounces straightaway, thatโ€™s not good either ๐Ÿ˜‰).

If a YouTube user runs a search that ranks your video, for instance, and then scrolls past it for another, theyโ€™re sending YouTube implied feedback to stop ranking your video.

Point is, the better the thumbnail, the better the click-through rate (CTR). The better the CTR, the more views ๐Ÿ‘€ youโ€™re gonna get.