Awesome Tips It’s Time to End Cringe Thumbnail Faces… and YouTube has the Solution
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YouTube has changed a LOT over the years, sometimes before your very eyes. We’ve been using their new A/B/C thumbnail tester to figure out what makes YOU stick around and watch more of the video.
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MUSIC CREDIT
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Intro: Laszlo – Supernova
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Outro: Approaching Nirvana – Sugar High
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CHAPTERS
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0:00 Intro
1:48 Bell’s Upgrade
3:35 Scorpion Chair
4:48 Our Best PC Builds
5:57 What’s Going On?
7:27 Conclusion
10:44 Outro
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Look… I have been here since you put the reservoir in the damn bath tub and I will click the video no matter what 😀
The things I’d like to see in your thumbnails are channel logo (the way you do with Techquickie) and series logo (WAN, Tech Upgrade, home tech, network stuff, random piece of tech, blast from the past, Scrapyard Wars, badminton center, …).
As an example of this done well I’d say “Viva La Dirt League D&D”. They run multiple series in a secondary channel. And with quick look I can see it’s D&D channel and which campaign.
With the white room tech upgrade one,
My take is that the issue was spacing, you have someone on the left, window, Linus, then empty space. It subconsciously looks weird, whereas the other way, window, central Linus, person on the right in the open area. Easier and more pleasing for the eye, and then opens to click into.
That explains why I see different thumbnails 4 the same video
Haven't watched LTT since the drama and the first video I click on has a joke where Linus is crappy to his staff. Think I'll keep skipping them, whatever the thumbnails are.
I just realised i completely ignored the skorpion video because i had no idea what it was about…
Sometimes, "YouTube as a business" Is a real turn-off.
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Me who just watches every video without ever seeing the thumbnail 👀
It’s Linus Tech Tips. We are going to click the video regardless of the thumbnail.
Maybe for a smaller creator this matters alot. But not for you or MKBHD…
So that's what's been going. Thought I was going mad. I get a notification about your videos but I'm often at work and can't watch straight away. Then later I go to my watch later playlist and can't see the video straight away. I often miss your videos becuase I'm looking for the wrong thumbnail!
AND OF COURSE YOU GUYS CHANGED THE THUMBNAIL LATER.
The first one was better btw
And here I thought I was experiencing Mandela Effect when most of the thumbnail got changed
I love how the tool was also used on this video 😉
Linus looks better shaven.
😐 is kinda funnier than 😩 thats why i clicked it
So many people in this comment section that believe thumbnails have no effect on them because they are so self-aware. Unfortunately, no matter your level of perceived sophistication, you will always be affected by the thumbnail in some way.
i have noticed youtube will suggest a video i know i wanna watch later and then later it will show up again with a different thumbnail. i remember seeing both with the scorpion chair and was more interested in the one showing the chair.
Thank god
Please send this to all YouTube creators. I'm so tired of the stupid reaction shit on my feeds. ❤ Your work.
I actually suspect that some youtubers are getting false results because I almost always add to watch later and often when i get to it, the thumbnail has changed and often makes less sense in the context of the video.
And now that i've watched this video, I think this is a huge part of it. Surely I'm not the only one who checks the stream to catch a few fish and hang them up for later, and there's no way watch time accounts for "watch later" mis-taps
My videos do best when you can clearly see my face, see what the topic of the video is and a short message in easy to read text.
Consistency in the “look” is really important too. At my level I feel like someone who would normally watch my video might skip past it if the thumbnail doesn’t catch their eye that it’s one of mine.
Thumbnails help me quickly filter out content I DON'T want to watch. Next I read the channel name to see if the source is trustworthy to me, then the title to check if the content interests me(these last 2 steps are in random order I think). I get recommended your guys videos sometimes 4 times until I randomly decide to watch it.
u didnt try anything withhout any faces at all? For me personaly a face thumbnail is a Red Flag for a Vid….well except maybe Linus, GN etc bc i know em. but i hardly touch new youtubers if they stuff their Face into mine at first.
Clarity. If I feel clickbaited, I'm out. Either I'm interested in the content or I'm not. Just make it as clear as possible what I can expect so I can decide. Clickbait makes me unsubscribe an avoid the channel.
In response to point number one, your fans still cringe and hate themselves when you do an awful thumbnail, sometimes we have to see the video pop up two or three times before giving in and watching a video with an interesting title and an awful thumbnail, often after running out of other new content to watch….just sayin, if it sounds really cool and we know it's not a randomly generated AI channel, we'll click anyways, but not always the first time it comes up in the feed
And then there's me: o weird, the thumbnail changed since I first saw this and decided to watch this.
Do they separate subs from non-subs?
I think it lacks desktop vs mobile. I would huess that on desktop little details are not as big as on phone, where you are looking only at one or two thumbnails from very close
YouTube algorithm must hate me then, cause I’m the type that knows I’m gonna watch the video in full but not at the moment I see it, so I add them to my watch later and work through it when I want, usually a few days later
Why can't YouTube generate three thumbnails for me from the video and let me pick one? I am sure most people use an auto generated one, because not everyone has a graphic designer on staff.
3:20 In the recent US debates, Bidens team got to pick the side the contenders stand on and they picked the right side. They preferred choosing this over having the last word, so I think there is probably some attention stuff going on there.
What about the quality of the video? Maybe high watch time videos it doesn't make a difference because the video carries itself. But for struggling videos,.the thumbnail version shows a bigger difference, because the better performing thumbnail has do do more heavy lifting.
I can't wait until there are procedurally-generated thumbnails that can try to show each individual viewer what they'd most want to see 😆
I am subscribed and I just click on new videos
This whole video was a masterclass in design and marketing. Can't believe it's free, I learned so much. Thank you.
3:09 personally find Bell on the left giving streamer talking over somebody else's video vibes. That said i tend to go off the titles.
Edit: Thumbnails surely have nothing to do with watch time, ive never turned off a video over a thumbnail
I as a viewer go out of my way to dislike videos with cringe thumbnails and avoid those channels in the future if they think cringe thumbnails are the sauce for their channel.
And since this absurdity has become common knowledge for Youtubers, the number of cringe thumbnails has gone way higher sadly.
Dude, I don't look at the thumbnails, I just watch the video's. And if I find it boring or not so interesting >> SKIPP. Something to do with the thumbnail? Don't think so. I think I read the titles though and might skip one based on title.
a 1:58