If you want to be legit on YouTube, it’s not about filming and uploading anymore. With all the competition, users are looking for high-quality content to consume. Everyone knows that audio and video quality are important. In fact, it’s easier than ever to record high-quality content with just your phone. So what’s the next step? Design. To look professional, you need a brand and a website. Here are 5 reasons a Youtuber needs a graphic and web designer.
5 reasons a Youtuber needs a graphic and web designer
It’s time to look professional. I’m not talking about wearing a suit and tie. I’m talking about looking like a legit business, or an authority in whatever content you’re creating. It has to look like you have a production team producing your video, even though it’s just one person. Besides saving you time and energy to focus on creating your videos, here are the ways that a designer can help elevate your YouTube channel.
01. Logo and branding
One of the first things you must have to look professional is a logo. Your logo will be everywhere and help with brand recognition. You’ll use your logo on your YouTube channel in the channel art, your YouTube video, on your website, media kit (if you plan to apply to affiliates), business card (if you plan to network), and so on.
Besides your logo, you also need a graphic designer to research and develop your brand. Why is branding important? You can think of it as creating a signature style for your channel and other assets. It keeps everything consistent. You’ll use the same fonts, colors, imagery, and so on. Sounds boring, right? Well, this helps with brand recognition. If you keep using the same style, people will start to know you for it. Not only that, but it saves you time in content creation. You’ll never have to guess which font and colors to use because it’s already decided.
02. Title graphics and channel art
A graphic designer can design your channel, title, and thumbnail graphics for your videos. If you already have an established brand, this will help with brand recognition. For your YouTube channel, the cover art is the main graphic on the page. It should showcase the important details of your channel.
Another thing you might not think about is the branding watermark on the bottom right side of the video. This graphic is usually the logo, but it could be a submark or an icon that’s relevant to your brand.
Thumbnails are the first thing people see when they’re browsing videos. Great thumbnails will obviously get more click-throughs. Not only that, but some people will also use title graphics in their videos to showcase what the video is about. Check out this video from Jenn Im for an example of cool title graphics. You’ll see that her thumbnail video and title graphics are completely different.
03. Social media graphics
If you’re on YouTube, you’re definitely on other social media channels to promote your videos. I’m guessing you’re using mostly Twitter and Instagram. No matter which social media platform you’re using, graphics are important.
According to Brain Rules, “vision trumps all other senses.” So, if you’re using just text, you’re not getting as many views as you could. Every platform has a visual aspect. You can probably get away with posting your YouTube video on Twitter, but you’ll definitely need an image on Instagram, Instagram stories, Pinterest and Facebook.
With these social media platforms, graphic dimensions are important. For Instagram, a 1 to 1 ratio is best, Pinterest is all about height to get noticed, and Instagram stories usually uses the dimensions of 1080px x 1920px. Facebook has their own videos, so if you post your YouTube link in your post, your video will be cropped weird. It’s better to create a graphic and upload it to Facebook to catch viewers attention. Then add your link in the Facebook post.
04. Opt-in and other video graphics
If you’re smart, you’re growing an email list. This list can be used to help get information on what content you can create next or list of potential customers. Usually, if people sign up for your list, they’re fans that love your content and want to support you.
If you’re trying to create and grow your list, one popular way to do this is to create an opt-in that people are willing to sign up to your mailing list to get. This can be a worksheet, workbook, planner, an exclusive video, and so on. These can all be designed by a graphic designer.
For your videos, you might want to create an intro and outro. You can also have a designer create buttons, icons, and other graphics that you want your viewers to click on.
If you decide to create digital products or actual products that you want to start selling to your audience, you’ll want a designer to design the final product. Products can include planners, books, ebooks, notebooks, mugs, and so on.
Note: If you want an intro video like logo animations or you need something that requires more than just a still graphic, you need someone (like me) with experience in multimedia.
05. Website graphics
If you don’t know why you should have a website, read here. When you do set up a website, you’ll need images. High-quality images are really important because it makes your website look like a professional site. When you see low-quality images on websites, you know you think that the website might be a scam, so you click away.
What types of images will you need for a website? Images for the header of each page, images of your opt-ins, products, featured images for your blog post, and etc.
Since websites are changing and updating every day, it’s great to have a designer to make these changes.
Summary
Don’t have time to read this post? Here’s a list of the 5 reasons a Youtuber needs a graphic and web designer:
- To create a high-quality logo and brand.
- Design the channel art, thumbnails, and title graphics for videos.
- Create social media graphics to promote new videos.
- Create opt-ins and other graphics needed for videos.
- Update and create website graphics.
Are you a YouTuber? Have you thought to hire a graphic designer for your channel? Let me know in the comments below.
-Paigon
