How Long Does it Take to Grow a YouTube Channel?

There are many studies that show on average, you can grow a YouTube channel from 0 to 1000 subscribers within 1 – 2 years.

If you’re faster than that, you are doing better than your competition.

But fall short in your uploading quality, consistency, and ability to provide valuable content, you might not see 1000 subscribers until after 2 years, if ever.

However, these are average numbers, meaning you can speed up the process.

There are definitely ways to increase your subscriber count in a much faster time span, which I’ll be talking about in this article.

But first it’s time to discuss how and why people don’t hit the 1000 subscriber faster than 15 to 22 months.

Why Your YouTube Channel Is Failing

You’re not posting enough

One of the biggest success killers is procrastination.

At the end of the day, creating a YouTube channel and treating it like a business is a surefire way to bring you success.

However, treat it like a little side hustle and you’re looking at a big fat fail.

Basically, you’re not posting enough as you should be, which should be around 2 – 3 videos per week.

Most people see success more or less at the 100th video mark.

So if you’re creating 2 – 3 videos per week, you’ll hit 100 videos in your first year, which is much faster than the average content creator.

You’re striving for perfection

You’re striving for perfection which doesn’t exist.

It’s all practice and a numbers game.

Your first 20 videos will be incredibly bad, while your next 20 videos will be even better.

However, your 100th video will be better than your 50th.

You can’t strive for perfection when starting out, you can only post your best and you’ll slowly get better over time.

Practice makes improvement, and the only way to put out better content is to do your best, post it, and on to the next.

You’re not providing enough value

People subscribe because they like you and find your videos entertaining, funny, informative, or a mixture of everything.

If you’re not delivering valuable content, and just kind of winging it (like putting something up for the sake of it), then people don’t have a reason to subscribe you.

What is your video about?

What is your point you’re trying to get across?

Will it spark interest and get people talking?

These are the sorts of questions you should ask yourself before you start creating your video.

You’re not targeting the right keywords

YouTube is a search engine with an algorithm, and an algorithm is designed to provide the best content for the users search query.

However, most keywords are too competitive for a new YouTube channel.

Therefore you will have to do proper research to target easy-to-rank keywords.

There are plenty of free YouTube keywords tools on Google.

How to Fast-Track Your YouTube Success

Consistency is key

As mentioned previously, by the time you hit 100 videos you will be better than average person because most people quit before they get there.

So one of the best ways to get to 100 videos is to be consistent in your posting schedule.

Strive for at least 2 videos per week, but if you can do 3 – 4, even better!

Do not worry about perfection as it never exists, just do your best, post it, learn from it, see what you can make better next time, etc.

You will absolutely get better over time and that’s why it’s so important not to worry about posting “perfect” videos.

Just focus on providing lots and lots of value.

Do more of what’s working

One huge mistake people make is sticking to a niche that they think their audience likes.

Pro tip: Give the people what they want, not what you “think” they want. Basically create more videos on what performs best and less of what’s not.

There’s a couple of reasons for this.

Firstly, the YouTube algorithm obviously likes that video and ranked it in the search engines to bring you traffic.

Putting out more similar content shows that you are knowledgeable in that field and will continue (hopefully) to rank other similar videos.

Secondly, your audience loves those types of videos as well. Keep putting out what performs well and you’ll start to see more subscribers and views to your future videos.

Be active and engage with your audience

In the very beginning you should be replying to all of your comments.

Remember, these people took minutes out of their day to write on your video.

The least you can do is show appreciation by commenting back.

This will show that you’re a real person, you care about the person on the other side, it builds trust, and makes people excited to see your future videos.

Collab with the bigger guys

This method is so underrated it’s not even fair.

Of course it’s quite difficult to pull off when you don’t have a track record of consistent videos.

However, after a few hundred subscribers and 20+ videos under your belt, you can start collaborating with the bigger guys.

Reach out to bigger YouTube channels in your niche and offer to create a free video for a shout out .

Bottom line: Learn who your competition is, see them as a collab partner that will take you to the next level, build connections and not enemies.

Bonus tip: forget the numbers

It’s very easy to watch analytics all day and see how many views your videos are getting.

However, just like any algorithm, it’s complex.

Some days you will get more views than others which is completely normal for any YouTube channel.

As long as the total numbers are climbing over time, you’ve got nothing to worry about.

Also watching statistics leads to less work and more procrastination.

It’s the same with blogging. At the start I was constantly watching how many visitors were on my blog and getting frustrated when numbers wouldn’t grow.

However, the only way to get pass this is to ignore numbers and focus on the big picture, which is consistent, quality videos.

So How Long Does it Take to Grow a YouTube Channel?

Simply put;

All niches are different, all YouTube channels are different, and the algorithm is complex that pinpointing a timeframe is impossible.

Some people see success in 6 – 12 months while posting 1x per week.

While others can post 1x per week for 2 years and only get 1000 subscribers.

As a rule of thumb:

Give yourself a 2-year timeline and dedicate yourself to your new online business, and you’ll see FAR more success sticking it out for the long-haul rather than giving up after 3 months because you only have 100 subscribers.

If In Doubt, Post More

I like to apply some of the golden rules of blogging to a YouTube channel, because they are extremely the same.

Except I’m trying to please the Google algorithm with written content, while you’re trying to please the YouTube algorithm in video format.

Anyway, my favorite golden rule is to post when you’re feeling lost.

Sitting and wondering why you’re not growing when you’ve only got 20 videos up and 3 months experience is only going to send you in a downward spiral.

Instead of doubting yourself, just create another video.

You’re on the right track, just forget the noise and focus on the main objective, which is more quality content 🙂

YouTube Is Good But I Prefer Blogging

Okay, so I have nothing against YouTube other than the fact that you’ll be spending too much time creating videos.

Don’t get me wrong, YouTube is a great platform to grow a business and make money.

Or get famous, whatever your goals are.

However, I prefer blogging for the simple reason that I don’t have to spend all day filming and editing videos.

One video can take up to 12 hours to publish.

While I can create a blog post in 2 – 3 hours and still make as much money as a YouTuber.

Free blog training here

So that’s a great alternative if you’re interested in making money online and don’t care about getting internet famous.