How Does The YouTube Algorithm Work
When a person gets on youtube they're gonna be recommended videos based on their previous search and watch history, and the goal of youtube is to keep you on their platform, why is that? because at the end of the day they're a business and they make more money the longer people are on the platform, so with you understanding that as a creator this is going to force you to level up your content and find things that are going to keep people engaged on your video, which is very important.
Now most people are not aware of this, but YouTube also pays attention to what your viewers are not watching as well, so when you're scrolling on your phone or desktop and you're looking at all of these different youtube thumbnails, they notice whether you scroll past a thumbnail and do nothing or you actually stop and click instantly
So let's just say that you don't click on a thumbnail but you stopped for a millisecond to view it, they would count that as an impression, and an impression is not like when you're scrolling through super fast and you're not really pausing on any other thumbnails, the impression is the moment you take that millisecond to pause, then youtube checks the block and at the point is where they will make a decision on whether they want to continue to recommend your content further.
Now when it comes to the next stage in the process this all depends on how long does the viewer actually watch your video and the average across youtube for how long viewers watch on average is between 30 to 40%, average percentage viewed, but what I have noticed as far as what moves the needle for most videos is 50% or higher average percentage viewed, and then YouTube starts to recommend your content in waves which I describe here in this video:
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