Setting Up Playlists on YouTube
When starting off on YouTube and taking your first steps you may only have one or two videos.
As time goes by and you find yourself uploading more and more videos you will soon reach the point where your YouTube channel looks something like this to the public...
Who remembers these artefacts?
Looking at this simply, YouTube is your own school's video archive. Keep it clean, keep it tidy, it needs to be as simple as possible for the user to find what they are looking for.
(This isn't a housecleaning blog... we promise)
Much like a website, your YouTube channel should be organised, structured, and easily navigated.
On a website you wouldn't have content spontaneously dotted around. It would be organised by type of content and placed in a specific section.
Let's look at a food channel as an example. When on a YouTube channel click "videos" and you are confronted with something a little like this...
Where do we go from here ?
When we click on playlists...
Hooray for organisation!
It's far less daunting as a user isn't it? The videos are organised into such playlists as "healthy recipes and lighter bites" and "one-pot wonders". The content is a lot clearer because of the playlists, and the user is much more likely to find what they are looking for.
How to make a playlist.
Creating a playlist takes a matter of seconds.
Check out our quick video guide on how to create a playlist....
Creating a playlist takes seconds and really revitalises the look of your YouTube channel. Videos become organised and are easily accessible for the user.
Using Playlists for Schools
Schools are a perfect example for why playlists are so effective on YouTube. Look at these great ideas for school playlists:
1. Departmental Videos: With a plethora of departments in schools, with no organisation many great videos will get lost and won't get the reach they deserve! Instead of having videos from music,sports and drama all in the same place why not organise them in a playlist? With all departmental videos being pulled into their own playlist it makes the channel far more accessible and users can easily find what they are looking far.
- Sports
- Science
- English
- Trips
- Geography
- History
- Music
2. Event Videos: With so many great events happening within the school calendar, using playlists is a great way to organise and capture these events in the best way possible. Imagine you film every event at a sports day. You can upload all the individual events into a specific playlist, you can then share this playlist via e-mail and share it with parents! It can also be shared through all major social networks!
3. Marketing Videos: No doubt that on your schools YouTube channel you will have some promotional and marketing videos. Organising all these into one playlist can be supper effective. For example if you had several videos named "A day in the life of a...." This would ideally suit a playlist so users can see all the content clearly.
4. Learning Videos: Learn a language, learn an instrument, even learn to cook. With YouTube playlists you can really be creative. It's not only about organisation. By being creative with how you structure videos you can create some brilliant, visual learning aids. Say you want to teach French. Structure videos into a playlist which effectively teaches the language, you start off with basic grammar and then move onto basic greetings and so on (Check out this example of a how to learn French Playlist) https://www.youtube.com/watchv=aW0utoW2SEs&list=PL8400690676A95A6E_ )
5. Homework/ Revision Guides: Again this is all about being creative with your playlists. Create informative videos for priceless revision guides for your pupils. Have every topic stored in one playlist with easy access for your pupils. Withso many pupils having access to phones/tablets and instant access to YouTube playlists are the new revision guides!
6. Sports Videos: With thousands of sporting events taking place every year within schools around the world, why not make a video of some of these events? Wouldn't it be fantastic to look back in twenty years time at your schools YouTube channel and to see yourself scoring the winning try or the winning penalty! With so many events playlists are ideal for making sure this is possible.
7. Trip Videos: School trips are a special time in every child's life. Playlists give schools the opportunity to share all of the special memories that children will make! Also you will be able to showcase all the wonderful trips that your school runs for prospective families.
Great Example Schools
To best show you how to use YouTube playlists in schools we are going to show you some awesome examples of using playlists for your schools! Well done if you are on here and keep up the good work 😀
British School in The Netherlands
Methodist Ladies College, Melbourne.
So why use playlists?
- Makes your YouTube channel a neat, clean structured social media channel.
- Create priceless learning aids such as revision guides and language lessons.
- Optimise the reach of your school marketing videos.
- Easily share precious memories and school events with parents.
It really is so simple and so effective. Make the user experience a great one when they visit your YouTube channel and don't let them get lost in a maze of content......
Don't get let your users get lost in a maze of content!
Be creative and innovative with you playlists. If you have great content, create a playlist and share it with the world in the best way possible!
Do you have any other ideas for how people can use YouTube Playlists?
If so, share your idea in the comments below! We’d love to hear any innovative thoughts you may have!