A mistake often made by those managing a YouTube channel is thinking exclusively about video production, setting aside the study of their audience.
Identifying topics to explore, creating video formats, and drawing up an editorial calendar might not be enough if a proper user analysis is not also carried out.
Fortunately, in the Analytics section of YouTube Studio, there is an area dedicated to this.
Recently, in the “Audience by viewing behavior” area, YouTube introduced two new metrics derived from the previous “Returning viewers” entry, namely “Occasional viewers” and “Regular viewers.”
- New viewers: users who watched your channel for the first time in the selected time period.
- Occasional viewers: users who started watching your videos for 5 months or less in the last year.
- Regular viewers: users who have watched your channel consistently for 6 or more months in the last year.
The difference between occasional and regular viewers is that the latter follow the channel consistently and for a longer period of time compared to occasional ones.
It is important to emphasize that it is possible to modify the time window for these metrics back to March 2025, the period when YouTube began tracking this data.
Analyzing these entries can offer very useful food for thought; here are some examples!
- If the majority of viewers consists of new users rather than occasional or regular ones, it means the audience is more attracted to a single video or specific topic rather than the entire channel.
- If you are faced with a mix of new, occasional, and regular viewers, it means you are succeeding in both retaining the existing audience and attracting new ones.
- If the percentage of regular viewers is low compared to subscribers, it means few users follow your channel regularly. To increase this number, publish content consistently and strengthen the bond with your audience through posts, comments, live chats, and brand recognition.
