YouTube is one of the most dominant video-sharing platforms to date. It can be a consistent source of income for some if the cards are played right.
With that being said, YouTubers who upload their content to the website can earn money if they know their audience well enough.
To understand their audience, good YouTubers will pay attention to their metrics. After all, besides luck, success on YouTube is a numbers game.
Still, not all the data, such as views, are available for the creators to see. While a lot of information about views is given, can YouTubers actually see who viewed their videos?
Can YouTubers See Who Viewed Their Videos?
YouTube does make loads of information available on its platform, but not everything is shared publicly. Which means, despite YouTubers being given analytics to help with their content creation efforts, YouTubers cannot see who specifically views their videos.
With the advancement of technology, it is fairly easy for YouTubers to obtain data that lets them to understand their audiences, which allows them to spark better ideas for their YouTube channel and content. In fact, obtaining data is one of the most groundbreaking processes made convenient nowadays.
Still, personal information of viewers is where YouTube draws the line. In fact, there are guidelines and policies that YouTube itself follows in order to ensure the safety of personal data.
The thing is, as big as the Internet is, some details that are too sensitive and cannot cannot be displayed publicly. The harm of having personal information leaked is immeasurable to any individual.
YouTube’s Privacy Guidelines
As mentioned, YouTube has its own guidelines and policies that dictate how much information is actually shown. To understand the basics of privacy on YouTuber, on what data that YouTube is allowed to share (and not to share), you may read this dedicated page.
You may find the entire set of rules regarding privacy is detailed and long, all in all, it all leads to protecting personal information.
Despite this, this mega social platform is free to use some of the data to help with ads personalization and videos recommendation. Basically, YouTube utilizes the collected data to give the best experience to its users.
Similarly, YouTubers also use the collected data from analytics to deliver the same feel-good experience too.
True enough, there are a lot of limitations placed on YouTubers when it comes to viewer data. Fortunately, there are many alternatives a creator can consider.
YouTube Studio
Although it’s not possible for YouTubers to see who viewed their video, other statistics are shown instead. In fact, an entire dashboard is made available to creators to better manage their videos.
This feature is called YouTube Studio, creators are given access to this video manager when they create an account. YouTube Studio is a helpful tool that makes uploading videos easier. But the greatest feature of this dashboard is that it can show analytics.
YouTube Studio is where a YouTuber learns how their videos perform using several measurements. Some of these measurements include the geographic location and even the basic demographic information of a channel’s viewers.
What Other Data Does YouTube Show?
Aside from general information such as the location, age, and gender of viewers, YouTube also provides more extensive data like number of new viewers and returning viewers through its YouTube Studio.
YouTubers are also able to see the average watch time or how long viewers stay to watch a creator’s videos is also displayed. In addition,, impressions, or how often a channel’s videos pop up in viewer’s searches are calculated as well.
These are just some of the data that YouTube allows its creators to review. But with the amount of information already provided, as it is, YouTube is generous enough with showing data.
Tips On Finding Out Who Views A YouTuber’s Videos
If a YouTuber would still want to find out who actually views their videos, there are alternatives. The two main ways that YouTubers can measure this is through their subscribers and comments.
Anyone who subscribes to a channel can be seen by the owner of the channel. In other words, YouTubers are able to see who subscribes to them.
However, these subscribers have an option of not showing their accounts to the YouTubers they subscribe to. While these users who opt not to share their details are hidden, they still count towards the total count
There’s still a catch for YouTubers when it comes to finding out who views their videos through their subscribers. Instead, YouTubers can search via the comments they receive from their clips instead.
Comments are public by default, which means that anyone who comments also makes their accounts public. Additionally, if these commenters happen to also be YouTubers, more opportunities can be explored as well.
Sometimes, the comment feature can be abused by spamming other YouTubers for publicity. So, Youtubers are urged to be responsible as well when using comments for research.
Is Seeing Who Views Videos Necessary?
The simple answer is no. It’s not necessary at all for YouTubers to see who views their videos. While it looks helpful, YouTubers already have a lot of tools at their disposal. In fact, seeing who views a YouTube video can actually do more harm than good.
Seeing viewers of a video opens up a lot of doors — and not all of them are positive. Disputes between YouTubers or against a particular audience can get more intense if viewer details are made public.
And most of all, getting info on who views a video is just the cherry on top. Most of the analytics that could help YouTubers adjust their content are already available. Features such as the YouTube Studio dashboard would already do wonders for YouTubers to enact good strategies to get more views on their YouTube videos.
YouTube is a platform that has strict rules regarding privacy and community safety. In fact, even the dislike counter on videos has been disabled due to unfair attacks on small YouTubers.
In short, finding out who views videos is not as important as other available YouTube features. And on top of that, the YouTube community would still be a safe space for everyone.
Conclusion
Basically, YouTube does not allow YouTubers to see who views their videos. And the platform does so to maintain safety in the YouTube community.
In a world where any information is accessible in the blink of an eye, data privacy is vital. That said, YouTubers still have access to other alternatives that can help them even more.
