You shouldn't expect much surprises when uploading your video. After all, you should already have a title and thumbnail created and your video should be complete. (Remember not to rush your video! It's better to delay it than rush it to get it out by a certain deadline.)

Despite all this, there are still some things we need to create for our video:

• Description
• Keywords
• Meta data
• End screen and cards
• Premiering your video - good or bad?

Description

The description of your video deserves more care than most give it. It not only tells people what your video is about, but it tells the YouTube algorithm what your video is about, which is crucial!

A good formula for your description is as follows:

Explain the video in 2-3 sentences. Make sure to include keywords!

Tell your viewers to subscribe here and give them a subscription link.

Post any links/videos that you reference in your video here, if there is any.

If your video has chapters, put them here.

Link your social media here.

To learn how to make a YouTube subscription link, read this.

Keywords

Keywords in your description are very important, as they tell YouTube what your video is about, which is crucial for your video getting recommended.

However, it is very important not to put misleading keywords! This will hurt viewer retention, which will in turn hurt your video.

Good keywords that almost all videos can include are:

• "Geometry Dash"
• The trends your video is based on, such as the exact search predictions you used to come up with your topic
• The names of popular levels in your video
• The names of popular players talked about in your video

In addition to putting the names of popular players talked about in your video in your description, it's not a bad idea to tag them via their YouTube handle.

Here's a good example of a video description using keywords. The video this is taken from is I Played Would You Rather In Geometry Dash. The keywords are bolded

In this Geometry Dash Would You Rather challenge, me and my friends try the world's hardest jump, Slaughterhouse, top 1 extreme demon Acheron, top 1 challenge VSC, and more custom challenges to see who comes out victorious.

It might also be a good idea to include the search predictions you used when coming up with your video topic as keywords in your video's title, especially if you're using a trend-focused idea.

Meta data

Two important sources of meta data for your video are its tags and category.

Tags

As opposed to popular belief, tags are no longer an important ranking factor to the YouTube algorithm. Keywords are much more important. In fact, your video probably won't take a noticable hit if you don't include any tags at all.

Instead, tags are used to put words that can be misspelt by viewers when searching for your video.

Good tags to include in your video is Geometry Dash, and perhaps the topic of your video.

Remember not to spam tags, as that can be seen as a bad sign to the YouTube algorithm.

Category

The category is simple. If your video is a gaming video, choose the gaming category and search for the game your video is on. For Geometry Dash content, that would be... Geometry Dash.

End screen and cards

These are not super important for a video's ranking in the YouTube algorithm, but here are some tips.

End screen

Avoid putting too many end screen options at the end of your video. Instead, it's best to just choose one video and recommend it to your viewers in your video. It's also a good idea to make it somehow related to the topic of your video.

Cards

Cards are those things that appear in the top right corner of your video. You can include as many or as little as you want. One tip, however, is to avoid putting them too early in the video. If a viewer clicks on a card, that is taking them off your video, which can hurt viewer retention. Instead, it is recommended to put your cards in the last quarter of your video. In addition, make sure they promote related content.

Premiering your video - good or bad?

There is an ongoing debate as to whether premiering your video is good or bad. Some say it's fine, others say it hurts the video and that videos should be uploaded without a premiere instead.

What is known is that the positive or negative effects of premiering a video, if any, are likely miniscule. As such, you shouldn't worry about how you upload a video.

Personally, I dislike premieres with a super long wait time. It's best to premiere your video instantly, or with a short countdown, if you're going to premiere your video at all. This is what I do with all my videos.

With all this done, it is time to press upload. Sharing your video with friends and on social media isn't a bad idea, but traffic organic to YouTube is better. Advertising your video to people uninterested will harm your video, however. This is because the people you advertise it to will not click, potentially hurting CTR, or will not watch, which will hurt viewer retention.

Now that your video is uploaded, it's time to focus on the next steps you should take on your journey to becoming a successful YouTuber.