Depth not scale: How Times Radio is building an engaged YouTube following

In a nutshell:

• Times Radio is building a large following on YouTube, but longer watch times and hitting the right markets matter more than the number of subscribers
• YouTube is a revenue stream for the digital radio broadcaster, which makes use of existing assets from the daily shows
• The platform is built for recommending more videos, so the broadcaster focuses on quality and maximising watch time
• Strong thumbnails can make or break your YouTube strategy. Focus on a few, big, short words, a human face and a strong emotion

Times Radio, News UK's pandemic-born digital radio station, has hit 1m YouTube subscribers. But that is a vanity metric that does not tell the full story of its social strategy.

Speaking on an episode of the Journalism.co.uk podcast, head of video Brian Whelan says that subscriptions alone cannot be monetised, and only a fraction of their viewership is subscribed - which is a general trend seen across the platform. It is long watch times, completion rates and breaking into key geographical markets that truly matter. In other words, metrics that show deeper levels of engagement.

The goal is to build a loyal following in key markets like the UK, US, Ireland, and Australia - which earn a higher cost per mile (CPM) - rather than racking up subscribers in less affluent regions. YouTube Shorts - its TikTok-esque short-form video format - is therefore not a priority, as they do not tend to penetrate these key markets as well.

"Having a video that goes viral in Latin America is not useful for us as a marketing funnel. It's not useful for us in revenue generation," Whelan explains, indicating that the longer-term ambition is to move viewers to a premium subscription with The Times.

Failing that, YouTube content can be monetised in its own right after channels have 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 hours of watch time within 12 months. While declining to say how much revenue comes from YouTube, Whelan said the social video team of eight is a profitable endeavour and that a dedicated strategy has the potential to be a "serious multimillion pound string to your bow" for a news publisher.

The team has a lot of existing assets and talking heads from the daily radio show to cherry-pick. These are typically punchy, well-formed, strong opinions and analysis, at least eight minutes long. This serves as a ‘best of Times Radio’ for people wanting to catch up, but also a way to capture new audiences.

This long-form approach has paid dividends. Whelan cites examples of a 70-minute video featuring multiple former NATO generals, which averaged 35-40 minutes of viewer retention.

Its best-watched video is one of a woman who found out her parents were siblings and subsequently lived a life of shame - believing people "would think differently" of her if they knew the truth. It tends to spike around Christmas time every year.

Times Radio aims to fetch 4m views every 48 hours on its channel, publishing one story every hour or 90 minutes. It can ramp up to every 30 minutes during breaking news, or reduce output on slower days.

According to Whelan, a video is 'tanking' - or underperforming - when it gets fewer than 2,000 views in the first hour. But he adds that a new thumbnail can turn things around - frontload the thumbnail with a few big words, a human face and clear emotion.

Because YouTube is essentially a super-powered recommendation system, you need to be effective and efficient with what and how you publish content.

"It breaks my heart to see videos go up just for the sake of it, just to publish content," he says.

"It suggests to me when I see different accounts do that, that maybe you don't know what does well. Just hold back videos that will do badly, and only do videos that will do well and build a success."

Looking back on the last two and a half years of its YouTube strategy, Whelan says he would keep the same focus on depth and quality over quantity. And to not worry about over-publishing on successful and trending topics - Ukraine and Putin have dominated Times Radio's output. But he acknowledges that audiences only look at the homepage and the next queued video.

Times Radio is in good company at News UK, which has many strong brands on YouTube with large followings, like fellow digital radio broadcaster talkSPORT, legacy newspapers The Times and Sunday Times, and Talk TV, a purpose-built platform for social video, sitting at 1.1m subscribers, eclipsed by the Piers Morgan Uncensored show which has its own channel with 3.4m subscribers.

It is interesting to note that different titles follow different strategies, as Times Radio has not found the same success with live content as talkSPORT, for example.

Follow the conversation on 27 November at our digital journalism conference Newsrewired in London, where we will hear a full panel discussion on social video strategies with WIRED, News UK, The Telegraph and The News Movement. Check out the full agenda and grab your ticket today - but be quick as there are limited spaces left

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