I had a question recently around YouTube and can add some personal experience to the discussion.  If you are new to the game, a quick update in that earlier this year YouTube starting getting tough on the use of its services for promotional reasons and came down heavy on people crossing over the line of their terms of service.

In what seems to be a consistent trend (more later in another post on Twitter’s new stance…), applications seems to go through a similar cycle:

1) They start up and end users get involved

2) As they become more popular, internet marketers get involved and use automation and or blackhat tactics to increase their coverage

3) The application loses its effectiveness for the end users as internet marketers overload the application

4) The application gets shirty and goes on a rampage and comes down tough on internet marketers who step too far over the line; or in the heat of the attack, even those who are relatively benign

5) Net result is 1000s of accouts banned and getting shut down

So, how do you use something like YouTube without the risk of  getting banned?

I came across this useful summary from Shecky.  The summary is however smart you think you are, if you do things that a normal end user would not normally do, then you are automtically in the danger zone….

1. Have only ONE YouTube account per ISP.
2. Never spam video descriptions, titles, or tags.  Descriptions can contain a link to your website and can be “keyword rich,” but it must read cleanly, and provide an accurate description of the video.
3. Never purchase YouTube views.
4. Never use automated “friend-getter” software like TubeBlasterPro.  Network and make connections with others on YouTube like you would on any other Social networking site like Facebook, etc.
5. Never upload duplicate content.  If you want to make some modifications to a video, change the title, change the beginning/ending, change the format, etc, that will probably work.  But, ask yourself this question:  does the new video actually provide new content?  If it doesn’t, I would think twice before uploading.
6. Use your channel for more than marketing.  If you are truly displaying your leadership qualities, your channel should be PACKED with good content.  That good content will draw people to you, and you’ll ultimately gain a lot of business from that approach.
7. Use your YouTube channel for your own branding (see #6).
8. If you have more than one YouTube channel, shut down the others IMMEDIATELY.
9. If you are deleting YouTube accounts, CHANGE the email address of your primary account.
10. If you are deleting YouTube accounts, CHANGE your IP address.  If you’re not sure how to do this, go to  http://whatismyip.com
11. Do NOT upload videos to YouTube via automated uploaders like TrafficGeyser.  Although TrafficGeyser is a wonderful tool, YouTube has figured out when videos are being uploaded with this software.
12. Do NOT use music in your videos that is copyright protected.  I was able to buy some wonderful royalty-free music from AUDIO JUNGLE very inexpensively.  I highly recommend using them.

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So, be aware of how you use YouTube (or any other application for that matter) or risk getting banned!

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