Do you need more than one YouTube channel?

A lot of the big YouTubers have more than one channel/profile.  Most often their main one (and most subscribed to) is the one where they do their main “schtick” (they almost always have a focus that they stick to with their videos, whether it be sketch comedy, commentary, reviews, news, etc.) and then the second channel will usually be for their personal videos – often vlogs (just them talking about stuff) or other random videos they feel like making.

Why do this? Well, the rationale is that this way people can choose what they want to watch from that YouTuber.  So if you just like the sketch comedy segments, but you hate the vlogs, then you don’t have to ever see the vlogs.  Or vice-versa.  Or if you like both, then you simply subscribe to both channels.

So when is the best time to create a second channel? I’m not really sure yet.  it’s debatable if you should wait until you already have a big subscription base or if you should just start of from the get go with separate ones.  I’m contemplating creating a new channel for videos of me just chatting about stuff.  And maybe even a third one for anything that isn’t vlogs or comedy spoofs,  so it’s all really separated and clearly defined.  That way when people subscribe they’ll know exactly what they’ll be getting.  Just like when you watch your favorite sitcom, you know what to expect week after week and that you’re not going to suddenly tune in and find them doing a serious drama one time.

I think what’s holding me back from doing it is that I feel like it’ll be difficult to get the viewership up on my new second channel if I create one.  Lisa Nova has 3 channels for example and her second and third ones have significantly less subscribers than her main one. And for me I’ve found it really difficult just to get people to switch over to the new newsletter on this blog from my old one on my previous web site, so that really just goes to show that it’s actually a lot harder than you’d think to get people to make simple changes and follow you in other places.  So I can ask my current subscribers to subscribe to my new channel all I want, but the reality is that less than half probably will.  And who knows how long it would take before that second channel got accepted by YouTube as a Partner account as well.

But having such wide variety on my channel is likely the main thing that’s keeping my subscriber count from shooting up.  When people subscribe it’s because they want to see more of the same type of thing that they’re currently watching, so going back and forth between different types of videos might really be a bad choice.

What do you think? Is having more than one channel a good idea to keep different types of videos separate and keep subscribers happy?  Or do you think it’s better when a YouTuber just has one and you only have one place to go to see all of their videos?  Should I open a second (and possibly third) account or would it just cause a lot less views on my vlog videos and divide up my subscribers into two smaller accounts?

—

YouTube Comment of the Day:

GothCat77 has made a comment on Dogs are better than cats!: