What is YouTube Shorts? YouTube Shorts Explained for Beginners,

Ever since YouTube introduced YouTube Shorts,  you must have heard a lot about YouTube Shorts.   But what basically is YouTube Shorts and  should you create YouTube Shorts videos?   Well, keep watching! Because that’s what  you are going to learn in this video. Hey digital learner, welcome back to the channel.  I’m Rahul from LearnDigitalwithRahul.com and  I help digital creators like you turn your digital presence into profit using various digital marketing strategies.

 

In today’s video,  you’ll learn what is YouTube Shortsand the  complete story of how YouTube Shorts originated.  And if you keep watching this video until the end,  you’ll also find the answer to whether you should  create YouTube Shorts videos or not. But before we get started make sure to subscribe  to the channel and tap on the bell icon so that  you never miss an important update. Alright, now without any further delay, let’s get started. In simple words, YouTube Shorts is the TikTok version of YouTube, and YouTube is trying hard  to compete with TikTok and Instagram Reels in order to grab the short video market share.Here is how Google defines YouTube Shorts officially:YouTube Shorts are vertical videos up to 60 seconds in length. 

In addition to showing on your channel, viewers may find your short-form video on the homepage Shorts shelf and tap into a new vertical viewing experience, made for short videos. Pretty simple, right? Well, let me make it even easier for you. To understand the current state of YouTube Shorts, first, you need to understand how the idea of YouTube Shorts originated. As far as I remember, back in October 2013, Snapchat introduced  Stories which was basically a short 15 seconds video when posted publicly  it would last 24-hours only, and then it would disappear.

Later, Instagram copied the same stories feature from Snapchat but due to the huge user base of Facebook and Instagram itself, it surpassed Snapchat in terms of daily active users for stories.So you can see that merging features from one social media platform to another is not a new  thing, I have already discussed this in detail in the 9th episode of the Digital Marketing  Made Easy podcast. So, rather than taking your time in reiterating it, I would keep it simple:Ideas and features being copied from one social media platform to another is not a new thing.Even the idea of short funny videos that helped TikTok gain huge popularity among the newer generation of people, was originally inspired by Vine.Later, Vine had to shut down but TikTok continued  to grow especially in countries with huge Youth populations like India.

As usual, no one cared until the Indian government banned TikTok due to security reasons, and later, the US government also followed the footprints of India. But as you know, in the online marketing  industry, one person’s loss is another person’s gain. And that’s what happened in the short video sharing platform industry.Instagram capitalized on this amazing opportunity and introduced Instagram Reels which is Instagram’s answer to TikTok.At the moment, Instagram is doing great with Instagram Reels. But YouTube didn’t want to miss the boat. So YouTube introduced YouTube Shorts in India,  needless to say, India had the largest number of active TikTok users in the world, and YouTube wants to grab a good share of those users before they make a switch to Instagram Reels.

And I’m quite sure, YouTube Shorts would certainly provide a tough competition to Instagram Reels  as well as TikTok in the countries where TikTok is not banned yet. There are a few reasons behind it, and I would share that in the upcoming videos, so make sure you subscribe and tap on the bell icon so that you get notified. So this is the complete story behind the origin of YouTube Shorts and now you must have understood the core thing what is YouTube Shorts and why YouTube shorts exist.Now, let’s answer the most important question, which is: Whether you should start creating YouTube Shorts or not? If you consider the monetary gains and other metrics, creating YouTube Shorts isn’t going to provide you any money because currently, you can’t monetize YouTube Shorts with Google AdSense.In other words, you can’t easily make money from YouTube Shorts videos. 

However, this is going to change in the future and obviously, there are ways other than Google Ads using which you can make money from your YouTube Shorts videos, more on that in the upcoming videos, so make sure you subscribe.But, in my opinion, if you have something to share with the world, then you should definitely share  it. No matter whether that’s in the form of text, audio, or video. And with YouTube Shorts, the good thing is: you just need a smartphone to start sharing your  ideas and message with the world. So why not? And that’s the reason why I’m creating a new YouTube channel  especially for the short-form vertical videos where I’ll be testing and experimenting with YouTube Shorts, so that I may teach my learning and findings with you.

I’ll share more about my experience with YouTube Shorts in upcoming videos, so make sure you subscribe.And in the meantime, I would suggest you try YouTube Shorts and create your first YouTube Shorts video. If you need video topics and  content ideas for YouTube Shorts, check out Bite-Size Content Vault for Digital Creators where you’ll find hundreds of content prompts and micro-video ideas perfect for YouTube Shorts.So this was it. I hope you found this video helpful. If yes, please hit that like button and share it with someone who might find this helpful. And if you have any questions, feel free  to ask in the comments below, I’ll try my best to help you and answer any queries you might have.