16 STREAMPUNK TOOLS TubeBuddy
Words by Chelsea Fearnley
TubeBuddy is a marketing and analysis tool for people who are serious about YouTube
ubeBuddy is a browser extension that adds a layer of handy tools
following through with those requests, so that’s where we came in,” Starkovich says. TubeBuddy has two key focuses. The first is time-saving, which involves creating features that increase productivity, such as bulk processing, canned responses and quick editing. The second is video optimisation and SEO. “We’ll help craft your video’s title, description and tags in a way that will allow it to rank higher in search results. We invest a lot of time in key word research, because content creators are always looking for more video hits and subscribers.” The company is independent from YouTube, but has a YouTube certification. Starkovich explains: “YouTube has an API compliance procedure that all third- party providers need to go through, and every once in a while YouTube reviews your entire product. But we know their guidelines, so when we build something new, we build it to follow those guidelines.” TubeBuddy is also self-funded. The company was able to use the profits it made from its previous marketing products
to bootstrap the browser extension. “We’ve since been able to drop the old products, and we’ve been profitable from TubeBuddy for several years now. We started with four founders, and now we have ten to 12 employees,” says Starkovich. Although a lot of what the company offers is free, it also has three subscription tiers from which it sees a return. “Users can upgrade their account for advanced features, but most are happy and get what they need with the free stuff.” SOMETHING FOR EVERYONE TubeBuddy has offerings not only for individual creators who are looking to grow their profile, but for larger enterprises. “We offer competitor research, so you can see what the competition is doing and what is working for them. We have brand monitoring, enabling you to track videos that others have uploaded about your brand. We also offer a/b testing, where, for example, you can test variations of a title or a thumbnail to see which one is driving the most clicks,” he explains.
directly on top of YouTube’s website. It is billed as a go-to companion for serious YouTubers and aspirants alike, providing features that aim to simplify daily tasks and help improve how YouTube is used. CEO Phil Starkovich tells FEED that TubeBuddy was created as a solution to the frustrations YouTubers feel when seeking better leverage for their channels, though the company’s origins actually date back to the Myspace era. “Before YouTube was even around, our company had identified the power of social media and looked for ways to leverage that in marketing,” he says. This early experience in the digital social world prepared Starkovich for the explosion of YouTube and subsequent rise of content creators. He started to notice them chatting online, sharing their grievances about the video streaming giant. “YouTubers were asking YouTube to build certain features, but YouTube wasn’t
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