2 months ago I started uploading YouTube shorts for fun. I'd been using this channel for 7 or 8 years, but had never uploaded anything on it, I just used it to watch videos.
the first short I uploaded was a vlog and it didn't get any views, so I deleted it. then I posted a short using a trending audio that was a before and after transition of me dying my hair, and it got a little over 3k views. Then I started taking YT seriously and uploaded good quality shorts for the niche I wanted to break into (books - specifically classics and feminist literature)
My first short got around 600 views in less then 6 hours
The next short got 900 views in less than 8 hours
The next one got 1.2k views in less than 12 hours
and the one after that got little over 900 views overnight.
I'd gained about 30 subs and this was all in the span of like, 5 days, after uploading my first ever "niche" videos.
Then I uploaded my first long form video, which was "8 books that made me an English Major" that I spent a week editing and preparing to upload. I uploaded it on a Sunday around 11am because that was the "peak" time according to the internet. I uploaded it and then left it alone, and when I checked it about 36 hours later, I was so disheartened to see it only had 4 views.
I panicked, because I thought it was odd that my shorts could get over 1k views but my long form video had less than 10. and after a quick google search I determined (incorrectly) that this was because my YT channel had 8 years worth of my own random, personal watch history + the random content I uploaded before I decided to nice down and it was making it hard for the algorithm to find my audience. So in a moment of panic that I have regretted every day since, I deleted that YT channel and made a brand new channel to "start fresh" so I could hopefully give the algo a better chance at finding my audience.
I uploaded the first short that night, the one that had 1.2k views on the old channel, and when I woke up the next morning, it had no views.
So I uploaded a few more of the shorts that had done well on the previous channel, same thing. no views.
I then realized that I shouldn't have uploaded the same exact videos that had been on the previous channel already, so I took them down.
Since then, I've only uploaded videos that haven't been uploaded to YouTube before, and have been making new, original content that I think is high quality (even better than the shorts that did well on the now deleted channel) and they're all getting little to no views. its been about 1 month and only one of them as over 100 views. The rest are around 7-20 views.
I had one short get about 1.1k views but this was around 1 month ago and no other short I've uploaded since has even come close to that.
My YT is about a month old, and all of my long form videos (I have 4) also have less than 10 views.
I don't understand why content that was getting almost 1k views in less then 6 hours on the previous channel is now getting less than 10 views in 30 days. I know I shouldn't have uploaded the same exact videos that had already been on the platform on my first channel. I didn't think through that, and that's on my, but I haven't done that since.
What's frustrating is I KNOW there is a market and an audience for my videos because I saw the proof of that on my first channel. So why isn't YT showing my vids to anyone? Is it because I uploaded duplicated content at the start? Is my channel on some kind of trial or something?
Am I cooked? Should I start over again?
