Until recently, when you uploaded a video to YouTube you pretty much had to hope that YouTube would offer you  a good selection of  thumbnails to represent your brand online…most of the time the available thumbnails did not do justice to your brand.

Now it is possible to create a brand identity for your individual videos by uploading a custom thumbnail. Thumbnails act as miniature marketing posters for your videos – they attract viewers to your content and compel them to click through to watch. See below:

youtube-custom-thumbnail

My videos will now clearly separate themselves from the crowd and will greatly improve brand recognition. How creative you get with your thumbnails is up to you but I would recommend making sure that your logo is always in the same place and is the same size on each thumbnail.

Your image should be 640px x 360pc @ 72dpi.

To add your thumbnail, simply go to your video manager on YouTube,  edit an individual video and when the edit screen appears you will see a ‘Custom Thumbnail’ icon. Upload your thumbnail and you are done!

Have at it!