How to make VIRAL THUMBNAILS for your faceless channel (YouTube automation 2024)

over the past month I studied the thumbnails of over 1,000 viral faceless YouTube videos that got over a 100 million views combined all of this was in an effort to answer one question how do you create a killer thumbnail that can blow up your faceless YouTube channel see when a viewer comes to YouTube they immediately get hit with a bajillion video options your goal is to get them to stop immediately on the homepage and think wow I got to watch this video and then click your thumbnail why the homepage you might ask well I not

only looked at 1,000 thumbnails but I also dove into the analytics and the most viral videos on this channel that you're watching right now and when looking at the top performing videos I noticed the majority of the views came from YouTube recommending them on the homepage or browse features which basically are the homepage watch History subscriptions anything on the first page that you land on when you go to YouTube If a video has a high click-through rate on these Pages YouTube assumes there's a high interest in the video topic and will then keep trying to

get more and more Impressions to that video by pushing it to more viewers homepages you can see here the percentage contribution of Impressions all three of these videos got from homepage versus the rest of the sources combined without these the remaining Impressions would mainly come from search and notifications which are significantly more limited so that is why having a thumbnail that stops a viewer on the homepage and gives them no other option but to click is so important so my goal by the end of this video is to give you the perfect recipe for creating

the most irresistible thumbnails for for your faceless YouTube channel you would think making a thumbnail is simple for example look at these thumbnails they're high quality they have contrasting colors they have a face in the thumbnail showing em motion they have everything we're told a thumbnail should have so why did these videos all get less than a, views most advice out there would make you believe that these thumbnails are perfect hypothetically the views should be pouring in right but they're not it was this lack of depth that brought me down this 100 plus hour Rabbit

Hole of looking at thumbnails watching interviews of successful YouTubers giving thumbnail tips and all of that allowed me to come up with one perfect thumbnail recipe the recipe is made up of five ingredients but before we get into the ingredients we have to talk about the video idea itself here's what Patty Galloway the king of YouTube strategy has to say about video ideas and I get this all the time you know I've got this amazing idea it's gonna be so funny I just can't think of way to thumbnail that and I'm like well then it's

not a good it's not a good YouTube idea unfortunately it needs to take that box it needs to be a great idea it needs to be very clickable we need to be able to make a clear thumb that around it so if you can't think of a thumbnail like Patty says the video idea just is not good enough but don't worry I created an entire video on how you can find outlier video ideas for your channel no matter what your Niche is so if you haven't watched that video already go ahead watch that video somewhere

up here and then come back and watch this video now the first first ingredient in our perfect thumbnail recipe is simple design here's two thumbnails both have the same video idea in title don't start a YouTube channel in 2024 the video on the left got less than 100 views the video on the right got over a million views the thumbnail on the left has a lot and I mean a lot that we're looking at multiple layers of text with three arrows pointing at different things so it's unclear what we should focus on Graphics just thrown

everywhere in the thumbnail it's confusing it's cluttered and overall visually unappealing so people didn't click the thumbnail on the right is simple one subject centered in the image holding a sign with concise text so it's clear what the viewer should focus on and it's clear what the video is about so a lot of people clicked on this thumbnail there's a concept in Psychology called cognitive load Theory this Theory suggests that humans have a limited capacity for processing information at any given time when a thumbnail is cluttered with too many elements it increases the cognitive load

on the viewer making it more difficult for them to quickly understand and assess the thumbnail so rather than sitting there and trying to figure out what's going on in the thumbnail the viewer is just going to keep scrolling combine this with the fact that you might only have one or two seconds to grab their attention while they're scrolling and it becomes extremely apparent how important Simplicity is when it comes to thumbnail design so how can you create simple thumbnails that still get the point of your video across to your viewer well a simple three-step framework

is one clear subject two bold text three strategic highlighting let's look at some examples clear subject bold text strategic highlighting clear subject bold text strategic highlighting clear subject bold text strategic highlighting the second ingredient in the perfect thumbnail recipe is familiarity as humans we tend to have a preference for things that we're familiar with that's why on average we eat the same five to eight meals every single week they're familiar we can trust them they're comfortable it's probably why if you see a video released by a handful of YouTubers you will always click no matter

the video subject you are familiar with them you know that they create good videos and you know that they provide value to you for those same reasons if a person comes across a thumbnail that has a recognizable face like a celebrity or themes that they're familiar with they're more likely to click so to incorporate at familiarity into your thumbnails for faceless YouTube channels there are two approaches the first approach is familiarity hijacking this involves using well-known personalities or recognizable elements in your thumbnails to capture viewers attention by leveraging their existing familiarity this can be seen

with Charisma on command a faceless YouTube channel that has grown to over 6.6 million subscribers using this principle in all of their thumbnails using the faces of familiar celebrities and personalities they get people to stop scrolling and think oh I know them and then click the video to find out more the second approach is familiarity building which involves starting from scratch and consistently incorporating specific characters or Styles into your thumbnails to build familiarity over time see with consistency this strategy will allow your audience to become familiar with your content just by seeing your thumbnail this

is the approach that 10x income or digital income project take there are two faceless YouTube channels that use the same AI Avatar in all of their thumbnails and videos so they've built that famili arity With Their audience ingredient number three is a bold claim this one has less to do with the design of the thumbnail itself and more to do with the video idea and how it's represented within the thumbnail for instance I could create a video of me walking my dog even if I created the most perfect thumbnail to exist on YouTube the video

would just be too boring to get clicks that's because there's no bold claim that's grabbing viewers attention and so they just keep scrolling to stop their scroll your claim needs to be bold enough that the viewer has no choice but to click on the video so before even recording your video think about the Bold claim that you're making in the video but make sure that it's the right kind of bold claim for example I could come up with a video idea of me going out and picking up a million rocks I don't know about you

but if I saw someone release a video on them picking up a million rocks I'm not going to sit there and watch that it is a bold claim though that they could actually go out there and do it but the video idea is awful so how can you come up with the right kind of bold claims for your faceless YouTube videos well here are three video constructs that have bold claims built into them and work well for faceless YouTube channels number one is something of Interest actually worth it is college worth it in 2024 would

be an example is it worth going to University would be another way to spin it the second video construct is world's most adjective object world's most amazing skills and talent ever 15 most extreme roads in the world would be another way to structure it the third video construct is topic of Interest everything you need to know Toy Story 5 everything you need to know Friday Night at Freddy's everything you need to know so now you have a couple easy ways to come up with bold claims but the claim on its own is not good enough

it needs to be presented in your thumbnail in a way that's going to Peak the viewer's Curiosity this is where ingredient number four in the perfect thumbnail recipe comes in and that's the Curiosity Gap the Curiosity Gap is the distance between what your viewer currently knows and what they are curious to learn this Gap is what motivates them to click and watch your video so your goal is to have your thumbnail make them so curious that they have absolutely no other choice but to click using the example from before if I make a slight change

to the dog walking video My Title might go from I walked my dog today to I walked my dog today and it turned into an adventure the Bold claim my walk was interesting enough to become an adventure the thumbnail me walking my dog but with an unexpected scene around us this would cause viewers to wonder about the story behind it they'll think what happened how did it become an adventure and that Curiosity Gap is what makes them click to find the answer by successfully incorporating a curiosity Gap you not only get the click but you

incentivize your viewer to watch until the end to find out what happens here's an example of a curiosity Gap done really well so the title is why don't we shoot nuclear waste into space it gets the viewer thinking and then you look at the thumbnail which suggest suest that it's the best idea ever but the title suggests we're not doing it so why don't we do it so that Curiosity Gap makes the viewer click this brings us to the last ingredient in the perfect thumbnail recipe the immediate payoff so imagine you click on a video

with an incredible thumbnail titled the funniest dog videos of all time you click and the video starts with hey guys it's Trevor today was a good day I went for a walk what are you going to do you're going to click off the video as fast as possible why because there was no immediate payoff now imagine you're scrolling and you see this video the thumbnail has the subject a policeman and a cow and in the first second of the video we immediately see the subject from the thumbnail walking a cow with a beer in his

hand this is an immediate payoff for the audience the thumbnail first made them curious and then when they click they get an immediate payoff which keeps them watching the video this is proven by the video's 6 million views so it to put everything together simple design plus familiarity plus bold claim plus curiosity Gap plus immediate payoff equals the best possible most clickable thumbnail for your faceless YouTube video and by using this recipe you will make thumbnails that have a much much much higher potential of going viral thank you for watching I hope you got a

lot of value out of this video this is the fourth video of a series of videos that we're making on faceless YouTube channels by the end of the series you'll know everything that there is to know about faceless YouTube channels from starting to Growing to monetizing and Beyond so make sure to hit that subscribe button so that you don't miss out on any more uploads if you are interested in this video and if you haven't seen any of the videos in the series yet I recommend you start with this video right here why 99% of

faceless channels fail so go ahead watch that and I'll see you in the next one