# Quantifying YouTube Keyword Opportunities — Whiteboard Friday

June 12, 20265 min read

Written by: [Phil Nottingham](/content/community/users/301962/index.html) Edited By: [Meghan Pahinui](/content/community/users/10757585/index.html)

#### Table of Contents
- [How is YouTube different?](/content/blog/quantifying-youtube-keyword-opportunities-whiteboard-friday#how-is-youtube-different?/index.html)
- [Median monthly view velocity](/content/blog/quantifying-youtube-keyword-opportunities-whiteboard-friday#median-monthly-view-velocity/index.html)
- [Median subscribers](/content/blog/quantifying-youtube-keyword-opportunities-whiteboard-friday#median-subscribers/index.html)
- [Median age](/content/blog/quantifying-youtube-keyword-opportunities-whiteboard-friday#median-age/index.html)
- [Finding the highest level of opportunity](/content/blog/quantifying-youtube-keyword-opportunities-whiteboard-friday#finding-the-highest-level-of-opportunity/index.html)

How do you assess YouTube keyword opportunity? Phil Nottingham shares three unique metrics for evaluating search demand, competition, and value.

## Access over 1.25 billion keywords with Keyword Explorer
[Try it for free](/content/explorer/index.html)

So for those of us experienced in SEO, we have a way of doing this that relies on the sort of metrics that you get in tools like Moz, metrics like [search volume](/content/help/keyword-explorer/keyword-metrics/monthly-volume/index.html), [keyword difficulty](/content/help/keyword-explorer/keyword-metrics/difficulty/index.html), and [organic CTR](/content/help/keyword-explorer/keyword-metrics/organic-ctr/index.html).

The search volume shows you the overall demand for a given query. Keyword difficulty tells you about the competition. And organic CTR tells you about the overall value relative to other keywords.

## How is YouTube different?

Firstly, YouTube is slightly different from Google. It's driven partially by search, but it's also a discovery engine. You can get views through the YouTube homepage, through subscriber feeds, suggested videos, and other methods.

## Median monthly view velocity

Search volume might not be useful for YouTube. Instead, we use MMVV, or median monthly view velocity, which helps assess demand for a given keyword by analyzing the top 100 videos for that keyword.

## Median subscribers

For keyword difficulty, we use median subscribers as a proxy to assess competition. This shows how difficult it would be for new channels to rank for given keywords.

## Median age

For organic CTR, we analyze the median age of content to understand visibility duration. Videos with a longer median age may receive views over a longer period.

## Finding the highest level of opportunity

If you find queries with high median monthly view velocity, low median subscribers, and a long median age, that's indicative of a high opportunity level. This helps identify keywords to create videos for, rank for, and attract a larger audience.

_The author's views are entirely their own (excluding the unlikely event of hypnosis) and may not always reflect the views of Moz._