If you are just starting out or a veteran YouTuber, a YouTube handle is important. Think of a YouTube handle as a username. People that come to your channel will see your handle as a “hello my name is” tag at a networking mixer. Selecting the right handle is important because you want it to reflect your branding and be memorable, right?
Here are the guidelines from Google
Your handle must follow these YouTube guidelines:
- Is between 3-30 characters
- Is made up of alphanumeric characters (A–Z, a–z, 0–9)
- Your handle can also include: underscores (_), hyphens (-), periods (.)
- Is not URL-like or phone number-like
- Is not already being used
- Follows YouTube’s Community Guidelines
Principles for selecting a good handle
1. Give it some real thought. You can probably do better than going with the first thing that comes to mind.
2. Keep it in line with your other branding. Ex: Does your logo include ? Put in your handle.
3. Make it easy to spell. Simple is always best in marketing. Be clear, not cute. Could a 5 year old understand what you’re trying to get across?
4. Be unique. If you are “Mike’s Plumbing” and find that handle taken, you can probably do better than “Mike’s Plumbing 01.”
5. Although YouTube allows them, special characters like underscores, hyphens, periods, etc can be confusing and hard to remember. Try to stick with words.
6. Don’t forget to include your new YouTube handle on your website, if you have one. If you do not yet have a website, click here.
7. Make sure your handle reflects the content of your channel. If you are a realtor using social media marketing to reach your people group, your YouTube handle should say something like “greatrealtorhometours” vs “Pantherfan1978.”
If you had a personalized URL before, you could continue on with it. The addition of handles allows any YouTube creator to have a custom URL. Thanks Google!
Well, we hope that this short article about YouTube handles has helped you get a handle on handles!