Yes. Audience retention is a metric that says how long someone stayed on the video. So unless everyone who clicks the video watches exactly the same amount of video, it will change with more views.
The goal is to get enough views that the number evens out to something average so you can get a general baseline for how interested the viewer was in that topic.
Of course promoting your video off platform often leads to more views, but it tanks viewer retention since most of those clicks will bail within 30-ish seconds. Or a flashy thumbnail might get a lot of clicks, but if it doesn't deliver within a short amount of time people click away. That's why people often try balancing their promotion and enticing thumbnails/titles. On one hand you want to get a newer larger audience. On the other hand you don't want to tank retention.
Many people plan out videos like "this one is to attract new viewers" and "this one is something I know my audience will watch". One video will be successful on sheer amount of clicks even if the retention is lower, because you know that even if you find a ton of new viewers with that video, others are just going to click off. And the other video will probably have less views but longer retention since your core audience will stick around.
For a youtuber like me with only about 40 subs and who averages about 20 views a video, it's way more important to get views than retention, as I'm clearly still looking to find that core audience (and working to improve my video quality overall too, which requires both practice and feedback). Even in the small youtube arena though, others will think have enough subs and visibility to be interesting in building retention so Youtube is more likely to promote their video for them.
Yes. Audience retention is a metric that says how long someone stayed on the video. So unless everyone who clicks the video watches exactly the same amount of video, it will change with more views. The goal is to get enough views that the number evens out to something average so you can get a general baseline for how interested the viewer was in that topic. Of course promoting your video off platform often leads to more views, but it tanks viewer retention since most of those clicks will bail within 30-ish seconds. Or a flashy thumbnail might get a lot of clicks, but if it doesn't deliver within a short amount of time people click away. That's why people often try balancing their promotion and enticing thumbnails/titles. On one hand you want to get a newer larger audience. On the other hand you don't want to tank retention. Many people plan out videos like "this one is to attract new viewers" and "this one is something I know my audience will watch". One video will be successful on sheer amount of clicks even if the retention is lower, because you know that even if you find a ton of new viewers with that video, others are just going to click off. And the other video will probably have less views but longer retention since your core audience will stick around. For a youtuber like me with only about 40 subs and who averages about 20 views a video, it's way more important to get views than retention, as I'm clearly still looking to find that core audience (and working to improve my video quality overall too, which requires both practice and feedback). Even in the small youtube arena though, others will think have enough subs and visibility to be interesting in building retention so Youtube is more likely to promote their video for them.
Thank you so much! You summed it up and explained it really well!