If you are a wildlife enthusiast who is passionate about kick-starting your social media journey and want to learn how to start YouTube channel to give a unique perspective to your amazing wildlife moments captured, then you have landed at the right place.
Hi, I am Shishir, the founder of Jungle Revives, and today I will walk you through my journey of starting a YouTube Channel from scratch that will help you understand the end to end process and efforts needed to build your online presence on YouTube so that you can create, edit and launch your own unique set of wildlife videos to build an online community and monetize your passion.
So, let’s straightaway get into the process.
But first, subscribe to the Jungle Revives YouTube Channel to discover what I have been doing in the wildlife space over the last couple of years.
Table of Contents
How to Start YouTube Channel for Wildlife & Nature Enthusiasts
I have been exploring the wildlife sanctuaries and national parks across northern India and many other regions in India for more than 8+ years now. I have always been passionate about how I can showcase the amazing videos I capture to the world in my unique perspective.
For several years, I was deeply involved in capturing the amazing wildlife moments across Jim Corbett National Park and many others where I visited for jungle safari trips. But in the last 2 to 3 years, I realized that the videos I have recorded through my smartphones and digital cameras over time have so many hidden wildlife stories that I can share with the world. I wanted to showcase the true beauty of Indian Jungles, Wildlife, and Natural Landscapes through my unique perspective. Instantly, I researched on steps to start a YouTube channel to bring my vision to real life.
After I gathered all the relevant information, I started Jungle Revives by Shishir. Over there, I share both long-form videos and short-form content. It’s related to the amazing wildlife moments I have captured in the past throughout the years, alongside the current trips. You can visit my YouTube channel and see how beautiful the Indian jungles and wildlife are. They are true gems of our country, and one must explore them in person whenever possible.
So, let me walk you through more on the aspects of how you too can start your own Wildlife YouTube Channel and grow your audience from scratch. Over there, you can share your wildlife perspective with the world to spread your unique stories of the grand wild jungles of India, which house many wild animals and exotic birds.
Foundation Steps to Start a YouTube Channel for Wildlife and Nature
Before you start your wildlife YouTube channel, there are certain prerequisites that you must fulfill, such as:
- A Google account
- Unique Channel Name
- Channel Logo
- Banner Image
- A Compelling Channel Description
Apart from this, you must have a strategic plan in mind regarding the way you will be posting wildlife videos, which will reflect your unique perspective. You should decide whether to start with you will be handling the video editing and posting yourself, or you need to hire an experienced video editor. So channel and overall brand identity, alongside content strategy, must be worked upon simultaneously.
Sign up on Google, Set up Account & Create a Wildlife YouTube Channel
Once you sign up on Google and set up your channel, you will get access to the YouTube Studio, where you can manage the upload and rollout of your content.
It also gives you access to an analytics dashboard where you can manage the performance of your videos and optimize your ongoing content rollout strategy accordingly. You can monitor parameters like views, likes, comments, shares, and much more. You can also see your top and least performing videos, which will give you an idea of what to post next to gather better eyeballs and engagement.
Basically, it’s your end-to-end channel management toolkit provided by YouTube.
This is Exactly How I Launched the Jungle Revives YouTube Channel
Above mentioned aspects are the first things I worked upon to launch my YouTube channel.
I decided on the Channel name Jungle Revives because I wanted to show the constantly changing Indian jungles, it’s wild animals and birds. That was my unique perspective.
In parallel to that, I partnered with an experienced designer/video editor to help me design my logo, YouTube banner, and edit a couple of initial short-form and long-form videos. Once I developed a seamless operational flow and assessed the skillset of my designer/video editor thoroughly, I hired him full-time to work with me for regular weekly content rollout.
Whether it’s streamlining the raw footage, editing them in sequence directed by me, creating an appealing thumbnail in YouTube video, or applying any type of animation or graphics relevant, he takes care of everything. Apart from that, I also have a dedicated content head who takes care of the entire production and rollout cycle end-to-end effectively and on time.
So, I realized that setting up a small team is necessary for me to kick this venture off the ground, and that’s what I did first and foremost.
Understanding the YouTube Algorithm 2025
The second most important step to launching your Wildlife YouTube Channel is to understand how the YouTube Algorithm works in 2025, so that you can understand the science and art of reaching out to a larger audience and gathering more engagement on your long-form and short-form videos.
This is what I did once I had my small team in place. I, along with my team, went deep into understanding how the algorithm functions to figure out what I can do to reach out to more people on YouTube.
Here are some of my crucial findings related to maximizing reach for long-form videos organically on YouTube.
- The key parameters for which you should optimize your videos include Watch Time, Viewer Retention, Click-through Rate, Session Time, and Engagement. You can check these via the YouTube Studio.
- The 2025 YouTube algorithm works on hyper-personalized content delivery rather than mass appeal content. So your wildlife videos must be unique and personalized to your Ideal audience persona.
- YouTube prioritizes viewer satisfaction at the top. So, ideally, targeting the wrong type of audience for your wildlife videos will result in them clicking Not Interested during YouTube Surveys.
- YouTube Algorithm adapts to real-time feedback based on user behaviour such as time of day, device type, and user location to optimize wildlife content suggestions.
If you optimize every YouTube Long Form video based on this, you can get more discoverable in users’ Home Feed, Search Results, Up Next, and Suggested Video Sections. It’s very crucial to understand this science. It’s the core to figuring out how to start YouTube channel for Wildlife and grow into a big community down the line.
On the other hand, YouTube Shorts work a bit differently organically.
- Initially, the YouTube algorithm sends your video to the feed of small seed audiences to check how they engage with your wildlife content.
- Based on factors like quick engagement, rewatchability, and the viewed vs swiped down ratio, YouTube decides to promote your short-form Video further.
- As of 2025, you can create shorts that are up to 3 minutes long to bring more depth to your wildlife storytelling while simultaneously maintaining focus on quick engagement.
Thumbnail in YouTube Videos Play a Major Role in Capturing Attention
You must always aim to create thumbnails for your Wildlife YouTube Videos in a specific format only. That includes using bold fonts, high-contrast images, and some element or text that awakens user emotions.
The reason is simple. YouTube gives preference to this from an algorithm standpoint. It helps the viewer decide which video to click on.
The Thumbnail must have color consistency and should highlight the core theme of your entire video.
Thumbnails are prominent for Long Form Videos and not mandatory for YouTube Shorts.
Everything about Wildlife Content Strategy, Creation & Management
Once you set up your YouTube channel for Wildlife Videos and figure out how the algorithm works, the only task that remains is to curate a content strategy that can get you more reach, views, and engagement. This is the 3rd and most crucial step regarding how to start YouTube channel for the wildlife and nature segment and grow it through consistent and regular video content publishing.
So let me bifurcate this into multiple aspects.
Wildlife Content Creation
One of the major Steps to start a YouTube Channel after you have done the preliminary work is to figure out what type of content to post on long-form and short-form formats.
What I have done is this.
All my trips to the wildlife parks and national sanctuaries across India get edited and posted as a long-form video. Every trip is basically a unique story that I try to tell through that polished 15-30 minutes of nature exploration.
It’s not just about the journey. It’s about what I experienced in that trip throughout the journey from start to end. My focus remains on highlighting the emotions I felt at various stages. Also, how that helped me capture unique natural moments of wild animals, birds, or the landscape overall.
I focus more on connecting with my audience and narrating the wildlife trip as if they were actually with me in the video. I try to make them a part of my video rather than just an audience member.
Then the long-form video gets audited by me personally to identify top short-form clips for YouTube Shorts. These are usually moments from the trip that I share on my channel for establishing a quick connect with the audience.
I have a dedicated content calendar in place every month. That helps me post consistently across short and long form content. Every Tuesday and Friday is kept for long form and the rest of the days are for short-form content. My team and I curate this calendar seamlessly so that everyone’s tasks are completed without any shortfalls.
Across All My Videos, I Follow These Best Practices
- Start the video with a hook that instantly captures the user’s attention
- Optimize every video for keywords so that viewers can find my channel easily and maximize my discoverability.
- I use various camera angles, b-roll footage, and relevant graphics to capture and maintain viewer attention.
- All my videos deliver value and capture the emotions of the audience instantly. It entertains them through a virtual safari experience.
- I optimize the Metadata where I place the primary keywords in the First 60 Characters of the Title. Similarly it goes in the first 25 words of the Description.
- I write detailed descriptions for each long-form video of at least 250 words. For YT shorts, I keep the descriptions very short and summarized.
- I use relevant hashtags in my video descriptions, at least 8-15 of them based on need.
- Also, all my video file names are optimized with target keywords across short and long form content.
- I optimize Thumbnail in YouTube videos to capture the instant attention of the viewer. I design it in such a a way that compel them to click, boosting my CTR.
- All my Videos have clear and concise call-to-actions.
- I also organize my Long Form Videos in various playlists based on their relevance.
- Last but not least, I stick to a consistent schedule of posting to maintain audience expectations and algorithm trust.
Performance Measurement Through Analytics in YouTube Studio
I follow YouTube analytics religiously and never ignore key metrics and insights. If you are a beginner and want to learn how to start YouTube channel for Wildlife and grow bigger, then understanding analytics is key to success.
- I ensure that the average view duration of my long-form videos is at least 3+ minutes.
- I aim for audience retention of 70+ % in the first 30 seconds of long-form content. Similarly, 5 seconds of short-form content.
- I keep on changing my YouTube Titles and thumbnails based on Video performance through regular A/B testing.
- I analyze the overall session length of the user and try to identify how to maximize it. I also note points at which the user dropped off from the video.
I never ignore video analytics in YouTube Studio because it’s the only way for everyone to figure out critical insights and build optimized content strategies for growing the channel.
Conclusion
Starting a wildlife channel on YouTube is easy. The critical and challenging part is to grow your audience through strategic content rollout. As I have been doing for a while now, I can help you guide on how to start YouTube channel for your wildlife and nature initiative and build something of value.
To connect with me, you can get in touch with my team. I will surely consult with you on setting up an optimized workflow. This will help you grow your channel into something big with your unique wildlife videos.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
How to create a YouTube channel on YouTube? What is the step-by-step process?
- Step 1: Set up a Google Account and Set up Your Channel with a Unique Brand Name.
- Step 2: Design Logo, Channel banner, and Channel description.
- Step 3: Build a Content Calendar for regular long-form and short-form video posting
- Step 4: Decide if you need a team or want to go solo initially.
- Step 5: Understand the YouTube Algorithm
- Step 6: Create engaging Content and follow best practices
- Step 7: Regular A/B testing of video titles, thumbnails, or anything else to boost reach and discoverability.
- Step 8: Optimize for engagement and regularly post as per your decided schedule.
What is the best camera for YouTube beginners to shoot Wildlife Videos and start a Channel?
As a beginner, you should focus more on learning the fundamentals of shooting and editing wildlife videos. The camera doesn’t matter that much. Once you acquire a certain level of skills and build a perspective of quality, you can upgrade to a higher quality camera accordingly. To start with, you can either use your smartphone camera or buy a DSLR. To Learn more, you can explore my guide to buy the best camera for wildlife beginners.
What type of music do I add to my Wildlife YouTube Videos?
The choice of music should be very strategic based on the intent of each video. It should match the flow of the events. It must use the perfect balance of soft and adventurous music that builds curiosity. Always ensure that every video fits perfectly with the footage.
How to Start YouTube Channel for Advanced Wildlife Explorers?
If you are an advanced wildlife explorer who has lots of videos of travelling through Indian National Parks and Wildlife Sanctuaries, you should immediately set up a small team and treat this as a content business venture. Set up proper workflows and SOPs for your trips, video editing, content rollout, and YouTube Management. Buy high-quality camera gear to shoot 4K videos for the best quality overall. Create an immersive experience for the audience. You can connect with Shishir from Jungle Revives to learn more.
How frequently should I change my YouTube Video Thumbnails and Titles to boost reach and engagement?
Change YouTube Thumbnails and Titles strategically 2-3 days after publishing the long-form video. Take into consideration factors like like CTR, views, and impressions. Do A/B testing until you find the best fit thumbnails and titles, but always avoid random changes. Always focus on data-driven updates to grow your channel strategically.
