Many podcasting tools offer the ability to automatically crosspost your audio podcast to YouTube. Here are eleven reasons I think you shouldn't do that.

I often use the term “fake video” to describe what some podcasters make. It's when they take the whole audio of their episode, put it into a video file, and display a simple image (static or sometimes moving). It's essentially audio with pixel dimensions.

I think the short, animated videos commonly called “audiograms” are entirely separate and beneficial. My following thoughts address the “fake video” approach.

1. The supporting reasons are mostly misunderstood and short-term

I usually hear four reasons to publish fake video on YouTube:

* To make your content discoverable on Google and YouTube—Maybe true, at first, but it will soon be demoted.

* It's easy and maybe even automated with publishing tools—Simply because something is easy doesn't mean it's good.

* It reaches a non-podcast audience—True, but it's reaching them so ineffectively, you might not see any positive results.

* “It can't hurt”—Actually, it can hurt, as you'll understand from the following points.

2. It's abusing the platform

YouTube is a video platform. It's designed for videos. When people search or browse YouTube, they expect to watch videos. Posting fake video goes against the simple premise of video.

If someone writes a long blog post, takes a screenshot, and shares that image on Instagram, we would consider that abusing the platform.

If someone makes a blank image and uploads to Instagram only so they can write a long blog post, we would consider that abusing the platform.

If someone releases a series of silent podcast episodes only so they can put out the titles in podcast apps, we would consider that abusing the platform.

And if someone publishes only audio, but no video, on a video-based platform, we should also consider that abusing the platform.

This is not an effective technique for sharing content appropriate to the platform. This is more like a blackhat hack with a bait and switch.

3. The “view” stats are meaningless

If you publish fake video, or you see other fake videos, you may initially think it's a success because of the view counts. But like “downloads per time,” view counts don't tell the whole story and are a meaningless stat.

Social networks count something as a “view” after different amounts of time. YouTube seems to have a 30-second threshold. So someone could watch a video for only 30 seconds, and it would be counted as a view. But if your video is as short as a few minutes or much longer, only 30 seconds is meaningless to actual consumption.

Think of it as a local store. The way YouTube and other social networks work, they would count you as a customer every time you drive by and look at the store. But were you really a customer if you didn't at least go inside?

Contrast that with the nature of podcast downloads and consumption. This is more like counting everyone who entered the store. True, maybe not everyone stays in for long or even buys anything at all, but they were still a customer by entering and behaving like a customer.

I've seen data on some fake videos that seemed highly successful: as many as nearly 23,000 views on one video! But the real truth is in the retention stats.

Only a 3.4% average view duration. 90% of the initially 23,000 viewers were gone within 90 seconds!

All data I've seen, from multiple sources, show that most fake videos lose 90–95% of the audience within only 90 seconds! Interestingly, this does seem to differ among countries. But that makes sense, considering that podcast consumption is not as popular or possible in some other countries.

You might think that later videos, which averaged about 200 views, had filtered down to loyal fake-video consumers. Retention rates were, indeed, better. This time, it took only about 4 minutes for 85–90% of the “loyal” audience to abandon the videos!