Putting your videos on YouTube

If you have a Gmail address, you already have a Google account, and a Google account is a YouTube account. There is nothing separate to sign up for.

1. Go to youtube.com and press Sign in at the top right.
2. Sign in with the same Gmail address you use every day.
3. That is it — you are signed in to YouTube.

One thing to decide first. Use an account you intend to keep for years, and one only you control. Your lessons will play from it for as long as your courses exist. Many trainers make a separate Gmail address just for their teaching — that is a good idea if you want to keep it apart from your personal mail, and it takes two minutes at accounts.google.com.

Videos longer than 15 minutes. A new account can upload videos of up to 15 minutes. To upload longer ones, verify your account once with your phone number at youtube.com/verify — it takes a minute and a text message. Most lessons are shorter than that anyway (see Recording your lessons).

A channel is just the name your uploads live under. You need one before your first upload, and YouTube will offer to create it for you.

1. Press your profile picture at the top right.
2. Choose Create a channel.
3. Give it your teaching name — your own name, or your studio's name. It does not have to match your RacingOwl site, and you can change it later.
4. Press Create channel.

You never need to publish anything publicly on this channel, post a photo, write a description, or get a single subscriber. It exists only to hold your lesson videos.

On a computer

1. Press the Create button (a camera with a +) at the top right, then Upload video.
2. Drag your video file in, or press Select files and choose it.
3. Give it a title — use the lesson's name, so you can find it later.
4. The description can be left empty.
5. Under Audience, answer Is this video made for kids? — YouTube insists on an answer and will not let you continue without one. For lessons aimed at adults, choose No, it's not made for kids. If you genuinely teach children, choose Yes. It affects only YouTube's own rules, not your RacingOwl course.
6. Press Next through the remaining screens until you reach Visibility.

On a phone

Open the YouTube app, press the + at the bottom, choose Upload a video, pick the file, and you will be taken through the same screens.

This is the one setting that matters. On the Visibility screen you will see three choices:

• Private — only you can watch it. Do not choose this: a private video will not play inside your RacingOwl course, and your learners will see “Video unavailable”.
• Unlisted — choose this one. The video does not appear in YouTube search, it does not appear on your channel page, and nobody browsing YouTube can find it. Anyone who has the link can open it — but you are not putting the link anywhere except into your RacingOwl lesson, so it stays with your course.
• Public — anyone can find it and watch it. Only for a free preview or a promotional clip you genuinely want the world to see.

Choose Unlisted, then press Save.

You can change this later at any time from YouTube Studio → Content: pick the video and change its visibility.

1. On your channel, open the video (or find it under YouTube Studio → Content).
2. Press Share, then Copy — or simply copy the address from your browser's address bar.
3. In RacingOwl, go to Manage → My courses → your course → Content. A new course needs a module first: type its name under Add a module and press Add module. Then add a lesson to the module and choose Video.
4. Paste the link into the YouTube link box and save.
5. Open the lesson as a learner would and press play, to check it works.

• Wait a few minutes before checking quality. YouTube processes a video after upload. For the first few minutes it may only play in low quality; the sharp version appears shortly after. Nothing is wrong.
• Name your videos so you can find them. “Beginner's Flow — lesson 3 — sun salutation” beats “VID_20261014_093122”. You will have fifty of these within a year.
• Make a playlist per course. It costs nothing and keeps YouTube Studio tidy.
• Never delete a video that a course uses. The lesson in your course will break and learners will see “Video unavailable”. If you re-record a lesson, upload the new one, paste the new link into the lesson, and only then delete the old video if you want to.
• Your income comes from your learners. They pay you on RacingOwl. Nothing about your channel's size or YouTube's own programmes matters to your course.
• You can switch comments off if you would rather not moderate them: YouTube Studio → Settings → Community → Defaults → Disable comments. Discussion on your course happens on RacingOwl anyway.
• Upload the biggest file your phone made. Do not compress or shrink it first, and do not send it to yourself on WhatsApp and upload that — WhatsApp heavily reduces video quality. Transfer the original file with a cable, Google Drive, or by emailing it to yourself.