How to Download YouTube Videos From Your Business Channel

So you want to download videos from your YouTube channel. Maybe you just need a copy of your most recent video on your computer to pull clips for social. Or you might have realized that while YouTube is great for sharing funny cat videos, it doesn’t always hit the mark when you’re trying to grow your business with video.

If you want to move some of your videos to a video marketing platform to get the customizable video player, lead generation tools, and marketing analytics you’ve always dreamed of, it’s a good thing you came here.

We’ll walk you through the steps to download videos from your YouTube account. We’ll also show you how easy it is to transfer your YouTube video library to a marketing platform like Wistia in just a few clicks.

Let’s get started!

How to download videos from YouTube

1. Sign in to your YouTube account.
2. Find your way to the Creator Studio by selecting “YouTube Studio” from the menu that shows up when you hover over your profile icon.
3. On the left, you’ll see a sidebar. Look for the “Videos” section; that’s where your video library lives.
4. Hunt down the video you want to download and give its title a tap to open up all the details.
5. Just under the video player, find the three-dot menu icon (⋮) and choose “Download” from the options.
6. Sit tight for a sec while YouTube gets that video ready for you. A download link will pop up when it’s all set. Tap on it, and voila! That video’s all yours now.

Why should you download your videos from YouTube?

Good question! Even though YouTube is the most popular video-sharing platform in the world, it isn’t always the best fit for all your video needs. There are several good reasons to move your YouTube videos somewhere else.

Maybe you want to keep a local copy on your computer for safekeeping. Or perhaps you’re thinking of deleting your YouTube channel and you need to back up your content first. Or you may be eyeing a shift to a video marketing platform that can give your marketing videos a boost in driving conversions.

Speaking of video marketing platforms, Wistia is one option worth considering. It comes with an array of tools and analytics that can help your videos work even harder for your business.

Why move your YouTube videos to Wistia?

Many marketers maximize the impact of their videos by keeping YouTube as a powerful reach generator (hello, two billion users!) while also hosting their videos on Wistia to tap into its advanced video marketing tools and analytics.

When you move some (or all) of your YouTube videos to Wistia, you’ll get to:

Drive more traffic to your site

YouTube videos are discoverable by search engines, but the traffic is directed to YouTube.com, not your site. With Wistia, you can embed videos on your site, automatically optimize your video SEO, and get your videos and website discovered by search engines.

Deliver an ad-free viewing experience

Ads disrupt the flow of content, which can weaken your brand narrative. That’s why we made Wistia an ad-free zone. You’ll never, ever see a single ad on your Wistia-hosted videos. You can’t say the same about your YouTube videos.

Get user-based analytics

By seeing how your audience consumes and interacts with your videos, you can optimize your videos and strengthen your marketing strategy. YouTube offers video analytics, but Wistia provides much more detailed metrics, including viewer engagement, drop-off points, and viewer heat maps.

Generate leads

Even if you spend a ton of time interacting with your viewers in the YouTube comments section, you can still walk away without their contact information. If you host your videos on Wistia, you can add Turnstile email collection forms to your videos and turn your viewers into leads.

Customize your video player

Instead of showing YouTube’s branding on your videos, you want your video player to match your brand’s aesthetics to deliver a more impactful viewing experience. Wistia lets you customize your video player to match your company’s colors, display your brand’s logo, and more.

How to move your YouTube videos to Wistia

There are two ways to do this (spoiler alert: the second way is much easier!):

1. Upload your YouTube videos to Wistia

If you’ve downloaded your YouTube videos, dig through the files on your computer to find them. We’ll wait. Once you’ve got them in front of you, it’s time to upload them all to Wistia.

1. Log in to Wistia or sign up for an account.
2. In the Content Library, select the blue “New" button and then choose “Project.”
3. Give it a title by selecting the pen icon at the top.
4. In your new Project, drag and drop your media directly onto the page, or use the “Add” dropdown menu to upload from your computer.

2. Import your YouTube video library to Wistia

Moving your videos manually from YouTube to Wistia can be quite a drag. Well, good thing Wistia has a YouTube integration! When you integrate both accounts, you can import videos from YouTube to your Wistia account (and publish videos to YouTube right from Wistia) without having to download anything.

To take advantage of this seamless integration, the first thing you need to do is connect your YouTube account with Wistia. When you’re in Wistia, take these steps:

1. Navigate to the “Account” dropdown menu and then select “Integrations.”
2. Find YouTube in the Social Media Integrations list.
3. Hit the blue “Connect” button and then follow the on-screen prompts to authorize Wistia’s access to your YouTube account.

Connecting your accounts is a one-time step. After that, you can easily import your YouTube videos whenever you want with these steps:

1. In the Content Library, select the blue “New" button and then choose “Import from YouTube.”
2. Select the videos you want to import — you can either choose individual videos or import your entire YouTube library.
3. Hit the “Import” button to start the transfer process.

Import your YouTube videos into Wistia today

Now that you’re primed and ready to move your YouTube videos to Wistia to achieve your most ambitious video marketing goals, go ahead and take that first step today!