Tracy Hazzard explains distinctions between YouTube Shorts, podcasts, and playlists and gives practical guidance on how to categorize content. She advises keeping Shorts under two minutes (references like 90 seconds/2 minutes), warns that YouTube will reject miscategorized content (shorts/excerpts aren’t allowed in podcast playlists), and recommends placing long-form episodes in regular playlists or as syndicated podcasts for show consistency.
Chapters
I know there's some confusion around YouTube shorts and YouTube podcasts and YouTube playlists in general. And so I just want to clarify things for you here in case you're confused. First off, a YouTube short is typically under a minute, like 90 seconds, 2 minutes. There's some fuzzy area in what they allow as shorts, but essentially think of it like a meme or a clip or something you would share on social media, a TikTok video. So definitely keep it under two minutes if you want to do a short. That's what a YouTube short is. So if you're trying to identify it as a short and it's not short, I think that there's a lot of YouTube restrictions and it's kind of rejected or it's ha. It's going to give you problems when you try to create that, when you try to add it to the shorts area. And if you're trying to create a podcast playlist, it's the opposite. They don't let shorts and excerpts. So if they think that it's a short earning excerpt, they're not going to allow you to create your, your YouTube podcast. So I just want to clarify those two things. Now, long episode is fuzzy information anyway, right? Your regular episode might be a seven minute episode. What's consistent and constant for you as opposed to a short is just for you. So some people have 90 minute videos and so a two minute short is just perfectly fine. It's actually a lot shorter than your long episode. So just making sure there's a distinction in the two. And if you have a. With YouTube not allowing you to create either a podcast playlist or a shorts playlist, it's probably because it's not fitting the category, it's not fitting their definition of it and they change that. And it also could be different. Like I said, by your definition of it, if it's not actually the full length of it, it will know that because the full length video exists elsewhere. So keeping that in mind that there's a lot of tools and a lot of information that YouTube is working with. You want to do what's right for your channel, right for your list, right for the viewer who's going to see those videos. So Long Tail belongs in your regular playlists or as a podcast, if you want to label it as a podcast and it really should be syndicated as a podcast. If you're labeling it that way, you're going to get more play because it has a show consistency to it. And then do not put your shorts into your podcast playlist. Put them in the shorts area. That's where they belong. Hope that helps to clarify the difference between shorts and long form videos and how you might create playlists using those.
