Guides To Livestreaming

Generally speaking while live streaming you should follow 4 major tenants; be consistent, engage with the audience, maintain reasonable audio/video quality, foster a welcoming community while also enforcing hard rules. 

Consistency is key for viewers to remember when you will go live, for how long, and what to expect. Breaking consistency can turn off viewers who are not watching for you explicitly, but more so a topic which hurts your content performance long term through reduced engagement or less recommendations. As you grow larger it is easier to maintain engagement and a following for you as the person, not the content you create or association to another figure. A consistent style of content is also preferable to having no distinct style at all. Establishing a stream schedule and a specific amount of time you will be live each week should be the first step to larger scale consistency.

Your audience makes your channel, while you may attract an audience, it's their presence that keeps you relevant as livestreaming is an entertainment space generally speaking and those who cannot represent their audience do not succeed. Attempt to incorporate your audience into your content, promote their fanart, set up plugins for them to interact within the games you play, listen to their concerns etc. Tolerating disrespect is however non-negotiable and should be dealt with appropiately without spiraling into drama, remember you are representing yourself, don't become careless with your image. Respect goes both ways, your audience should respect you and you the streamer must respect their decision to watch you as you are not owed watchtime nor the audience something to watch.

Reasonable audio/video quality is important for viewers to understand you and have an enjoyable experience, cluttery visuals, choppy video, slideshow-like streams (I've had this problem), audio distortion, or unpleasant dissonance will repel viewers. Stream at settings that are ideal for your device while still presenting the most quality possible, audio quality is more important than video quality as audio is your main medium of communication with the audience at large. Do survey methods to reduce background noise interference into your livestreams whereever possible, you are poised to see benefit long term. 

An inclusive community will naturally have people enter it regularly, negative impromptu statements, discrimination, hatred, or excessive drama does drive some viewers away. There should be enforceable rules that align with your values, the social media platform's guidelines, and protects individuals biological circumstances as well as ideological disposition. As an example, my YouTube community has a subset of Christians, both discrimination against them directly or harassment of their beliefs is something to be heavily restricted. Utilize moderation tools to hide specific words of topics you dislike as well. 

General livestreaming information

The time of day you stream is important, your target audience could only be available for specific subsets of time each day, streaming outside of these times is less beneficial as you will be more reliant on new incoming viewers. Unlike videos, streaming should be allocated to the times your viewers are most active.

To reach more people you should collaborate with other youtubers in your niche, optimize your ability to be searched online, and produce content that people are looking for. Weekly or monthly, review your content and scrutinize it carefully to ensure it's targeting the correct audience while being engaging/enjoyable for the viewer. Your analytics can also help you with this to determine how long people are watching, when they leave, where they watch from, and their potential interests. 

For console streaming you will generally need the console, an HDMI cable, usb-c and 3.0 cables, as well as a streaming software such as Open Broadcasting Studio, Stream Labs, or another platform that can stream to your desired platform or multiple of them. Do ensure any of the streaming equipment you purchase is compatible with the console using, your computer, monitor, and television. Mobile device streaming has both mobile streaming apps or you can use a mirror tool to display your phones screen directly to your computer and stream that way.

Links to Software