how to name a youtube series: call it what the thing is called. your company, your project or your brand, in a word or two, and keep the episode number and the searchable words out of it. the series name is what a returning viewer recognises; each episode's title is what a stranger searches for. underway's first step asks what's it called?, and whatever you type goes on the card that opens episode zero and every episode after it.
most advice on naming is about channels or about fiction: a catchy web series title, a clever double meaning, a list of a hundred name ideas. a series that documents something real, a business, a build, a shop, a year of learning, has a simpler job. its name has to survive a hundred episodes, a pivot or two, and being said out loud by someone who is telling a friend about it.
a real poster from building underway, the series underway's founder films about building it. the name is the company with one word in front; the number sits apart from it, in the corner.
how to name a youtube series: the short answer
- use the name of the thing you are documenting: the company, the product, the shop, the project.
- add one word only if it helps: building polajoy, the launch, year one. leave it off if it doesn't.
- keep it short enough to read on a phone at a glance, and to say in one breath.
- never put a number, a date or a target in it. the episode label does the counting.
- put the words people search for in each episode's title, not in the series name.
- pick it once and keep it. a series renamed every few months has to be learned again by everyone who already knew it.
that is most of it. the rest of this page is why each of those holds, and how to check a name before you commit to it.
what page one gets wrong about naming a youtube series
the pages that rank for this search are good at what they set out to do. youtube's own creator blog has sound advice on branding a series: a consistent title format, the same look on every thumbnail, a playlist, an upload day built into the name. wistia's piece on show title structures is the best of the rest, with four patterns for naming a show for a brand. studiobinder writes about web series for filmmakers, where a name like high maintenance works because it is a joke and a description at once.
what they mostly miss is the documentary series: one person, filming what is actually happening, episode after episode, with no script and no ending in sight. a clever title is a liability there. it promises a tone you will not always have, and it hides the one fact a new viewer needs, which is what this is about. the other pages also blur the channel and the series together. on youtube they are often the same thing at the start, and they stop being the same the day you start a second one.
so treat it as a plain naming problem with a long horizon. the name will be read a few thousand times by the same people, and it has to still be right at episode 200.
how to name a youtube series that documents something real
| example | works when | watch out for | |
|---|---|---|---|
| the thing's own name | polajoy | the company or product is the story, and its name is already known or easy to say | a pivot that changes the name. the series can keep the old one as its history. |
| a verb and the name | building polajoy | you want the title to say this is the making of it, not an ad for it | it reads a little long on a small card; keep the name itself short |
| the chapter | the launch, year one | you are documenting a stretch with a beginning and an end | the chapter ends and the name is wrong. seasons are usually the better tool for this. |
| a plain description | a bookshop from scratch | the business has no name yet, or the name means nothing to a stranger | it is a description, so it is easy to copy and hard to own |
notice what is missing from the table: puns, the founder's own name as the whole title, and anything with a number. a pun wears thin by episode ten. your own name is fine for a channel but says nothing about what the series follows. a number in a name, day 1 of 365, sets a target, and a target counts down to the day you miss it.
the series name is not the episode title
this is the part most naming advice skips, and it decides whether anyone new ever finds you. people do not search for series names they have never heard of. they search for problems, tools and questions: why users sign up and never come back, how to price a print, how to find a first wholesale customer. the series name earns recognition from people who already watch. the episode title earns discovery from people who don't.
so the two do different jobs, and putting them in the right order matters. youtube weighs the start of a title most, and nobody types episode 11 into a search box. underway sends each episode to youtube with its name first and the label after it, in the shape why users sign up but don't use the app: i tested mine · episode 63. the series name lives on the card that opens the episode, in the corner label and on your page, where a returning viewer sees it every time.
each episode's name is written for search too. underway writes it from what you said, checks its opening words against youtube's own search suggestions, and keeps it to under sixty characters. a name that only works if you already know the series, or that names the series, the product or the founder when nobody searches for them, is written again. two other ways to title it sit under the name, and use this renames the episode everywhere.
count episodes, not days
the series name and the number beside it are two separate decisions, and the number is the one people get wrong. day numbering looks honest and turns out not to be. miss a week and you have to choose between posting day 47 after day 44, a public gap, or day 45, which is not true. most people also start documenting some way into the work, so day 1 was never day 1.
episode numbering has none of those problems. episode 47 is simply your forty-seventh episode, whenever it was filmed. underway's episode label offers episode 47, day 47 or #47, with episode as the default; whichever you pick, the numbering underneath never changes. a viewer who arrives at episode 47 can see at once that there is a lot behind it, and episode zero, the introduction, stays pinned at the front as the place to start.
how to test a youtube series name before you commit
- say it out loud to someone and ask them to type it. if they misspell it, so will everyone else.
- read it at phone size, in the corner of a frame, over your own face. if it needs more than a glance, it is too long.
- search youtube for it. if a much bigger channel already uses it, pick something else now rather than at episode 30.
- ask whether it survives the likely next chapter: a new product, a move, a hire, a raise.
- check it has no year, no number and no promise in it.
- ask whether it still makes sense to someone who has never heard of you. if it only makes sense after episode 10, it is an in-joke.
an earlier version of underway's first step, filled in for a demo series called polajoy, not a customer. the box headed name the series now asks what's it called?, and the reminder time is set later, in account.
where you name your series in underway
the first of underway's getting started steps asks, in order: your first name, what's it called?, what are you documenting?, and your website if you have one. what's it called? is the series name. your company, your project or your brand, in a word or two: underway, polajoy, the shop.
- the name goes on the card that opens episode zero and every episode after it, and on your page if you make the series public.
- the one line about what you are documenting is not decoration. episode zero's questions are written from it, and the directory reads your industry from it rather than asking you to pick one.
- if the name the questions should say out loud is different, what the questions call it in account is for that.
- leave the name empty and the series is called after you, sam's series, until you change it. once episode zero exists, today offers finish setting up your series, which asks for the name again.
- account, under series, asks the same questions in the same words, and both places edit the same answers.
you can change the name later, in account. episodes already posted keep the name they went out with, which is one more reason to settle it early.
seasons: name the chapter, not the series again
the urge to rename usually arrives with a new chapter: the launch, the first hire, the move to a shop. that is what seasons are for. a season in underway is a chapter with a name and a goal. the series keeps its name and its numbering, and the season carries the chapter: building polajoy, season 2, the launch. earlier seasons keep their names, so nothing about the past is renamed by the present.
a stealth series works the same way. episodes filmed before you go public sit in your vault as season 0, numbered and in order, and the public series starts at season 1 when you launch. you can name season 1 on the day you go public.
then practise episode zero
with the series named, the third step is episode zero: a conversation about what you are building, who it is for, where it honestly stands and what comes next. it does not take a number, it stays at the front of the series as the place a new viewer starts, and every interview after it uses it as context.
before the real one there is a practice. a three-minute try with just your voice, and one on camera, if you want them. your co-host says up front that it is a practice, asks what you are building the way it will in the real one, and wraps up before three minutes. nothing is kept, nothing is sent anywhere, and nobody has to practise. the real one is up to ten minutes, and you can keep it, have another go or delete it. episode zero and every go at it are free on every plan.
the co-host goes by the name of your series' interviewer voice, the name on the screen beside yours, and you can change both in account.
the real card that opens episode zero of building underway. the introduction carries no number of its own and stays at the front of the series.
if the series is about what you are building, how to film it: build in public video.
should my youtube series have the same name as my channel?
at the start it often does, and that is fine. name the series after the thing you are documenting. if the channel later carries a second series, the first one keeps its name and the channel name can be yours.
should i put keywords in my series name?
no. put them in each episode's title, where people actually search. a series name stuffed with keywords reads like an ad and still will not rank, because nobody searches for a series they have not heard of.
can i rename my series in underway later?
yes, in account, under series. episodes already posted keep the name they went out with, so it is worth settling early.
should i number episodes by day?
usually not. day numbers punish a missed week and are rarely true from the start. underway offers day 47 as a label for niches that expect it, with episode 47 as the default, and the numbering underneath never changes.
does the practice count as episode zero?
no. a practice is deleted when it ends and never counts as an episode. there is one with your voice and one on camera, each about three minutes.
the rest of the format, once the series has a name: how to make a youtube series.
and how to title each episode so strangers find it: how to title a youtube video.
Originally published at https://underway.life/how-to-name-a-youtube-series
Top comments (2)
The 'count episodes, not days' point really landed for me — day numbers quietly turn a missed week into a visible failure, while episode 47 is just episode 47 whenever it arrives. I also liked the say-it-out-loud test; if someone can't type a name after hearing it once, that name is doing extra work every time it's mentioned. The practice episode zero idea is a nice low-stakes way to find that out before anything is public.
The say it out loud test is the one I would keep. I like your point about putting the searchable words in the episode titles instead. A series name has to survive being said by someone else, and if they cannot spell it after hearing it once, they will never find it again.