Chasing external traffic vs feeding Suggested

Chasing external traffic vs feeding Suggested
Word from a growth consultant: dumping links in Reddit/Discord can actively hurt the metric you're trying to grow.
— External viewers often watch 20 seconds and bounce — that craters your avg view duration, and Suggested punishes videos with weak retention
— Letting Suggested do the work means YouTube only shows you to people whose watch history predicts they'll stay
Confidence: medium-high. Cold external traffic on a retention-fragile video is a known own-goal.
For a channel like yours: external promo is fine for a strong, high-retention video that can absorb tourists. On a thin or slow-start video, external traffic poisons the early signal. Match the traffic source to the video's retention strength.