YouTube Transcripts, Search, and Channel Data Pulls
Get YouTube transcripts, search results, channel uploads, and playlists, with sourced IDs, caption-track details, and upload monitoring.
Before & after
Same prompt, same agent — the only difference is the skill.
You can search YouTube directly for competitor videos on productivity topics. You'd probably want to use a search query with their channel name and 'productivity' keywords to find relevant content. YouTube's search algorithm should return recent videos if you filter by upload date. You could also check their channel directly to browse their latest uploads. You might want to look at their video titles, descriptions, view counts, and publish dates to understand their content strategy. Do you have their exact channel name? That would help narrow down the search.
COMPETITOR PRODUCTIVITY SERIES - LAST 30 DAYS FILTERED RESULTS (5 recent videos found) 1. VIDEO: '5 Habits That Destroyed My Productivity' Published: July 28, 2026 (3 days ago) Views: 12,400 (fresh engagement) Duration: 14 min 32 sec Transcript available: Yes (full text extracted) Engagement: 340 likes, 28 comments, 2.7% like rate → Key insight: Negative-angle approach (avoid mistakes) → Audience sentiment: Fear-based (resonates with 25-35 demographic) 2. VIDEO: 'My Morning Routine Increased Output 3x' Published: July 20, 2026 (10 days ago) Views: 34,800 (strong performer) Duration: 19 min 45 sec Transcript: Available Engagement: 1,240 likes, 156 comments, 3.6% like rate → Key insight: Routine/habit framing (actionable) → Audience question: "What's your specific wake-up time?" (repeat inquiry) 3. VIDEO: 'Why Goal Setting Failed Me (And How I Fixed It)' Published: July 14, 2026 (17 days ago) Views: 8,900 (underperformed vs. others) Duration: 11 min 22 sec Transcript: Available Engagement: 210 likes, 12 comments, 2.4% like rate → Key insight: Vulnerability angle → Performance note: Confessional framing less effective than solutions 4. VIDEO: 'The Productivity Tool I Ditched (Spending Less Time Organizing)' Published: July 8, 2026 (23 days ago) Views: 27,600 (strong, likely shared) Duration: 8 min 18 sec Transcript: Available Engagement: 890 likes, 124 comments, 3.2% like rate → Key insight: Anti-tool stance (contrarian) → Audience response: Tool recommendations in comments (counter-narrative) 5. VIDEO: 'Productivity Systems Don't Work (Here's Why Mine Is Different)' Published: July 2, 2026 (29 days ago) Views: 19,400 Duration: 22 min 14 sec Transcript: Available Engagement: 620 likes, 89 comments, 3.2% like rate PLAYLIST IDENTIFIED: 'Productivity System Teardown' (7 videos, 15k total views) COMPETITOR STRATEGY SIGNALS → Frequency: 1 video every 6-7 days (consistent cadence) → Format: Long-form personal narrative (11-22 min average) → Angle: Contrarian (what doesn't work, mistakes to avoid) → Performance: Habit/routine videos 2-3x more engagement than theory → Monetization: Ad-supported (estimated 30-50 revenue per video)
About this skill
You paste a YouTube link and ask for the transcript. What comes back is a summary of a video that was never fetched, a "no captions" error on a video that clearly has CC, or a channel listing that burned your API quota and still missed uploads. This skill handles YouTube retrieval like a research engineer would. It resolves the exact ID first, picks the cheapest source that is actually complete, and labels where every result came from.
What it does
- Turns any URL form (watch, youtu.be, shorts, live, embed, @handle, /c/, /user/) into a canonical video, channel, or playlist ID before fetching anything
- Lists the caption tracks before choosing one (creator-made, auto-generated, or translated) and labels the choice, so you know how far to trust the text
- Cleans auto-caption VTT: removes the rolling duplicate lines, strips timing tags, adds timestamp deep links, and marks likely mishearings
- Picks the right source for each job: the RSS feed for recent uploads (no key, no quota), the uploads playlist for full archives, and search only when you are actually searching
- Builds monitoring scripts that track seen video IDs, seed state on the first run, and flag Shorts and scheduled premieres
- Says plainly when something can't be fetched (no network access, captions disabled, IP blocked, members-only) and gives you the exact command to run yourself
What you get
The data you asked for (a transcript, an upload table, playlist contents, or search results) under a provenance header with the source, caption track type, and counts. For archives and monitoring, you get a runnable script.
Best for
Researchers, analysts, content strategists, and developers who pull YouTube data to quote, summarize, track competitors, or feed a pipeline, and who need it to be accurate rather than plausible.
SKILL.md preview
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name: youtube-transcripts-search-channel-data
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