Throughout the rise of social media, companies and advertisers have had to adapt in order to keep up with trends. In the last fourteen years, Youtube has risen as a major online power. It's the second most popular website in the world. I personally watch Youtube all the time so I'm familiar with how advertising works on the site, but I don't know everything behind the scenes.
There are several ways a brand could use Youtube in their marketing. One of the most obvious ways is creating traditional commercial-style advertisements and paying to have them posted on a user's home page, have Youtube recommend their ad as a video, or play the video advertisement before a video the user is choosing to watch. These types of ads typically cost a few cents per view. The advertiser can choose how much exposure their ad, and therefore their brand, will receive, and pay exactly for what they're getting. One downside of playing an ad before a video is that the user is usually just trying to watch that content. If there is a "skip ad" button, the user is likely to skip the ad. For some companies, the five seconds of exposure may be worth it.
Another huge component of Youtube advertising is individual sponsorships. A company can pay a certain content creator to show off and discuss their brand or product in a video. They will often contact a Youtuber and offer a deal with a contract. The Youtuber may be paid a flat fee or receive money based on the number of views. They may also be given a link or a code that, when used by a viewer, will allow the brand to see how much traffic and how many purchases that Youtuber is bringing in; the Youtuber will be paid based on that. Creators with a large number of subscribers and/or views are likely to be appealing to advertisers because there is a larger audience to be reached. Sponsoring Youtubers also has the benefit of the viewer connecting with or supporting the person promoting the product, which may make them want to buy from the brand. However, there is no guarantee of how many views a Youtuber's video will receive, especially in today's unpredictable Youtube environment.
When a Youtuber is sponsored by a brand, they are often presenting the good or service as if they love it, and it's something they use all the time. Personally, as a viewer, I prefer when a Youtuber is honest and states that it is a sponsored video. In this way, the brand is still getting exposure, but I'm viewing the creator as a more transparent or honest person. Maybe in the future if they say they genuinely love a product, I'll be more likely to buy it.
Youtube is constantly evolving and changing. In the past few years, there has been a large discussion about money on Youtube. This is creators' jobs. Advertising on Youtube can be helpful for the brand, but it is extremely important for the people who make money from it. Demonetization- meaning the creator cannot make money from the ads played on their videos- has become a huge problem. Receiving sponsorships has also become more difficult for some, as brands are wanting to lean to a more "family friendly" side. However, the Youtube audience is growing at an incredible rate, and marketing through this site is becoming more and more appealing to companies.
Sources:
https://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2018/09/20/youtube-marketing
https://blog.hootsuite.com/youtube-marketing/
I think the Youtube ad space is really interesting. Another issue YouTube faces is making sure ads are on videos those brands approve of. A few years ago brands realized there ads were being played on content that was totally against their brand. For instance the content was offensive or violent. This caused an adpocaplys where a lot of brand pulled their brand off YouTube. This was bad for YouTube and for creators who lost out on revenue. To combat this YouTube has worked to step up their game as far as making sure videos that should not have adds are demonetized.
ReplyDeleteDemonetizing violent videos and content that advertisers don't want their image connected with is all well and good, but there are some inherent problems with demonetization. For one thing, a good number of reporters and journalists covering dangerous places or talking about terrorism, racism, and other things that demonetization bots look for are frequently demonetized. Youtube needs to do a better job figuring out how to select between important and negative content, and part of that should be done by increasing the number of human moderators. This would end up costing Youtube a lot more money than using bots, but it also means that they would not have these same advertiser-pullouts that hurt youtube so much.
DeleteSince I use Youtube regularly and am exposed to all the advertising like everyone else, it's really interesting read about the marketing behind the scenes, as it's not really something I think about much while watching Youtube. However, Youtube ads are really useful for advertisers, as they can chose between different types of ads (skippable, non-skippable, or at the beginning/middle/end of a video). They also have the ability to market to specific demographics, people who search specific keywords, and people who watch specific types of videos or channels.
ReplyDeleteYoutuber of the beauty channel is often push ads invisibly to their audience, they often recommend some "good" products, said it is their love, attracted countless fans to buy. Many audiences may actually believe that these things really work well because they are recommended by their favorite youtuber, but they don't realize that this is actually an advertisement, and the youtubers are paid by the manufacturers.
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