What is YouTube Advertising?

YouTube AdvertisingWhat is YouTube advertising?

YouTube advertising is the opportunity to create video advertisements that can attract more people to your brand and let them know what you have to offer.

Types of YouTube ads

There are 3 main types of YouTube ads:

  • In-stream ads. You can create an ad that plays during a video, at the beginning, middle or end of a participating video.
  • In-search ads. You can create YouTube ads that appear in the search results for particular queries.
  • In-display ads. You can create an ad that appears on the YouTube watch page.

In addition to the video choices, you can also create a YouTube ad that appears as an overlay on videos, offering visitors the chance to click back to your website. This last type of ad can be particularly helpful for encouraging click-throughs from YouTube to your main website. Some marketers will even add them to their own videos to provide an additional CTA.

YouTube Advertising superbowl exampleHow to make YouTube advertising successful?

  1. Create a target for your ad that will let you get your brand in front of your intended audience. This might be through targeting a specific video or by even targeting user interests.
  2. Your video needs to pull people in immediately. Particularly during in-stream YouTube ads, customers can skip your ad after just a few seconds to watch their selected video. If you want them to watch your entire ad, you will have to give them a reason why.
  3. Your video needs to play into the reasons why people are on YouTube. Even when it comes to advertising, people do not come to the platform to receive a sales pitch. These advertisements must also either focus on either teaching or entertaining.
  4. The human connection can be very valuable when creating a successful ad. YouTube ads that include testimonials in particular are often appreciated.

Is YouTube advertising effective?

After you create your YouTube advertising campaign, you want to then focus on measuring your results so that you can adjust your strategy accordingly. Metrics to measure a success of a YouTube ad campaign are:

  1. Click-through rates. See how many people click through your YouTube ad to visit your targeted site, such as your YouTube brand page or your main website.
  2. Customer behavior on your site. See what people do after clicking through. If they are on your brand’s YouTube page, do they watch any videos? Do they subscribe? If they are on your company website, do they read any articles? Do they convert on any landing pages?
  3. Share of Voice. See how well your YouTube ad is increasing your overall Share of Voice. BrightEdge has a Share of Voice tool that makes this a simple process.

YouTube advertising can be a fantastic way to attract more attention to your brand. They let you tap into the billion-strong video audience and entice more people to see what you have to offer. Creating the right YouTube ad can make an enormous difference in your success.

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