As a parent, it’s difficult to imagine what your kids are watching online. I always see my kids on their phones. In the car, while eating dinner, and even just after school while they lay in their room, the kids on their phones. And when confronted with the question about what they’re watching, the answer more times than not… YouTube. Or, they’ll tell a story about something and when asked about where they heard about that or saw that… YouTube.
If you’re a parent with tweens or kids that are older than that, you’ve probably had similar conversations. After all, people watch over 1 billion hours of YouTube video EVERY SINGLE DAY!
Luckily, as business owners there are more than just teens watching videos on this platform. In fact, the largest age group using YouTube is between the ages of 15-35. And with over 2 billion monthly active users, YouTube has emerged as a highly effective strategy for businesses and marketers.
With its massive user base, precise targeting options, engaging visual content, and cost-effective nature, YouTube offers a unique platform to reach and engage with a vast audience.
Advantages of Advertising on YouTube
Massive Reach:
With over 2 billion logged-in monthly active users, YouTube is the second largest search engine and the largest video platform in the world. This incredible reach provides businesses with an unparalleled opportunity to showcase their products or services to a vast and diverse audience. Whether your target market is local, national, or global, YouTube’s reach ensures that your ads can reach the right people at the right time.
Precise Targeting Options:
YouTube offers a wide array of targeting options to help advertisers refine their audience reach. By leveraging demographics such as age, gender, and location, you can ensure that your ads are displayed to the most relevant viewers. Additionally, YouTube provides interest-based targeting, where you can select specific topics or keywords related to your business. This precision targeting ensures that your ads are seen by people who are more likely to be interested in your offerings, leading to higher engagement and conversion rates.
Here are a few examples of ways that you can target on YouTube:
The above is just a sample of some of the thousands of categories available to choose from when advertising on the platform.
As a business owner, if you are looking to utilize YouTube as a platform to reach your audience, you must first ensure that you have your own YouTube channel where the video you want to use as your ad resides. In addition, YouTube will require a small companion display ad to run alongside the video that is 300 x 60 and under 150 kb.
Engaging Visual Content:
One of the key advantages of advertising on YouTube is the ability to leverage the power of video. Unlike text-based ads, video ads have the ability to captivate viewers, evoke emotions, and deliver your brand message in a compelling manner. Through visual storytelling, you can create a lasting impact on your target audience, helping them remember your brand and increasing the likelihood of them taking action.
Cost-Effective Advertising:
YouTube advertising can be an incredibly cost-effective strategy, especially when compared to traditional forms of advertising such as TV commercials. With YouTube, you’ll be paying by impression, meaning you pay for a certain number of ads each month. This allows you to plan your marketing budget in advance.
Detailed Analytics and Insights:
YouTube provides robust analytics and reporting tools to track the performance of your ads. You can see metrics such as the number of impressions that ran each month, the number of clicks you received on your ads, the click-through rate (CTR), the devices on which your ads are being served, and even a breakdown of the different creative pieces in rotation. You can also view the completion rate of your video ads and track conversions that occur on your website because of your ad campaign. These insights enable advertisers to measure the effectiveness of their campaigns, identify areas for improvement, and make data-driven optimizations. By leveraging these analytics, you can refine your targeting strategies, enhance your ad creative, and maximize your return on investment.
Don’t just take our word for it, take a look at some of the numbers:
- In Q1 of 2023, advertising revenue for YouTube was almost $6.7 billion
- In a study conducted in 2022, 59% of respondents agreed that YouTube ads are more relevant than ads on linear TV or other streaming apps
User Engagement:
YouTube boasts impressive engagement metrics, with users spending an average of 40 minutes per session on the platform. Moreover, over 70% of YouTube viewers use the platform to discover new products, making it a fertile ground for businesses to capture the attention of potential customers.
Ad Recall and Brand Awareness:
According to Google’s internal data, YouTube’s ad recall rate is 2x higher than that of TV. This means that viewers remember and recall ads they see on YouTube at a much higher rate than traditional television commercials. Additionally, YouTube has been found to be effective in increasing brand awareness, with studies indicating that it generates a 20% higher lift in recall compared to TV.
Mobile Viewership:
Mobile devices play a significant role in YouTube’s success, with over 70% of YouTube watch time coming from mobile devices. This mobile viewership provides businesses with an opportunity to reach audiences on the go, making it crucial to optimize ads for mobile devices to maximize their impact.
Influencer Marketing:
YouTube has given rise to the phenomenon of influencer marketing, where creators with large followings endorse or feature products in their videos. This approach has proven highly effective, with 60% of YouTube subscribers stating that they would follow advice on what to buy from their favorite YouTube creator over traditional celebrities. Partnering with relevant influencers on YouTube can amplify your brand’s reach, boost credibility, and generate valuable leads.
Increased Conversion Rates:
According to a study by Ipsos, YouTube ads drove a 15% increase in website traffic and a 19% increase in offline store visits. The study further revealed that 47% of consumers who saw a YouTube ad took action as a result, whether it was visiting a website, conducting further research, or making a purchase. These conversion rates demonstrate the power of YouTube advertising in driving real business outcomes.
Advertising on YouTube offers a multitude of advantages for businesses and marketers seeking to effectively reach their target audience. With its massive reach, precise targeting options, engaging visual content, and cost-effective nature, YouTube provides a unique platform to showcase products, build brand awareness, and drive conversions. If you’re looking to add a video strategy to your marketing mix, YouTube would be a great choice.
