Jan 2021

Brand advertising on YouTube

YouTube is an excellent channel for brand building advertising

The reach of YouTube in the US now exceeds linear TV among people 18-49
This reach is delivered much more precisely than TV, especially against specific audiences (1)
If used as a supporting channel alongside TV, YouTube is likely to deliver cost-effective incremental reach (for all age groups) (2)

Three main video formats to choose from

Any

Only pay if a viewer watches to the end, or 30 seconds, or interacts

Choose these if you can get your message across with engaging creative (that viewers won’t want to skip)

6 seconds

See examples from Subaru, Ford and Duracell

Choose these if you have a simple message, and can get it across in the time

15 seconds

Like regular 15 second TV spots

Choose these if you have enough budget and want to go all-out for maximum reach (or if the other formats don’t work)

Where – Location down to zip code level
Who – Based on language, demographics, and what Google has inferred about them. This includes interest categories / affinity audiences (e.g. cooking enthusiasts), life events (e.g. marriage) and “in-market audiences” who are shopping for something (e.g. yoga apparel)
Content your ad appears alongside – Keywords, topics (e.g. face care products), and “placements.” Placements can be specified videos or websites or “dynamic lineups”. Dynamic lineups are sets of videos around a topic in a country (e.g. “Cooking - Japan”)

Attitudinal targeting is more effective than demographic. A study found 32% higher lift in ad recall and 100% higher lift in purchase intent when attitudinal targeting was used
It’s possible to feature your ad alongside particularly high quality content (“preferred” / “select”) or to exclude certain content (e.g. profanity). This might be relevant from a PR standpoint, but the evidence is that as long as the audience is there, what they are watching doesn’t matter

Frequency capping is the killer feature that makes YouTube so efficient at delivering reach
As a guide, for launches cap views at 3, and for maintenance cap them at 1 per month
For comparison, in the world of TV it takes ~500 GRPs to reach most people once

Set up a reach campaign in YouTube’s regular Google Ads interface, or the Display & Video 360 enterprise interface
Cap frequency in the regular and enterprise interfaces
Turn on reach reporting if necessary

Notes

As Google point out, most TV ads are seen by heavy viewers. The more specific the audience, the more TV spend goes to waste
On average, across 21 Share Shift studies Google commissioned with Nielsen “advertisers saw that shifting just 20% of spend from TV to YouTube generated a 25% increase to the total campaign reach within their target audience, lowering the cost per reach point by almost 20%”. It’s easy to compare the cost of reach on YouTube vs. TV, and decide which is best for you