YouTube has evolved from a fun place to find viral videos into an entertainment giant at the forefront of pop culture. There are now over a billion monthly YouTube viewers watching over 6 billion hours of video a month.
As a small business, Adwords for Video represents a tremendous marketing opportunity at a fraction of the cost of alternative advertising strategies. It represents the future of online promotion: the combination of video, social, and target marketing on an unprecedented scale.
What Are YouTube “TrueView” Ads?
When visiting YouTube, you’ve probably noticed the occasional pre-roll ad that lets you skip after 5 seconds. This is a TrueView ad format.
As a business advertiser, you only pay for the viewers that watch your entire video. This guarantees your budget is spent on potential customers that are truly interested in your product or service.
Your ad can appear before YouTube videos, in YouTube search results and on the Google Display Network across the web. Unlike TV, the ads can be of any length, although between 30-60 seconds appears to be most effective for most campaigns.
Here are four immediate benefits Adwords for Video offers for your business.
#1 Easy Setup: Adwords for Video Integrates into Existing Adwords Campaigns
For businesses already running a standard Google Adwords campaign, video easily integrates into your ad dashboard. You can even utilize your pre-existing target keywords. If you haven’t yet set up an Adwords campaign, the process only takes about an hour.
Since YouTube video ads are still in their early days, you can often get video keywords for far cheaper than on Google search since there are less businesses bidding on them.
#2 Reach Your Ideal Customers: Target Your Ad To Those That Want Your Product/Service
Adwords for Video allows you to target market by age, gender, interests, topics, ad placements, remarketing lists, keywords (YouTube search) or content keywords (on other websites using the Google Display Network). With the integration of Google+ and YouTube, you’ll soon have even more nuanced targeting capabilities.
For example, if you own a local daycare, you might target women age 18-35 who have subscribed to early childhood development channels on YouTube, searched YouTube for videos about childhood, recently watched one of your other videos on YouTube, or are currently browsing a website that covers similar topics.
This gives you the power to really focus your message, and increase your chances of turning viewers into buyers. It’s narrowcasting instead of broadcasting.
#3 Immediate Results: Prompt An Instant “Call to Action”
With TV commercials, you pay for viewers to see your ad and hopefully they’ll think of your business the next time they need your product or service.
On YouTube, however, the potential customer already has his or her computer, phone or tablet in front of them. You have the unprecedented ability to get him or her to take an immediate action, whether it’s purchasing from an online store, reserving an appointment, or signing up for an email newsletter.
#4 Measurable Results: Receive Instant Feedback on What’s Working
With your Adwords Dashboard and YouTube Analytics, you can track each and every metric that’s important to your campaign. What was the average length that people watched the video? What specific demographic of viewers clicked through? Once visitors reached your website from YouTube, how long did they stay on your site and what actions did they take?
This type of granular, meaningful feedback can drastically increase the effectiveness of an ad campaign, and give you instant feedback on where improvements can be made to your video ads.
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