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PPC for beginners: A comprehensive introduction to YouTube Ads

Almost every user wishes to have information in the video form, as this keeps their attention engaged in the content, they find it easy to navigate and relate with the description being provided. With the growth of technology, this is the era of videos and YouTube is helping businesses to grow their customer base and engage with potential customers. At the present age, there is no better channel than YouTube for video advertising.

YouTube is the second most visited website on the internet with nearly 2 billion active users and growing. With the speed that the videos are posted on YouTube, businesses should always plan their video advertising strategy, and present the content in a way that the analytics help in increasing the ROI. YouTube Ads feature a variety of options like YouTube advertising, sidebar slots, pre-rolls (pre-video) content, and many more. Depending on the plans of the video marketing agency, YouTube advertising can be best put to use in reaching out to a greater number of visitors and finally increasing sales.

What is YouTube advertising?

Even though it can be understood that YouTube Ads are the new commercials, the video advertising part is something different that is presented to the visitors. YouTube advertising is a way of promoting the business mostly in the video format and reach out to potential customers in a very short time. The growing prominence of YouTube Ads excites campaigns to present their products or services on the YouTube Google Ads and reach out to a greater number of customers. The Google Ads YouTube strategy is also now taken into account by campaigns and thus is put to action before they work on YouTube advertising.

Since YouTube is owned by Google, YouTube advertising shares many of the features of Google except the big difference that they are videos. There are many ads that are displayed on the Google search engine whenever a search query is made in the Google search bar, but most of them are in text format whereas YouTube presents the ads in the video format. YouTube Ads can be played at the starting, in between the video, and at the end of the video. Some YouTube Ads can be skipped by viewers after the ad is played for few seconds, while others are non-skippable. This depends on the type of YouTube ad posted by the business which we will discuss further in the blog. YouTube advertising can be PPC ads depending on their length and placement.

YouTube advertising is video promotions that appear on the channel’s website or app, as well as on its partner sites known as the Google display network (GDN). The Google Ads YouTube advertising displays results from the viewer’s search history and their YouTube viewing habit. Target ability is what makes YouTube advertising so compelling since the company’s video promotion can be featured alongside relevant YouTube videos that millions of people choose to watch for education or entertainment purposes.

Types of YouTube Ads

YouTube provides different ad categories that businesses can choose to display their ads from. YouTube PPC ads help the campaign to figure out the relevant customer and thus save money and time from getting wasted on the irrelevant customers. The types of Google YouTube Ads are discussed below:

1. True view ads – The true view ads are a type of PPC ads where advertisers only pay when viewers watch or interact with their ad. This can be done by clicking on the ad, by clicking on the call-to-action button, by connecting to the website link on the ads, and thus, the video can be customized to share a variety of content. The Google Ads help to increase ROI thus increasing the business for the campaign, as advertisers only pay when the user watches a video for a set time or until the end of the video, or if they take any action to reach the service page of the campaign. YouTube requires that skippable true view ads be between 12 seconds and 6 minutes in length, and that non-skippable.

There are 2 types of true view ads with which the YouTube video ads can be optimized:

Video discovery ads (previously in-display ads) – Video discovery YouTube Ads show up on the YouTube page, search result pages, and ads as on YouTube watch pages. These are essentially the same signals that Google uses for in-market audience targeting. When a viewer searches for something on YouTube, the discovery ads appear with the organic search results. Discovery ads have relevant content matching with the organic search results. These kinds of ads appear on the top with the text lines and are labeled as ads. Google has announced new discovery ad formats for mobile search and native placement Google mapping, to revamp the shopping experience at Google. Discovery ads are native ads that appear in multiple Google feed environments. Discovery ads appear in the Google discover feed on the mobile, YouTube feed and Gmail. These Google discovery ads can now be monetized with new native set up by Google, and thus is now looked upon by businesses to increase their target audience and revenue.

In-Stream ads - True view in-stream ads play before someone watches the video they have selected to play on YouTube. In such ads, viewers have the option to skip the ads after few seconds the ad is played. This ad can be played in the Google Display Network or sites that purchased Google video ad space. In-stream ads let video marketing agencies or businesses customize video ads with different CTAs and overlay text, as highlighted in the skippable in-stream ad. For any business that wishes to increase their view count, it’s a good idea to make videos at least 12 seconds long as YouTube analytics does not track videos less than 10 seconds. The in-stream ads can be created using Google Ads. The YouTube analytics and reports help to analyze your YouTube videos and also figure out when to display the ads.

2. Overlay ads - YouTube in-video overlay ads appear on the bottom of the video in watch pages. These are also a type of PPC ads as the advertisers have to pay only when a click is made on it. These ads pop up after the video starts playing and maybe in the form of text or image. As it is 480*70 image ads format and displayed at the lower 20% of the YouTube video, so it is not as intrusive as other large pop-ups. If the users are not interested, they can even close the ad by clicking on the “X”, displayed in the top right corner of the ad. Most active campaign implements both an overlay and a common display ad to increase their visibility and optimize their ad campaign to reach out to the target audience and increase the conversion rate. Two essential overlay ad campaign practices are:

Including a compelling CTA on the overlay – Any business wants to increase their brand awareness and is ready to pay money for it. The video marketing agency should keep in mind to put in a compelling call-to-action in their YouTube Google Ads, to increase their click-through rate and ROI. The business should master the art of social media marketing and provide imperative headlines and content in the Google Ads YouTube channel so that the leads get finally converted into customers. The YouTube Ads cost is kept in range by the video marketing agency and helps the business save money and they do not just keep raising the bids and pay anything extra out of their budget. The CTA button guides the customers through the whole process of what they are going to get.

A dedicated landing-page – Any business that pays YouTube Ads cost, wishes that the visitor gets converted into customers. The first impression that the visitor gets about the services of the company is the landing page that the visitor reaches after clicking on the CTA button or the link of the website that is provided. As it is the second-largest social media platform, it makes sense to run ads for businesses on YouTube. With YouTube Google Ads, the businesses can reach an audience far beyond various other platforms. But to make the prospects believe in your services and to increase the brands loyalty, a good product description page needs to be worked on. The content on the landing page should be organized so that the user finds it easy to navigate through and thus suggest others also to reach out to your website. This peer-to-peer advertising is very helpful for the video marketing agency as they do not have to incur extra YouTube Ads cost. This acts as the social proof of advertising and the customer directly searches the website on the search engine. This search also helps the website to rank better on SERPs and helps to grow the trust of the company. If businesses find it difficult to design a promising product description page they can get in touch with a video marketing agency as they have proper knowledge of YouTube Ads cost, YouTube Google Ads, video advertising, and can work in the best way for the company.

3. Pre-roll ads – A pre-roll ad is a promotional video that appears before the video that the user has selected to play. A post-roll ad, on the other hand, is also a promotional video that appears after the ad has finished. There’s also a mid-roll that appears during the middle when the video is being played. A pre-roll ad is a paid video, and it can be 15 to 20 seconds in duration. The pre-roll can also be long-form videos and thus can be divided into different parts. This way at least the main content of the video can be delivered to the users as they will have to go through each part of the video. There are also non-skippable mid-roll videos which can be of a long duration of up to 10 minutes. Although Google has its own requirements for the type of video advertising being done. Pre-roll ads give as much freedom as true view ads where the businesses can include people, dialogue, audio and more elements that they find best represent their services or products. Because pre-roll ads can’t be skipped so the ads can be created with a call-to-action (CTA) so that campaigns can optimize the attention of the viewer. Perhaps by this, you are encouraging the viewers to click on the ads, reach your product page and convert them into customers. Since the creation of ads to attract the user towards making a click may not be easy, so some tips for YouTube advertising may be kept in mind by the campaign, and if the problem still persists the services of a video marketing agency can also be taken.

4. Bumpers – Bumper ads are small six-second ads that the viewer cannot skip and increases brand awareness. Bumper ads obviously cannot talk much about the campaign but at least help in making a frame in the viewer’s mind about what type of services the company provides. Just make sure to utilize these six seconds very wisely, and to present to your audience with the video campaign that part which they can remember. You can create bumper ads in Google Ads under the video campaign type. Bumper ads use target CPM (cost-per-thousand impressions) bidding, meaning the businesses have to pay each time when the ad is displayed 1000 times. Bumper ads are easy to dismiss, but in doing so the users are missing some points. When combined with other ads like True View ads, this becomes another powerful tool to attract viewers.

To make effective use of such ads try to use them in clusters, mix them with other ad formats. Try to stick to one point as you have only six seconds to focus. Try to highlight one unique feature, one product feature, answer one of the questions, and make sure all are aligned in a way that meets the goal of the campaign. YouTube Ads cost also needs to be kept in mind while planning a six-second short video as the campaign cannot waste their money on such ads that do not cover any of the above-discussed points. It is hard to do it but that’s how you become the best in social media marketing and be ahead of your competitors.

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Benefits of YouTube advertising

No matter how good your video content is, without the right YouTube advertising strategy, it can be hard to get good results for your campaign. You may have a very good social media marketing strategy, but if you really want your video to be seen, you need to put it on YouTube. However, while the YouTube ad campaign is run through Google Ads, advertising on YouTube is very different from your standard PPC ads. In addition to targeting the right audience and creating killer video content, you need to choose which options are the best for your viewers and present the video as per the choice of the viewers.

In today’s world, as YouTube is getting to the hands of the customers on the desktop and the mobile version, the ads are more accessible than the traditional TV ads. Here, businesses do not have to pay a huge amount of money for video advertising and can also control their ads to figure out only the relevant customers by using PPC ads. Google YouTube Ads provide several options to video advertising and ensure that the businesses can meet their needs and even the customers get their desired results. The Click-through-rate is highly monitored and the Google Analytics and reports suggest the companies to keep improving on their content.

The companies may have gained enough expertise and revenue from search engine optimization and pay-per-click (PPC) ads. But now, with the growing domain of advertising on Google Ads YouTube platform, businesses cannot miss the opportunity of advertising on YouTube. Let us now see some of the benefits of YouTube advertising. Let’s now discuss some of the benefits of YouTube advertising:

1. Cost effective – With PPC advertising, you know it’s an extremely cost-effective strategy. YouTube advertising is also cost-effective as the campaign decides how much they are willing to pay, whenever a click is made on their ads.

cost effective

2. Highly targeted – Targeting is very crucial for any campaign and Google YouTube Ads help you in reaching the exact audience. This can be done by taking into account certain factors like demographics, the topic of interest of viewers, customer match, video remarketing, in-market audience, etc.

3. Connect with your audience – YouTube advertising presents the services of the company in the video format; the viewers get to know about the product description of the company in the story format and the attitude of the company also comes ahead. You can go live on YouTube and also get in direct contact with your customers, leading to an increase in the engagement rate, lead generation and build the trust of the customers.

audience final

4. Easy to measure advertising metrics – YouTube advertising metrics are easy to measure as you just need to click on the “Analytics” tab on your YouTube account. This would display the number of views of your ads, the conversion rate of visitors, and all the other data at a single place. The details of the cost and budget can be viewed from the Google Ads account and thus be worked on to improve the performance of the company.

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5. Fast results – Since it is the second largest search engine, it is obvious to get fast results. Your ads get displayed to a larger number of people, so there are fast results, and you get more ad clicks, website traffic, more sales, and more revenue.

fast final

6. YouTube advertising puts you in front of billions – It creates an opportunity for small businesses, startups, and enterprises to reach out to more interested users than ever before. This helps in better leads generation and the sales of the company increase. Even if you choose specifically to target a set of audiences it would still be more than various other platforms, unless you have a billion followers on any other platforms.

reach billion people

Credible digital marketing services

Being a Digital Marketing Company we provide prominent YouTube d management services. We customize Google Ads YouTube services, study insights, and data from the changes in the market happening regularly. We formulate the best strategy for our customers, digital analytics, and help customers achieve their business growth. We create ad campaign, launch ad campaign and do proper campaigns audit to figure out the best for our customers. We prepare white label reports and plan the best market research to make video ads, optimize mobile ads, do content marketing, email marketing that best fits the demands of the customers.

Round Off

YouTube advertising is one of the best ways to get your video ads out in front of relevant, potential customers, and explain how your product or service can benefit your audience. It may take time to organize content in a video format, but is the best way as the viewer understands easily what you are trying to convey. It displays out the services offered by the company and helps customers to decide easily on what next is to be done. It also increases brand affinity and helps convey the core messages of the brand, explaining to the customers of the products or services that they can get from the business. The businesses should be good on their strategy to launch a well-targeted YouTube Ad.

References:

YouTube Ads for Beginners: How to Launch & Optimize a YouTube Video Advertising Campaign
The Complete Marketer’s Guide to YouTube

Megistron Media