Did you know that YouTube has over 2 billion logged-in users daily?
That’s impressive.
For brands and advertisers, that’s a massive opportunity.
Are you making the most of this audience?
Any brand that wants to be heard and seen, should take advantage of this huge potential for reach. With YouTube and overall digital video advertising, you could be connecting with your desired audience at a time when they’re most willing to listen.
One of the most important factors you need to determine before beginning your digital video campaign is deciding on the format of your ad.
YouTube offers a vast variety of ad formats, each designed to help you reach your goal.
To help you get started, let’s take a look at the best formats for each goal.
Build Awareness & Ad Recall
You’re looking to capture the attention of a new audience and maintain top of mind with existing audiences. All of the following are specifically designed to reach this goal:
- TrueView for Reach:
This format is skippable and duration is recommended at 15’’ although there are no restrictions. This is charged by CPM and allows you to measure ad recall lift,awareness lift, impressions and unique reach.
- Bumper Ads:
Bumper ads are mobile-first non-skippable 6-second ads designed to drive reach. These ads should always carry one single focused message. They are charged by CPM and you can measure ad recall lift, awareness lift, impressions and unique reach.
- Reservation 15/20s:
These ads are non-skippable ads with a duration of 15 or 20 seconds. Unlike our previous two formats these are charged at a fixed CPM, meaning a high number of impressions are guaranteed but the cost will definitely be higher since you’re not bidding for better pricing. With this format you can measure ad recall lift, awareness lift and impressions.
- Outstream Video Ads:
Non-skippable ads that are recommended to remain under the duration of 15 seconds. These appear across mobile sites and apps allowing you to reach people wherever they’re watching, e.g. whilst they’re reading a news article. They’re charged at vCPM and you can set the maximum amount you’re willing to pay each time the ad is seen. Measure success by ad recall lift, awareness lift, impressions and unique reach.
- Masthead:
Non-skippable ads with no duration restrictions designed for high visibility since it places you on the top spot on the homepage of YouTube. The bidding approach here varies in that it’s charged daily with a fixed CPD. Measure the success of your ad by impressions, unique reach and views.
Grow consideration & Interest
You want to influence your desired customer and their decision process in opinion-shaping moments since this is when they’re most willing to listen to your message and consider taking action.
- TrueView In-Stream:
A non-restrictive duration skippable ad that allows you to display your ad before, during or after a YouTube video. Alternatively, it can appear on Google’s video partner sites. With a CPV bidding approach, you only pay when your ads been seen or interacted with e.g. clicks on your CTA for subscriptions.
- TrueView Discovery Ads
Skippable and open duration format that is displayed in YouTube search results or on the homepage. With this format, you only pay when someone actually clicks on the ads thumbnail or the title of the video and begin watching it.
Drive Action
Your goal is to drive action from your customers in decision-making moments. You have a strong CTA and want to drive leads or conversions.
- TrueView for Action
Open duration and skippable ad with a target CPA or Maximize Conversions bidding approach. This format aims to get you as many acquisitions/conversions as possible. It’s of utmost importance that these ads have a clickable, actionable and strong CTA like ‘buy now’ or ‘sign up’. To run this ad format you need to have conversion tracking enabled so you can measure your success.
- Universal App Campaign for Video
A skippable and open-ended duration format that helps you automatically push your app on the YouTube platform by appearing wherever it’s most likely to get you that install. In this case the bidding approach selection ranges from CPA to CPI to ROAS. You can measure the installs you’ve received and any in-app actions you’ve set after that.
Deciding your goal should be your primary concern when running a digital video marketing campaign. A trusted advertiser will help you determine which format is most suitable to gear you up for success.
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