How the YPP Guidelines Affect the Quality of YouTube Ads

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Is YouTube advertising part of your online marketing strategy? Maybe you haven't used YouTube yet. Perhaps you have been running YouTube Ads for years and are noticing a decline in performance. Indeed, the framework conditions have changed significantly in recent years, making it more challenging to find relevant channels and videos where you can place your ads.

Why is this the case? Our YouTube Warriors have investigated this question. Of course, we not only present problems but also bring solutions on how you can still use YouTube effectively in 2021.

How does advertising on YouTube work?

If you are not yet familiar with YouTube Ads, here is a quick overview: On YouTube, the largest video platform owned by Google since 2006, companies and individuals can create their own channels and upload videos. These videos can be set to “public,” “unlisted,” or “private” to control who can view them. Public videos can be monetized, meaning they are available for advertising.

This allows advertisers to run ad videos on these videos. There are different ad formats and placements, such as non-skippable ads at the beginning of a video. Billing is based on format, either by views, impressions, or clicks.

How have the guidelines for the YouTube Partner Program developed?

In 2012, the YouTube Partner Program was opened up to everyone. This allowed all channel owners to make their videos available for advertising. The result: a wide variety of small and large channels were available to advertisers. At the same time, the channels competed with each other for ad space.

In April 2017, YouTube tightened the guidelines for participation in the Partner Program: the requirement was 10,000 views on the channel. Another tightening occurred in January 2018, which YouTube justified by raising standards to improve the quality of channels and videos for ad space. Specifically, this means that since then, 4,000 hours of public viewing time within the last 12 months and 1,000 subscribers have been required.

With this revision of the guidelines, large channels benefited, and many small channels no longer met the requirements of the Partner Program. Since large channels typically target a B2C audience, monetizable channels in the B2B sector are becoming scarce, as they often can no longer participate in the Partner Program due to their size.

What do the current YouTube guidelines mean for advertisers?

The variety of channels and videos in the YouTube Partner Program brings several advantages for advertisers: for example, individual videos or channels can be precisely selected as placements, allowing for highly accurate control over the environment in which the video ad appears, creating greater relevance.

Especially for niche topics, smaller channels and videos with fewer views but a better-matched target audience are very valuable. Particularly in B2B areas, where relevance and quality are much more important than mass distribution, this precise selection of placements is lost with the current guidelines of the Partner Program.

While videos can still be researched in the Display Planner, channels and videos that were once perfectly matched are often no longer available because they no longer meet the requirements and are not monetizable. This means that it has become much more difficult to find accurate placements for niche topics.

In 2021, the conditions are changing again with an adjustment of the guidelines. Those who operate a YouTube channel but do not meet the requirements of the Partner Program can no longer choose to keep their videos ad-free (i.e., not monetized). YouTube itself reserves the right to decide whether ads are displayed on these channels and videos. If ads are displayed, the revenue remains 100% with Google, and channel owners do not even receive information on where, when, and how often ads were shown in their videos.

What this means for advertisers and to what extent small channels can again be used for advertising is unclear. The old diversity of long-tail placements has not yet returned. We will continue to monitor the topic and share our insights with you as always.

Are YouTube Ads a suitable channel for your business?

Are you unsure whether YouTube is suitable for your business and industry? A simple search gives you an initial impression of whether relevant placements are available and to what extent your target audience is present on YouTube and which content and topics are particularly popular.

Search for the most important relevant terms on YouTube: Are there videos on your topic? Also, consider extended topics and terms that may interest your target audience (products, services, and questions you may not offer or answer yourself but are closely related to your topic because they describe a similar problem, for example). How many views and clicks do the videos have? How many subscriptions do the channels have? Are there interactions with the videos? Are the videos monetized?

The answers to these questions and the results of your research give you an initial impression of whether YouTube Ads could be worthwhile or how important YouTube is as a platform for your industry. It is also advisable to consult external expertise—look for a YouTube expert who has experience with the platform.

7 Tips for improving your YouTube ad performance

Do you want to improve the performance of your YouTube Ads? Here are 7 tips from our Performance Marketing Warriors, who have extensive experience with YouTube advertising.

1. Define your audience

Our first tip may seem trivial, but knowledge of your audience is essential in all online marketing measures and thus also forms the basis for performing YouTube Ads. Who do you want to reach with your channel and content? What goal are you pursuing with your channel, videos, and ads, and for whom are they relevant?
If you already have a YouTube channel, you can learn more about your audience in YouTube Analytics. Also, consider which phase of the Customer Journey your audience is currently in: which topics and terms are relevant in this phase? Which related topics interest your audience?

2. Put yourself in the audience's shoes (User Intent)

What is your audience looking for, what do they want to know, see, and do? The User Intent is also of great importance in all online marketing channels. Keep in mind to provide added value and not just purely promotional content. Your video content must be relevant to your audience—this is especially true for videos that you want to use to build organic reach.

But also when creating video ad materials, make sure to engage your audience and convince them to watch more of your channel's content or visit your website. Advertising can and should also be entertaining or helpful.

3. Placements and Targeting

A helpful tool for researching suitable targeting options is the Google Display Planner, which allows you to identify thematically suitable placements (YouTube videos or channels) where you can run your video ads.

Alternatively, you can add placements directly when creating the campaign and use the search function. Especially in the B2B sector, the thematic focus of your YouTube advertising is important for reaching your target audience and generating relevant traffic.

Take advantage of video remarketing campaigns and specifically target users who have watched a video from your channel or visited your website. If you have multiple videos available, set your campaign so that users do not see the same video every time but get a variety of videos displayed, reducing the risk of your advertising being perceived as too intrusive.

4. Use Frequency Cap

“Blocking YouTube ads” is searched over 4,000 times a month, and over 300 times “YouTube ads annoy.” This user intent (seeking a solution to the problem of unwanted YouTube ads) suggests that YouTube Ads should be placed with sensitivity. Especially on a platform where it's rarely about purchase intent but primarily entertainment and information, commercial content is a sensitive topic.

The “Frequency Cap” allows you to limit how often users see your ad videos, reducing the chance of them becoming annoyed and forming a negative impression of you or your brand (and giving your ad a “thumbs down” or skipping it).

How much is too much also depends on the audience and the advertising or ad format; for example, B2B ads have proven successful about two to three times a week. Remember: less is more!

5. Use Exclusion Criteria

Even if you have done extensive research beforehand, you should use exclusion criteria. This prevents your advertising from appearing on videos that don't fit you and your target audience because, for example, they don't offer the desired content quality.

At a campaign level, you can set your criteria under “Inventory types” or “excluding types/labels,” such as videos with or without age restrictions. You can also exclude specific channels and videos.

Working with a good YouTube agency, they will already have extensive lists of bad placements, which are continuously updated.

6. Optimize your own channel

To use YouTube effectively, you should integrate your channel into your strategy. Although you also have the option to advertise a product or service directly with YouTube Ads and direct users to your website or online shop, your channel is a crucial complement.

YouTube, as the second largest search engine, brings great potential for many different industries and topics. With an optimized channel, you create organic reach and become more visible as a brand. You can also use YouTube ads to advertise your channel and videos and increase your channel's number of subscriptions.

7. Complement YouTube Ads through collaborations

If there are no or too few suitable channels and videos for relevant placements, remember that there are other ways to gain traffic and leads through YouTube. Besides your own channel, you can use collaborations to increase your reach.

After the update of the YPP guidelines, smaller topic-specific channels can hardly monetize their videos through the Partner Program. As an alternative, you can enter into direct collaborations. This could mean, for example, that your service, product, or event is mentioned in videos.

Looking for expert support for your YouTube campaigns?

Do you want to generate more traffic via YouTube? As a full-service online marketing agency, we focus on performance marketing. Since we also manage other channels, we have an eye on your business and content marketing strategy and how the YouTube channel fits into it. Our YouTube Warriors have extensive experience, particularly in the B2B segment. Because we create and optimize YouTube channels and run YouTube advertising, we bring both perspectives, and can advise you on generating both organic and paid traffic via YouTube. We also offer a Masterclass on YouTube Channel Optimization.

Contact us here!

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