Recently, a client came to our team looking to grow their organic brand presence on YouTube. They wondered whether there was an ad format that might lead to an increased subscriber count or generate views across videos on their channel. While most YouTube ad formats lead users directly to a client’s website, In-Feed Video Ads for Consideration actually direct users back to an advertiser’s YouTube channel, keeping them on-platform and engaged with additional branded content.
Background
This ad format allows advertisers to engage a qualified audience at key moments of discovery across various YouTube placements. Relevant users will see video ads in YouTube search, the Watch Feed (above related videos), and the YouTube home feed.
Google reports that on average, users will watch one additional video from your brand within 24 hours of watching an in-feed video (Source). The ad format is created to reach your audience and direct them to your channel for related videos.
For advertisers without a robust repository of 15- or 30-second ad-friendly video cuts, In-Feed ads are especially nice, as they have no video length requirements and no best practice budget minimums. So this ad format is an easy way to test into YouTube without having to ask for additional budget or content.
Video Formatting
While most video ads have length requirements for the different ad types and placements, there is no limit to the length of your in-feed video ad. This type of ad is perfect for longer-form videos looking to garner additional views and reach a broader audience. All that’s needed for setup is a link to the YouTube video.
In-Feed Video Ad Bidding Strategy
In-feed video ads use cost-per-view bidding, meaning advertisers pay when a user clicks to watch the video, not simply when viewing the ad in their feed. This drives higher intent, more qualified viewers compared to pre-roll ads. With cost-per-view, impressions are free added value.
Additionally, this ad type supports smaller YouTube budgets that may not meet the heavy recommended investment for other video campaigns or ad types. Advertisers can also set an average cost-per-view bid during campaign setup and adjust as needed to increase visibility, similar to setting a max CPC bid limit for a text campaign.
Case Study
International Toy Company Looking To Grow YouTube Channel in The American Market
Goal:
- Drive brand awareness of special holiday products with longform video content
- Increase engagement with the client’s YouTube channel by increasing subscribers and driving video content views and likes
- Leverage a predetermined budget allocation
Approach:
- Use In-Feed Video for Consideration to drive engagement with holiday-themed storytelling content and appeal to parents looking for children’s gifts that are fun, educational, and of premium quality
- Determine a conservative cost-per-view bid using industry benchmarks for the initial campaign launch, and then increase bids to improve visibility or decrease bids to improve efficiency with CPVs
Results:
Not only did these ads increase views on the client’s 25-minute videos, but we were able to grow their YouTube channel with the bonus of adding new subscribers, likes, and additional channel video views while maximizing a budget that may have been too small for other ad types. In future campaigns, we may recommend shorter videos, as we found users did not watch the entire video, but we were still able to drive an increase in engagement on their YouTube channel.
Conclusions:
While In-feed video ads won’t likely drive conversions or reach the largest-possible audience, these video ads prove to be a great option for advertisers looking to dip their toes into YouTube, but who can’t meet the recommended budget of $500/day (or more) on YouTube alone. As a bonus, you don’t need to spend time editing existing video content to be bumper- or 15-second skip/non-skip length, which can often impose a barrier to entry for new YouTube advertisers. If in-feed video ads sound like a great next step for your business, then let’s connect to get started!