The Beginners Guide to YouTube Advertisement for Small Businesses and Startups
Advertisement plays a significant role for every brand, be it small, medium, or large. But you need to choose the right advertising platform for marketing and promotion. YouTube is definitely one of those platforms that you can utilize to promote your brand and business further in front of a wider audience base.
It’s currently the second most popular website on the internet, and in a month, it draws over two billion users. Imagine drawing even a fraction of that traffic towards your small business website!
Sounds great?
But it’s not as easy as it sounds! As you might already know, most users usually skip the ads that you put; results could be a big zero from all your money, time, and efforts. But no need to give up so soon!
This blog post will tell you some unique methods you can use to get your marketing campaigns successfully afloat on YouTube for your small business.
So, let’s get started.
Before we move into the various small business YouTube advertising strategies you can use to place your ads on YouTube, you need to know about the different kinds of ads YouTube allows.
If you are still not aware of all of them, then here are they:
YouTube Ads Types
- YouTube Skippable In-Stream Ads
- YouTube Non-Skippable In-Stream Ads (Bumper Ads)
- YouTube Non-Video Ads (AKA, In-Display Ads)
- YouTube Video Discovery Ads (Overlay and Banner Ads)
Let’s take a look at all of them in detail.
YouTube Skippable In-Stream Ads
YouTube Skippable In-Stream Video Ads are something that almost all of us are familiar with. They play before or during the video, also known as the “pre-roll” and “mid-roll” slots. These are the ones that we skip the most, ring any bells?
As a matter of fact, one of their defining features is that you can skip them right after 5 seconds of their playing. Being an advertiser, you will only have to pay when any viewer continues to watch the video after the first five seconds. This is why it is often recommended that the ads must be at 12 seconds long and maximum of 3 minutes.
The payment will happen based on viewing the ad for 30 seconds or clicking on the ad in between. Whichever occurs, first will be counted.
Worth Knowing:
Sidebar: Have you often seen the pop-up named “Trueview” at the side of your YouTube screen? Well, fret not; this is just YouTube’s pet name for a particular payment type. With this mode, you will only have to pay for an ad impression when some users choose to view it.
YouTube Non-Skippable In-Stream Ads
Next up, we have YouTube Non-Skippable In-Stream Ads. This is the type where you don’t get the ad skip button at all. They can be played before or during your videos. Most of the time, social media companies advise small businesses and startups to go for this ad type.
But will this ad type really suit you? This will completely depend upon you and your goals for better brand awareness. You need to work hard on your creativity and be absolutely sure about compelling your audience to watch the whole advertisement. If you are confident about this, only then you should choose this type for your brand.
These ads have a few specifications based on various countries; like in India, Malaysia, Mexico, Singapore; these ads will only play up to 20 seconds.
The payments for this type of ad happen per 1000 views.
YouTube Non-Video Ads
YouTube Non-Video Ads are perfect for any business running short on marketing budget or has a limited budget for ad campaigning. If you don’t have the budget to ad with video features, then YouTube allows you to continue your campaigning through non-video ads.
There are two types of non-video ads:
- YouTube Display Ads: The YouTube Display Ads will be there at the right sidebar. It will also contain an image and text teamed up with a CTA option. This action often comes with a link to your website.
- YouTube In-Video Overlay Ads: These YouTube ads will appear on top of the video. Mostly they refer to other monetized YouTube channels.
If you can use both these types to benefit your business with the help of killer content, the results will surely turn out to be impressive.
Worth Knowing:
YouTube Bumper Ads: Bumper ads are nothing but 6 seconds long YouTube Non-Skippable In-Stream Ad. They are very much similar to the “true view” ads, and they are often used as pre-, mid-, or post-roll slots. With a bit of a strategy in place, you can use these small ads to increase your audience reach and brand awareness drastically.
YouTube Discovery Ads
Lastly, we have the YouTube discovery ads. They are very different from the general in-stream ads that you know. These ads work more towards the ads you often come across on Google’s Search Result Pages.
At the end of the day, you need to remember that YouTube is as much a search engine as it is a social media platform.
You will be able to see YouTube Discovery Ads right alongside the organic search results. This makes the entire thing much more open for your customers. They can now choose which one to go for based on the appeal. If your video looks more promising, your audience can decide to go for that rather than the organic SERP.
In most cases, the YouTube Discovery Ads will contain a three-liner text along with a catchy thumbnail. If someone clicks on the link, they will be either redirected to your video page or the channel itself.
Tips to Make Your Small Business YouTube Ads More Effective
- The first important thing to keep in mind is to be successful with your ad campaign on YouTube; you need to expand your reach as much as possible. Apart from the 2 billion daily logged-in users, YouTube has a staggering base of unregistered users who are responsible for the enormous 5 billion daily video views. So, the possibilities can be endless with each video published every day. So, the bigger you cast the net, the greater will be the possibilities to find the big fishes, i.e., customers who might be interested in what you are offering.
- If you are doing shopping ads, your hands will be more or less tied to the strict guidelines that YouTube has implemented. But if not, then you will have the freedom to actually customize your ads as per your preference and make them much more appealing to your audience. Regardless of your brand or business size, if you can think dynamically and come up with exciting ideas, then your products are bound to sell. This is why YouTube is truly the best platform for any business to expand their ideas flourish constantly.
- Being cost-effective is a virtue that every business should possess. Instead of spending a lot of money buying fancy equipment and hiring professionals to shoot your ad, you can simply follow YouTube’s guidelines to shoot and edit your video ads. Always remember that it’s not the ad but the unique idea used in the ad that sells the products.
- Measuring your ad campaigns is necessary if you wish to move forward with your brand. When you don’t know whether your campaign truly works or not, how can you continue investing in the campaign? This is why you need to look at the analytics tab under your YouTube account and check the reports every week. You will have all the information you need to understand your audience’s taste and likings. Here, you will get to know how many people have clicked on your ads, how long have they watched the ad before they clicked on the skip button, which are the ads that received the best views all around, at what point most of the clients are clicking on the link or leaving the ad, etc. All this info will help you create better ideas and more compelling ads based on the nature of your business and the requirement of the market.
Final Words on Small Business YouTube Advertising
While anyone can create an ad on YouTube, knowing which type will suit your brand or product the most and acting accordingly will make all the difference from the rest.
I believe with the above discussion; you now have a clear idea about all the different types of ads that you can use and the campaign tips that you can team up with them. Accordingly, you will have to fix the budget. as a reputed social media marketing agency we think if you are just a startup, then taking too much of a risk at the very beginning is always ill-advised.
So, what is your most preferred small business YouTube advertising strategy to win over your audience and customers on YouTube? Have you used any of the techniques mentioned above? If yes, let us know about your experience in the comment section below, and it will help thousands of readers and small business owners out there.
Till then, happy YouTube advertising.
