In 2015 it finally happened, Google was knocked off the throne of being the most visited website on the internet. In its place stood the humble video sharing website YouTube, however the new king of the internet is not just a place for low quality home videos anymore. It’s now a marketing and advertising goldmine and I’m not talking about those five second ads we love to skip. The better companies are subtler than that, just look at will it blend, a simple concept of pureeing phones and other hard things has led to over 200 million views and an amazing advertising platform for Blend Tec blenders. Your company, whatever the scale, also has a lot to gain from utilising this website and I’ll explain why.

What makes it so great?

Taking statistics from Fortunelords (2017), I have compiled three of the main reasons as to why there is such great potential.

1) Everyone is watching

1 billion people globally watch YouTube Videos every month, it is now the second most used search engine on the internet and unlike Bing and other competitors it searches exclusively videos. Moreover, in an average month, 8 out of 10 18-49-year-olds watch YouTube.

2) Geographical Scope

YouTube is available worldwide, and has become localised in more than 89 countries. The interface itself has also been translated into 76 languages meaning that it can be read in 95% of people’s native language.

3) Available on both desktops and mobiles

The use of apps and responsive web displays has led to an increase in the way that people. Mobile views now account for over half of the total views of videos, with average viewing duration on mobile exceeding 40 minutes.

Now that we can agree that the potential exists. Deciding how you want to use YouTube is essential, Miller (2011), has identified three marketing goals that YouTube can help you achieve.

How YOU can use YouTube

YouTube for Brand Awareness

YouTube has become a way for companies to create and showcase videos that they believe reflect them as a brand. These videos tend to be light hearted and multiple videos with similar characters can be put onto the channel, Berger and Milkman (2013) state that the use of happy and positive sentiments lead to a greater chance of a video being shared and in turn becoming viral.

An example of this can be seen with Old Spice, who have accumulated over 360 million views on their YouTube through their comedic advertisements which started in 2010.

YouTube for single Product Advertising

If you can do it correctly, YouTube is a great opportunity to advertise specific products that you want to feature. The sporting industry has been classically very effective with this, sporting giants Nike have on numerous occasions been successful in creating viral YouTube videos advertising a single new product.

An example of this when advertising their new “Mercurial Superfly V” football boot, the use of an exciting high paced, visually stunning one-and-a-half-minute advertisement managed to rack up over 7 million views.

However, if you aren’t a massive multinational with huge advertising budgets then you may have to be a bit more inventive with your advertising. Refer to the good people at will it blend if you need inspiration.

YouTube for Product Support

With any product, there are always going to be frequently asked questions and problems surrounding the use of it. One way of retaining a good brand image is to offer post sales product support. Rigopoulou (2008) show that the absence of this can affect both short and long customer satisfaction. However, this isn’t cheap if you need to sustain call centers or have experts at shops that can show customers how they to properly use your product.

One obvious example of this is Sky who due to the technical nature of their product, often face problems with customers struggling with their products.

The Downsides

You can’t make people watch your videos. if you don’t want to pay YouTube directly then there is little you can do to make people interested in your content. Moreover, regardless of how inventive your idea is, it’s hard to get noticed in a sea of other firms with the same bright idea.

Secondly, videos can also go viral for all the wrong reasons. Sony in 2014 made a video for their new Play Station Vita, that was exceptionally sexist. Unfortunately for you the video was subsequently taken down, however the Verge sum it up well enough here.

References

Berger, J. and Milkman, K.L. (2013) Emotion and virality: what makes online content go viral?. GfK Marketing Intelligence Review, 5(1), pp.18-23.

Fortunelords (2017) YouTube statistics. [online] < https://fortunelords.com/youtube-statistics/&gt; [accessed 28 February 2017]

Miller, M., (2011). YouTube for business: Online video marketing for any business. Pearson Education.

Rigopoulou, I.D (2008) After-sales service quality as an antecedent of customer satisfaction: The case of electronic appliances. Managing Service Quality: An International Journal, 18(5), pp.512-527.