Faithful BizBlog readers, it’s been a little over a year since we launched this blog to focus on what matters most to advertisers and partners on YouTube. Thanks so much for your readership!
In an effort to make sure you get all YouTube info in one place moving forward, we’ll be consolidating the BizBlog back into the main YouTube blog starting Tuesday. We’ll be posting business-related updates with the tag “BizBlog,” so here’s how you keep up with us:
1) Subscribe to the YouTube blog and sort by the “BizBlog” label 2) Follow us on Twitter or friend us on Facebook 3) Are you a small business? The Google Small Business Blog brings together all the info you’ll need to know about Google’s products and features. 4) Let us know what you want to read going forward by filling out the survey below
See you on the main blog, and thanks again for visiting the BizBlog!
Lionsgate has been placing its footage on YouTube for awhile now, in the form of promotional trailers and clips, television showsand full length films. So why this inspired creative approach to ‘The Expendables’ trailer where Stallone interacts with the ‘mercenaries’ in other videos?
“We’ve promoted ‘trailer overlay experiences’ for past films like ‘Daybreakers’ and ‘My Bloody Valentine 3D’ to great results”, said Lionsgate’s VP of New Media for Theatrical Marketing, Danielle DePalma, “This time we took the idea for ‘The Expendables’ to the next level by including a human element that surprises the user and turns something as simple as an interview into a bad-ass experience that matches the film’s fun and intensity.”
A bad ass YouTube experience? Precisely. It’s not about just getting your content uploaded anymore. There have to be drivers to your videos. For Lionsgate, that’s been the Youtube Homepage, the brand channel, Promoted Videos, and offline activities. DePalma went on to say, “Any offline event as powerful as Comic Con translates into buzz online, which is critical to marketing success. In the case of ‘The Expendables’, the energy and excitement from the overflowing crowd in Hall H and the thousands of fans proudly displaying their Expendables tattoos and pumped up by the cast signing and materials turned into extraordinary word-of-mouth via Twitter, Facebook, and blogs.”
Granted, not every business can attend trade shows or leverage large budgets for custom gadgets and Stallone-caliber endorsements. Lionsgate had the assistance of The Visionaire Group to pull together their YouTube customization. Nevertheless, if you're Sly-less and without a digital creative agency, there's still something to learn from 'The Expendables'. Have a diverse range of drivers to your video online and off, bring the element of surprise to your ads in ways that delight your audience, and hey - don't forget to SHARE.
Posted by Kate Rose, YouTube Communications recently watched Rocky Remix
In an age where hardcover books are feeling threatened by the web, publishing houses are learning new tricks. Increasingly, Random House and other large publishers have given book deals to web memes from ‘LOLcats’ to ‘Shit My Dad Says’, and have turned back to the web in order to market them.
Random House, in particular, expertly leveraged the power of YouTube with their blog-turned-book, Awkward Family Photos. During pre-sale weeks, authors Mike Bender and Doug Chernack posted videos of Mike’s grandparents reviewing the book on YouTube and used an InVideo campaign to help them go viral.
Soon after, their blog spawned a community of people commiserating and celebrating their awkward family moments. Best of all, the videos landed the book on the NY Times’ bestseller list, right behind ‘The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo’.
Co-author Doug Chernack says, “We were screenwriters at the time, and we’d never done a book before. There was no easier way to get something going than YouTube. Since we posted, thousands of people reached out, saying how much they loved the videos and wanting to know when the next would be posted.”
From a marketing perspective, using YouTube’s InVideo Ads was the right choice for Random House in generating buzz for this new book. Their Marketing Manager, Jay Sones, said, “We thought the YouTube ads were a great way to connect the video audience to a print product that they would really enjoy and, based on our ad metrics and book sales, we were right.” Overall, the clickthrough rate on the videos was 0.51%, up 10x that of other creatives. The average cost-per-click was $1.70, and the views and customer engagement were sky high (128,000 views at the time of this posting). Because of its cost-effectiveness, Random House will explore video and other online marketing tactics for their emerging eBook and digital business.
Sones also identified a critical part of the success of this book, “The authors are incredibly talented internet marketers. They’ve got a pitch perfect ear for what’s going to go big on the net. They’ve also got a sharp awareness of their brand and their viewers.” Ask co-author Mike Bender whether it was his talent for web marketing, and he’ll deny it. But he will talk about the authenticity his grandparents brought to their role as spokespeople. “They are who they are, it’s very real, and that’s why people have responded.”
There’s a lesson here for companies looking to launch a new product. Mike Bender said it best; “You have the opportunity to do something really creative to get the word out. Folks can smell when someone’s just trying to sell them something. Make them laugh and you’re 95% there.”
Last year, Kia Motors launched the 2010 Soul through a series of clever creatives featuring ‘soulful’ hamsters. You know the ones. Day breaks on a morning commute and hamsters clog the freeway, all spinning on exercise wheels. Meanwhile, three ‘enlightened’ hamsters roll up in their Kia Soul, blasting hip-hop and wasting the hamster wheels off the line.
In tests of that creative, Kia found that it resonated more with their 18-34 year old target demographic than any creative they’d ever run before. So they made the unusual choice to re-vive the ‘Soul Hamsters’ through a second big media push which includes a large YouTube component, including Wednesday's masthead. We wanted to know why Kia’s ‘spokeshamsters’ worked so well, and what their plans were for viewers. Here’s what Kia had to say about the campaign:
1) Kia was very successful with its launch of the 2010 Soul last year through the clever 'Soul Hamster' spots. It's unusual for a car company to do another big media push in the second year of a launch. What were the results of that original campaign, and what prompted Kia to revive 'Soul Hamsters' on YouTube?
“This or That” is the rebirth of the initial Kia Soul award winning advertising campaign and brings back the loveable Hamsters due to popular demand. Soul is a unique and highly personalizable urban passenger vehicle and the new spot builds on that creative theme. The new “This or That” campaign is now on cable, in theaters and online and visits to Kia.com are up more than 2.5MM visitors since launch. Further illustrating the campaign and vehicle’s popularity, Soul videos on YouTube have more than 2.6MM views. Soul fans on Facebook doubled to more than 29,000 in the first two days after its release and today there are more than 80,000 fans.
2) You're sponsoring the YouTube masthead today, and it features a contest called "Who's Next?", searching for the next YouTube star. To do this, you've partnered with current YouTube stars, Smosh, ShayCarl, and LisaNova. What do you hope these partners will add to the campaign?
We are constantly working to engage our fans. The Kia Soul has attracted a new audience to the Kia brand and engaging these fans through the “Who’s Next?” contest gives them the opportunity to have fun with the Soul’s playful personality. These celebrity judges provide us with the best of both worlds in that they have huge established communities that largely consist of the Soul target customer. Furthermore, their hard work and success lend an edge of credibility as well.
3) The masthead is just the beginning of your media push around the Kia Soul. What else are you doing on YouTube and online to drive contest entries and brand engagement? Social media is an important part of the marketing strategy for the Kia brand and Soul and engaging passionate enthusiasts in this space creates additional opportunities to build buzz through a new, interactive experience. Our social activations include blogger outreach with partner Fanscape, communications by the judges themselves to their subscriber base, and outreach to Kia’s own established social community. In addition, there also is video distribution and an e-mail blast with Tube Mogul.
4) If you can forgive the alliteration, what is it about rapping rodents that resonated so well with your demographic? In other words - what worked about this particular creative? Why not push features instead of spokeshamsters?
In place of a traditional and formulaic car ad, the cool hamsters in the Soul commercial continue to entertain in cinemas, on television and online in a big way. Understanding that the Soul’s primarily Gen Y audience plays a great deal in the digital space, and that they viewed the first hamster commercial multiple times, the newest hamster experience is rich with details in the hamster world as well as through music and additional integrated Soul content for audiences to discover with repeat viewings. Youthful consumers want to feel unique within their group in an effortless way, not an obvious one. While they have their own bold and distinct style, they don’t want to look like they are “trying too hard”, so the Hamsters personified all of the Soul’s unique features.
Additionally, music and in-car entertainment is an increasingly important factor for today’s car buyers so building off of several catchy music groups from the first Soul commercial, “This or That” features the popular ‘90s hip-hop group, Black Sheep, which further resonates with the youthful demographic.
5) The 'Soul Hamster' spots originally ran in theaters and on TV last year, and then seamlessly transitioned to the internet. With other Kia advertising, do you need to tailor your ads directly to an online audience, or can you just cut down a longer television commercial?
Several Kia commercials start in theaters because they have an entertainment value and theaters provide a wide reach. Each vehicle has a different demographic and we tailor our advertising efforts to individual audiences to keep our efforts fresh and appealing. Sometimes a cutdown of the TV ad works. Sometimes when we shoot the TV ad, we shoot extra or side footage to create an Internet-optimized version. And sometimes we shoot strictly for Internet, like we did for the Moochie webisodes (www.moochiemania.com). It all depends on the strategy. Kate Rose, YouTube Communications recently watched A Hamsterdance Tribute Video
Mozilla's founding Chair, Mitchell Kapor, was once noted to say, "Getting information off the Internet is like taking a drink from a fire hydrant". It can be an overwhelming experience, particularly when you're looking for information to help your business succeed.
Today, we hope to turn that gush of information into something a little more palatable. We are proud to launch think with Google - our new YouTube platform for sharing business insights and industry viewpoints delivered in bite-sized, inspiring and actionable talks.
The channel has many leading thinkers offering their insights on trends, creativity, marketing, business strategy, consumer insights and more; helping you navigate in the dynamic business landscape. Contributors already include Zappos’ CEO Tony Hsieh, Amazon’s Managing Director Brian McBride, innovative author and speaker Don Tapscott and London Mayor Boris Johnsson.
The hope is that this will become a thriving business community in the spirit of YouTube – so head to the channel, listen to the thinkers and feel free to make your voice heard.
A few weeks ago, a bunch of us from YouTube attended VidCon, an online video conference produced by and for the YouTube community. During the three-day event there were plenty of screaming fans, music performances, and Justin Bieber-inspired hair cuts. To quote YouTube partner extraordinaire, ShayCarl, "If you have an internet connection and you were NOT at VidCon then you are obviously still using 56K. NOOB!!"
You don't have to have attended VidCon to learn from the event, though. Conference organizers, Hank and John Green, aka the vlogbrothers, made sure there was ample opportunity for YouTube's top partners to teach the next generation how to be successful on YouTube. We took good notes and, as it turns out, many of these tips could help advertisers be successful on YouTube, as well.
1) You can't make it on YouTube alone.
Make friends and build relationships with producers who have audiences, then leverage their audiences through cross promotion, shout-outs and annotation referrals. Many popular YouTube producers are also willing to create branded entertainment videos or provide product placement opportunities.* Some partners, like whatthebuckshow, have been very successful with these opportunities, building trust with viewers at the same time by calling out the product placement in videos when they occur.
*Keep in mind that certain FTC Guidelines may require disclosure of endorsement relationships between advertisers and partners, so you may want to check with your legal counsel.
2) Keep to a schedule and theme when publishing content.
Expectations are important. People want to know what type of videos they will be watching week after week on a particular channel. They like a recognizable topic and show format for the videos. That doesn't mean that producers can't mix it up, but consistency definitely counts. The top partners, like sxephil, also highlight when they publish new episodes in the header banner of their channel so fans know when to return for fresh content.
3) Think about the next action and viewer engagement.
YouTube is an interactive medium. What do you want someone to do after watching your video? Ask them to rate, comment, or share your video. Ask them for their opinions. You can even ask them to click on a link and purchase your product. Top partners often respond to previous comments in new videos. This also provides a great opportunity to get to know your fans and build deeper relationships.
4) Cross-platform promotion and the first 24 hours are huge.
As soon as partners upload a new video, they notify their fans via Twitter, Facebook, etc. (Their YouTube subscribers are automatically notified when they return to the site and log in.) They also email influential blog editors and traditional media outlets that are relevant to the topic or that have featured them in the past. Leverage every distribution channel you can to promote your new video. There are a lot of ways people discover videos, so leveraging as many outlets as possible increases the chances of discovery. (Be careful not to spam though!) Advertisers shouldn't forget about using paid media to launch new videos either. Both Promoted Videos and traditional display advertising can provide lots of additional views.
5) Watch comments, but not too closely. Obsess on Insights.
Comments can provide valuable feedback and additional information about your videos and your audience. Viewers will tell you what they like and don't like about your videos. But you need to have a bit of a thick skin since there will always be haters and trolls; don't take them too seriously. Good content will always get plenty of positive comments, as well. Focus on watching Insights to determine where and how people are finding your videos and if any external sources are directing a lot of traffic. If you do discover that a particular blog is sending you a lot of referrals, reach out and say thanks. Then add them to your notification list for the next time your publish a video. Hot spots will also tell you when people start to lose interest in your video. Posted by Rick Silvestrini, Product Marketing Manager (and nerdfighter), just watched 'Top 10 Moments from VidCon'
After the huge success of last year’s webinar series, which we co-hosted with Effie Worldwide, we are proud to announce that we shall be reprising the series again this year. Today we invite to you register for the first installment in this free series, which will take place on July 20, 2010 at 2 pm EDT. All the webinars and tons of great case studies are always available for you on theEffie Worldwide YouTube Channel.
If you join the webinar, you will hear directly from the esteemed agencies and marketers responsible for three off the best Effie Award-winning video and social media campaigns:
Thanks for your submissions last month! Here's the next batch of requests for love on Twitter or Spotlight Videos (if you don't see this module on your homepage, add it here). Spotlights run a few times per week and showcase interesting and timely videos from our community and partners, all organized around an event or theme. Tag any appropriate and relevant video with the tags below to be considered for these spotlights, and please do so well before the date listed below. Please also note that themes and dates are subject to change and spotlights may be added or dropped without notice.
7/4 - Independence Day: BBQ, fireworks, sun, sand and sea...the possibilities for video are endless, so show us what you've got! (tag: yt4th)
7/9 - Vidcon: Going to this user gathering/conference in L.A. next weekend? We want to see your video'd reports, encounters and other fun stuff. (tag: ytvidcon)
7/22 - ComicCon: We're looking to feature the latest from this year's comics/pop culture expo (tag: ytcomiccon)
Mia Quagliarello, Product Marketing Manager, Community, recently watched "Go South Africa!"
Captioning is becoming increasingly important to YouTube and videos all across the web. Captions ensure that many more people can understand what's happening in your video, from deaf and hard of hearing viewers to people who speak a different language from you and choose to auto-translate the captions into their language. Captions also make your video a lot more discoverable. People searching for content on YouTube might encounter your video if your captions contain the words or subjects they're looking for.
You may be able to manage creating captions for your videos on your own, but sometimes you have too many videos or your video has elements that need special care. Today, thanks to support from the Described and Captioned Media Program (DCMP.org), we're pleased to roll out a new "YouTube Ready" designation for professional caption vendors in the United States. The YouTube Ready logo identifies qualified vendors who can help you caption your YouTube videos. If you're interested in having your videos captioned, here's DCMP's current list of YouTube Ready vendors who may be able to help. Please keep in mind that participating vendors:
Have passed a caption quality evaluation administered by the DCMP
Have a website and a YouTube channel where you can learn more about their services (see playlist below)
Have agreed to post rates for the range of services that they offer for YouTube content. Typical rates range from $2/minute for a transcript to $10/minute for full professional captions.
The first launch of the program includes 12 qualified vendors, with more to come. We're happy to have them on board, and hope they'll help to provide even more options for captioning your videos. If you're interested in finding a YouTube Ready caption vendor, check out our Help Center or visit DCMP's page.
Last month we announced the launch of YouTube Partner Communication Hub, which is the go-to spot for news on the latest features, product updates and other partner-related information. Today we are excited to let you know we have revamped the “Optimization Resources” section of the site and have added a few new documents that will help you make the most of your presence on YouTube. Specifically, we have added resources which show you how to improve content discoverability, increase revenue potential and take full advantage of our Insight tool.
Going forward, we will regularly update the “Optimization Resources” section of the site with new tips and fresh insight -- so check back weekly. You can also opt to receive automatic updates via RSS by subscribing to the feed.
Google's Search Stories campaign had modest beginnings, but the world fell in (Parisian) love with it when one of the spots became Google's first-ever TV advertisement, airing during this year's Super Bowl. Since then, the campaign has been adopted by 150,000+ users who've made their own versions of the ad, and it's become a great example of how a brand can involve its audience in an ad campaign. The effort continues to evolve with the first co-branded Search Story spot, released last week to coincide with this week's opening of Toy Story 3. The video features a few characters you may well know and love (Buzz, Woody and the gang) sharing their own search story. Google's Robert Wong, Creative Director, tells us how the project came to be...
1. What was the genesis of the Search Stories campaign?
Search has become so commonplace in our lives and when you take a step back you can see that your searches are actually marking time. In kind of the same way that pictures or songs might, they tell the story of your life. We thought this was a pretty cool notion. Then, from there, it was a natural evolution to stringing some searches together to make a story. Because at the end of the day, the best search results don't just show up on a web page, they show up in someone's life.
2. Why Disney/Pixar’s Toy Story?
We got lucky. After doing a few of these we began to ask what would happen if we got people who are great storytellers to help. I had a friend at Pixar so we figured why not start at the top of the heap. Amazingly, they were into the idea.
3. Was it easy to meld creative/narrative visions?
They really could not have been nicer or more collaborative. Initially, we went out there to introduce ourselves and talk generally about working together. We also got to meet with some of the creatives behind Toy Story 3, who took us through the new movie. After that, we went back and came up with bunch of ideas to pitch to them. It was a lot fun getting to play around with those amazing characters they’ve created, but having just caught a glimpse of Toy Story 3 and it being such a major focus of theirs, it was a natural direction to go in. From there, it was a lot of good back and forth. We hit on a story we all liked pretty quickly and they gave us a lot of guidance with getting the characters right.
4. Tell us something about the video that no one would know just by looking at it.
I know some people have been surprised to hear that, aside from having the actor for the character Andy, John Morris, record “Hmmm,” we didn’t record anyone. It was all pick up dialogue from Toy Story, Toy Story 2 and Toy Story 3.
5. What’s your favorite moment from the video?
Hamm always cracks me up, but I love the Woody and Buzz moment. Woody’s laugh is so great, as is Buzz’s reaction to it.
After a successful Partner Meet-up in Chicago, we continued our YouTube Partner Meet-up roadshow with a stop in the Big Apple the first week of June. All NYC-based YouTube partners were invited, and over 150 were able to attend the event at the Google New York office. In addition to YouTube best practice presentations, networking time, and Q&A with our team, we were lucky enough to hear the inspiring stories of how some of our most subscribed partners found success on YouTube. The panel included:
From left to right: Michael Buckley, William Hyde, Ben Relles, and Kevin Nalty
Our panel shared many key insights with all of us; here are a few to share:
Keep at it! The YouTube platform is constantly changing. Regardless of the fluctuations you see in your subscribers or view counts, keep with it. Your hard work will pay off.
Talk to your audience, literally. Appreciate those who subscribe to you, interact with the YouTube community, and be sure to thank all of your loyal followers.
Be original, creative, and do what interests you. YouTube is a great platform for creativity. Continue to create the highest quality original content, and all else will follow.
Next Partner Meet-up Stop: Los Angeles
We’re excited about the upcoming Partner Meet-up in Los Angeles on Thursday, July 8. It’s being held on the front end of the VidCon online video conference, which is another great opportunity to learn more about the online video space and meet others in the industry. If you’re a YouTube partner traveling to Los Angeles for VidCon and interested in attending the YouTube Partner Meet-up, please complete this form to receive an invitation. We look forward to another great Partner Meet-up in Los Angeles!
The 14th Annual Webby Awards were held last night in New York City at Cipriani Wall Street, attracting the best and the brightest of the Internet. Viewers across the globe can get a taste of the evening’s festivities, including highlights, behind-the-scene footage, and 5-word winner speeches, on the Webby Awards YouTube Channel at youtube.com/webby.
To bring a unifying design to the stage and to the site, Tribal DDB New York, a digital marketing agency, created the overall look for the award show. They enlisted Shepherd Fairey’s Studio Number One and The Wade Brothers for creative graphic elements and an original film opener for the 14th Annual Webby Awards.
Now in its second year, the Webby Awards YouTube brand channel experience began with public voting for The Webby People’s Voice Awards. This year all the nominees for Online Film & Video were hosted on the Webby channel (they are still there for viewing now) and for the first time ever, viewers could vote for their favorites -- not just give a star rating -- right on the brand channel itself.
Footage from last night’s event also includes red carpet interviews with celebrities including Vint Cerf, host B.J. Novak’s opening monologue, all winners’ acceptance speeches, and much more including user-generated content from winners in attendance shot live at the event. Check out these clips and more at the Webby Awards YouTube Channel at youtube.com/webby.
YouTube is increasingly becoming a key advertising platform for marketers of all kinds, from new display advertisers to some of the biggest brandsin the world. A common need for all advertisers is to measure the effectiveness of their campaigns beyond click-through rates or the basic number of impressions. This is especially true for video advertising, which can have a powerful, lasting brand effect beyond click-throughs or conversions.
Last year, Google AdWords launched Campaign Insights, a powerful tool that can give advertisers reliable data about how a campaign has raised brand awareness, or active user interest, in a particular product or service. Campaign Insights compares the impact of a campaign on a large groups of users who were exposed to a display ad campaign with the impact on a similar group who were not exposed to the campaign. Specifically, it then calculates the incremental lift in both online search activity and website visits -- a good indicator of advertising effectiveness. Our models are even sophisticated enough to identify the incremental lift that was specifically caused by the display campaign (as opposed to incidentally correlated.)
Today, we are now able to provide Campaign Insights results for some YouTube advertising campaigns that are reserved in advance (not bought in the AdWords auction). We can currently only measure the effects of relatively large campaigns, but we’re working hard to expand this opportunity to smaller campaigns as well.
Representative graph showing potential effect as measured by Campaign Insights:
Please contact your Google sales representative if you are interested in measuring the effectiveness of your YouTube campaign using Campaign Insights.
Peter Sherman, Product Marketing Manager, recently watched “The Cove”
A bunch of you tagged videos that came in very handy for our Mother's Day and Pac-Man's birthday spotlights last month, so thanks for reading and contributing!
Now we're thinking about Spotlight Videos (if you don't see this module on your homepage, add it here) for the month of June. Spotlights run a few times per week and showcase interesting and timely videos from our community and partners, all organized around an event or theme. Tag any appropriate and relevant video with the tags below to be considered for these spotlights, and please do so well before the date listed below. Please also note that themes and dates are subject to change and spotlights may be added or dropped without notice.
6/10 - World Cup: who's your team? what are your predictions? let's see what *you* can do with a soccer ball (tag: ytworldcup)
6/17 - E3: we're looking to feature the latest from this year's video game expo (tag: yte3)
6/20 - Father's Day: we've already got a curator for Father's Day set, but if you've got other dad-centric videos tag 'em for our Twitter stream (tag: ytdads)
If you look at studies about Millennials' penchant for service or society's growing fascination with all things green, it's not surprising that businesses are thinking more and more about how they can increase awareness for social causes as they increase their margins. Earlier this year, Pepsi decided to forego its million-dollar Super Bowl spot in favor of an enormous social media campaign focused on investing in communities and giving back.
Cause marketing isn't new to YouTube -- businesses such as Starbucks and Timberland have been churning out videos on behalf of causes for years, through contests, viral marketing spots and disaster relief pleas. But some are doing it better than others. Here's a look at five videos companies should watch before launching a corporate social responsibility campaign on YouTube:
1. Help the Honey Bees, Haagen-Dazs
This video had YouTube buzzing in 2008. Capitalizing on the popular B-boy/dance battle trend on YouTube, the video mixed impressive dance moves with a catchy beat and kept the audience's attention until the end--when it revealed that it was a video to raise awareness about Colony Collapse Disorder and the widespread disappearance of bees from our environment.
2. The Girl Effect, Nike Foundation
Nike is known for its creative advertising, so it's no surprise that the Nike Foundation's Girl Effect video found an immediate audience on YouTube. It is often said that the most successful corporate cause marketing initiatives help boost a company's bottom line as well as support an important cause. Nike captures women's attention and succeeds on both fronts with this catchy animated short.
3. One Day Without Shoes, TOMS Shoes
With its "One Day Without Shoes" video campaign, TOMS Shoes reinforced a valuable YouTube message: Empower others to become your video advocates. TOMS asked YouTube users to create their own original videos endorsing the campaign (and promoting the TOMS brand by default), and received numerous pieces, including this one from user Rashnu; one from the Jonas Brothers; and this vlog from one of YouTube's most popular users, Mitchell Davis.
4. The Cove PSA: My Friend Is..., Participant Productions
If you're a production company that has just released a documentary about an important cause, you're probably thinking about how to fill those theater seats. Participant Productions cleverly decided to use its connections to create this funny YouTube trailer starring such Hollywood heavyweights as Jennifer Aniston and Ben Stiller. The video seeks to help prevent the fishing of dolphins while getting people excited about the main documentary event.
5. How to Clean Ovens, Seventh Generation
Seventh Generation is a cleaning brand that has built its business on its environmental reputation. But you may not know that the company is also a huge supporter of WAGES, Women's Action to Gain Economic Security. This how-to video series from Seventh Generation stars members of the WAGES community and shows the company's willingness to put the people and ideas it supports front and center.
Today we’re excited to announce the launch of the YouTube Partner Communication Hub: the go-to spot for news on the latest features, updates, and events for partners globally. In addition to surfacing the latest and greatest in YouTube happenings, the Hub also provides an easy way to access our various Help resources.
Connect with other partners in our Partner Help Forum
Connect to our Partner Help Center
Review YouTube's current site issues
View the partner support team's most recent YouTube video
Receive site updates and announcements
Keep up-to-date with YouTube blogs
Get optimization tips
We encourage you to visit the Hub bi-weekly for updates. You can also receive automatic updates via RSS feed by subscribing to the feed below. You can add it using Google Reader:
As YouTube has evolved, marketers have changed the way they think about online advertising, especially around video and user engagement. Now more than ever, major brand advertisers are using YouTube as the hub for larger, integrated display campaigns that run across the web. Case in point: Coca-Cola -- the world’s #1 brand, according to Interbrand -- recently launched the “Longest Celebration,” a user video competition on YouTube, and the center of its online advertising campaign for the World Cup. Inspired by Cameroonian soccer star Roger Milla’s goal-celebration dance from the 1990 World Cup, Coca-Cola has invited users around the world to submit videos of their own dances to Coke’s brand channel, youtube.com/cocacola. As part of its campaign, Coca-Cola will run display ads across the Google Content Network, and point viewers to their YouTube channel in their television commercials.
In the latest interview in our Five Questions series, we spoke with Prinz Pinakatt, Interactive Digital Consumer Marketing Manager at Coca-Cola, about the World Cup, user uploads of famous Coke ads, and using YouTube to reach an international audience.
1. Why did Coca-Cola decide to make YouTube the center of its online advertising campaign for the World Cup? We were looking for a global platform that people use to upload, enjoy and most importantly share engaging and entertaining video content.
2. The "Longest Celebration" competition is all about engaging the YouTube community to create videos for Coca-Cola. How did you come up with the idea for this campaign, and what inspired you to make user-generated content its focal point? A spontaneous goal celebration is a very emotional and uplifting experience to have and to watch -- and it perfectly represents what Coca-Cola stands for. So, we translated the combination of goal celebrations and Coca-Cola in the context of this very special FIFA World Cup in Africa into an invitation to football fans all around to world to join one big celebration -- the "Longest Celebration.” And since the majority of the world is on YouTube it was the obvious choice.
3. Coca-Cola is a global brand, and the World Cup is a truly global event. Is there an international element to your campaign? How does Coca-Cola use YouTube to reach an international audience? We have made the channel available in more than a 100 countries using their local languages. That itself shows how global this campaign is. To reach the YouTube audience itself we developed targeted Promoted Video campaigns as well as very impactful banner ads.
4. Many advertisers and content owners block user uploaded versions of their videos, but Coke consistently leaves them up -- from recent commercials to classics like "Mean Joe Green." What value does Coca-Cola see in allowing user uploads of their content on YouTube? We believe that a user creating his personal version of one our ads shows the quality and the emotional engagement it created. In fact it's earned media as the user will distribute his personal creation.
5. Coca-Cola has been around for over 100 years. How has the company's approach to advertising changed over time, what’s been consistent, and how does YouTube fit into it today? The question we always ask ourselves is how do we make sure that we communicate with our target audience in a meaningful (addressing the Zeitgeist), engaging (providing relevant content and messages) and contemporary (using the best tools) way. Today part of the answer is clearly YouTube given the role it plays in people's lives.
Posted by Dick Soule, Team Manager, Global Accounts, YouTube
Video has always been a unique storytelling tool, especially useful when reporting the news. From raw, citizen-reported videos from the streets of Tehran, to student documentaries highlighting under-reported issues in local communities, or investigative reporting done by professional news outlets, just about every type of news video can now be found on YouTube. Video is also tightly integrated into the Google News experience, providing users different ways to consume and enjoy news, while giving news publishers the opportunity to reach a greater and more diverse audience.
We are working to make it easier to get your video content indexed in Google News, but ensuring it’s found in a timely fashion is another matter. So we thought we’d share six best practices for how news publishers can increase the discoverability of their news videos.
1. Timely uploads Videos should be uploaded as quickly as possible -- this will help them reach the news homepage faster and be grouped with the most recent articles.
2. One story per video Instead of having one video that contains multiple segments covering several different stories of the day, it's a better user experience (and easier for us to index), when there is one story per video, and the video title is specific (not something generic like “Breaking News”). At the very least, the description of the video should match the first story in the video.
3. Categorization If you are providing general news coverage, select YouTube category “News & Politics” (which is youtube_category_id 25) when uploading your video. If you have multiple channels, clearly identify each category (politics, business, entertainment, sports, etc.).
4. More detailed descriptions Similar to the first paragraph of a news article, descriptions of the news video should convey the who, what, when, where, and why of the story in a few sentences -- the more detail you can supply, the better.
5. Rich tags Another way to convey the content of the video is using the keyword tags. Providing keywords that might not be in the description gives us more knowledge of what the video is about. Especially helpful are proper nouns: the names of the people, places, companies, etc. mentioned in the video.
6. Make it Embeddable Be sure your video is embeddable on other sites since this is currently a technical requirement for being displayed in Google News. Additionally, if your videos are geo-blocked in certain regions, they will not appear in Google News.
If your news organization isn’t already making its video content available on YouTube and Google News, we encourage you to get started. More information on how to submit your news videos to Google News can also be found in the News Publishers Help Center, and you can watch this video for additional tips on news search engine optimization.
Posted by Benoit Lafortune, Sr. Strategist Google News, and Olivia Ma, YouTube News Manager
We want to give a big thank you to all of the partners who were able to join us. This summer we will be holding similar events in New York City (Wednesday, June 2nd) and Los Angeles (first week of July). We are looking forward to meeting all of the people who are defining YouTube with their innovative and original content.
For those who were unable to attend, here are some key take-aways from the Meet-up:
1. Leverage relationships with other partners to promote your channel and grow your subscription base. Reach out to partners in your area and get creative. 2. Optimize! Use the description, tags, title, and annotation your video watch pages. 3. Continue creating fresh, original content...the subscribers will come.
We had a lot of questions from partners, which we think you might find useful:
How can I see my revenue share? Revenue share and other technical specifics are all located in your contract which was sent to you via email when you joined the YouTube Partner Program.
What is paid placement? Where should I disclose it? Paid product placements are content that is created specifically for a sponsor and where that sponsor's brand, message, or product is integrated directly into the content. For example, if your video highlights a new piece of clothing that you received from a sponsor, you should disclose this when uploading your video under the Advertising Options section, Edit Video Settings.
What’s the process for being a Featured Video or Spotlight Video? Our team is constantly looking for fresh content that users will like. That said, Featured Videos and Spotlight Videosare a great way to be promoted on YouTube. As partners, you are automatically eligible for slotting into these promoted positions; however, there is no way to sign-up for these spaces.
How is the YouTube Rentals program going? What happened to the download beta? The downloads feature is no longer available. However, we have launched the YouTube Rentals beta, which is open to all partners. Learn more about the YouTube Rentals beta here.
Is it possible to upload a higher quality source file for videos already on my channel? At present, it is not possible to make any changes to existing video uploads, even if that means enhancing the quality. You can re-upload the video, but this will be treated as a new video and all views, comments, historic quality, etc. will be lost.
Can I reformat my videos from 4:3 to 16:9? Again, it is not possible to reformat videos at this time.
Is it possible for YouTube partners to get more human support? We are always making efforts to better support our users. Although we cannot provide all of the phone calls and face-to-face meetings that we would like, we will continue to do the best we can to support you with our resources.
Can partners have priority when submitting additional channels for partnership? We review partner applications in the order that they are received. Please be patient and plan ahead - we’ll get back to you as soon as possible!
Can partners have priority in the DCMA claims process? We don’t prioritize the DCMA process, specifically filing a counter-notification. It is the same for all YouTube users and partners.
Am I able to add a 10-second clip at the beginning/end of my video? It is not possible to add pre or post-roll clips to your videos. Similarly, it is against policy to burn pre-rolls into your videos - more information here.
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