What can you learn from the Leaderboard?
Why do some YouTube ads break through, and so many others fade quickly into oblivion? A look at the Year-End YouTube Ads Leaderboard provides some extremely helpful clues.
The Leaderboard lists the ten most-watched, most-engaged-with, and most-loved ads of the year. As Kate Stanford, director of marketing for YouTube, explains in this Think With Google article, “it’s a reflection of the brands that go the extra mile on YouTube.”
Stanford analyzes the Leaderboard to develop four New Year’s resolutions every marketer should consider, with the goal of boosting their advertising engagement in 2017.
Resolution 1: Don’t just join the cultural conversation on YouTube. Add to it.
Creative that’s tied to culture wins. The list cites ads as varied as Mountain Dew’s “Puppymonkeybaby” and Always’ “Keep Playing” as great examples of messaging that adds to conversations that are already happening.
Resolution 2: Measure for attention.
Regardless of how long your ad is, measuring how attentive the audience is – how much of the ad they watch – provides a valuable marker. The more people watch, the higher metrics like awareness and consideration tend to climb.
Resolution 3: Spend more time on mobile. Your consumers already do.
YouTube found that ads viewed on their mobile app generated an 84% higher attention rate, compared to traditional TV advertising. About two-thirds of the views the ads in the Leaderboard received came from mobile.
Resolution 4: Fact-check your instinct on where to find your audience.
Online video doesn’t just appeal to teens and millennials.In fact, the largest percentage of Leaderboard ad views came from the 25- to 34-year-old cohort. Which means this tool has a much wider reach than many of us may have previously believed.
The Leaderboard, and this article provides plenty of food for thought. And it ends with some wise advice: Pick one of these resolutions to focus on, and follow through. That resolution should inform every media plan, every creative decision, and every review of campaign performance. (Until next year’s Leaderboard is revealed, of course.)