Behind YouTube's New Pitch to Secure TV Ad Dollars and Build Brands

YouTube's pitch to advertisers is changing heading into the TV upfront, and it doesn't want marketers to skip its message. During a recent panel at South by Southwest, YouTuber and "Hot Ones" co-creator Sean Evans lamented how, even today, advertisers need to be told that linear TV viewership isn't superior to YouTube viewership. And while that may be true for some, according to Sean Downey, president of Americas and global partners at Google, today's conversations are moving past the point of whether or not YouTube is premium. "Advertisers understand it now. I think two years ago, we had to have that conversation, and we had to talk about what was premium," Downey said. "Now you see that there's unrivaled reach, unrivaled watch time, and these creators like Sean Evans have millions of followers who tune in every time they post something new. And our advertisers see that." They better see it—because it's hard to miss. In February, YouTube CEO Neal Mohan announced that TV has surpassed mobile as the primary device for YouTube viewing in the U.S. by watch time—a regular want of ad buyers looking for brands to appear on a bigger screen. Among its other announcements, the platform has 1 billion monthly active viewers of podcast content and 70 billion daily views across YouTube Shorts. Plus, according to Nielsen, YouTube has been the top streamer in the U.S. for the past two years. The platform regularly pulls in more than 10% of TV watch time in Nielsen's monthly Gauge report. On the back of all that data, YouTube is entering its fourth year in TV upfront week for its Brandcast presentation. Discussing the company's early conversations with ad buyers ahead of the annual advertising showcase, Downey said the focus has been on the differentiation of the platform, including added reach and flexibility. In addition to its streaming offering, the company is focused on sponsorship opportunities around key moments, allowing advertisers to activate in the creator content surrounding big events; opportunities around sports, whether that's something like creator integrations or taking advantage of YouTube TV's NFL Sunday Ticket; focusing on artificial-intelligence-powered formats, offering a way to reach consumers at scale across the funnel; and the company's social presence, putting brands right next to trusted creators through offerings like YouTube Select, which allows advertisers to tap into the platform's top 1% of content. Ahead of the company's upfront pitch, Downey spoke with ADWEEK, giving an inside look at YouTube's advertising priorities as the company looks to take a bigger share of TV ad dollars, all the while outlining how conversations have changed. This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity. ADWEEK: This is YouTube's fourth year in the upfront. What are you doing differently this year that you haven't done in the past? Going through the five scenarios for advertisers—so they understand how to get the most impact—is a new approach. Historically, we've talked about, "It's a huge streaming platform, No. 1 in the world, and it drives amazing results, and this is why you should invest and build your brand here." Now, we're talking about building brands and influence, and that comes across five key areas: a great streaming presence, understanding moments that matter, having great sponsorship opportunities deeply integrated, surrounding the culture more aggressively around things like sports, and then letting YouTube help you drive results across the full funnel in our AI-powered spots. Then, of course, that works across streaming, social, as well as regular views. That message is newer. It's a different message than we've given in the past, but it showcases the total place that YouTube is—that I don't think other providers can do. ADWEEK: During the 2024 Summer Olympic Games in Paris, YouTube viewers watched more than 40 billion minutes of Olympic content. Brands always want to be in live moments, like having a Super Bowl ad. But can you talk about that strategy of also surrounding live moments? What we've tried to do is make that easy for the brand to surround those moments, so we've been leveraging things around takeovers of really strong creators that are focused on that content. We've been putting together AI-powered playlists and sponsorship categories that might fit that content around that structure—that could take the form of things like mastheads or creator integrations with specific creators. Then, we're making sure that they have a really strong awareness around the event. They have a high share of voice, and they can get around that popular content with creators. But we've done that in a more curated way, where we've identified the things that matter, and then we've tried to match them with some of these creators and brand opportunities so they can be in the event and around all the great stuff. That has a pretty wide package for people. Advertisers always want to be on the big screen, so YouTube viewing on TV passing mobile was a big announcement. What do you want marketers taking from that? People come to YouTube to be entertained, and they're doing it in all formats, and increasingly more in the living room, which means it's mainstream for them, and that's where they're going to get the bulk of their entertainment. The way I like to look at it, though, is you look at the watch time. It's got 1 billion hours per day. That tells you that people are in front of that content. You have a lot of high-end creators that are the new producers of Hollywood, that develop really premium episodic content that has tremendous reach against certain categories. They love that. Then we're seeing more of the Shorts activity find its way to the TV screen, as well. So what you end up with is a very engaged consumer that's leaned in, that's engaging with an influential creator community across long-form and short-form, and that just provides an advertiser an opportunity to have a really rich engagement with a consumer and start to drive some of their outcomes. And that's what it means to be TV-centric. It means it's mainstream. That doesn't mean that we're not growing everywhere else. It means, as you look around the watch time and the growth of YouTube, it's become the No. 1 place where people like to watch. I'm glad you mentioned YouTube Shorts. We're talking with buyers about their upfront opinions, and some say YouTube Shorts are having a moment. What does that mean? I think what advertisers are realizing is it delivers pretty incredible results because it's a really engaged user community. First of all, they can reach about 40% of Shorts viewers that they can't reach anywhere else. So they can take part in the YouTube audience in that format, and it drives a lot of opportunity. Secondly, that's spread across all audiences, so they're able to get longer view-throughs. If you look at Shorts, we're seeing that it has really strong engagement rates in terms of viewership and time. And then when they're measuring that, they're getting really good returns on however they're measuring, whether that's an outcome-based measurement that they put in place or maybe they put it into a short-run MMM (media mix modeling) model. They see this actually driving outcomes. The more brands have played with that, the more they've seen that. And that's probably what they mean by "moment"—because they're actually making it a big part of their buys with us at this point. In addition to the TV viewing announcement, YouTube is also creating less intrusive mid-roll ads that air during breaks in the content rather than interrupting scenes and talking. And it just happens to roll out May 12, which is during upfront week. Can you talk about that, and as the platform is evolving, what are ad buyers excited about? No. 1, we're a consumer platform, so we have to invest in really strong user experiences across the connected TV spectrum, and we understand viewer preferences. So that's why you're getting fewer, longer ad breaks. I think it creates a more seamless viewing experience for viewers, and they can get the messages and they can still view the content, so it becomes the less interruptive type of thing. So you might get in-feed ads that are more interactivity-oriented, and you'll just have better user engagement from that perspective. That allows them to have good tune-in, good attention span, and good user experience. And we think that drives repeat views. That's a really simple equation as a platform. In 2024, YouTube reportedly had a 20% increase in upfront ad commitments. As you're looking for even more TV ad dollars this year, what's your pitch to advertisers? What are the conversations that are getting them to move budgets? The big push that we have is that you grow as much as we perform for you against your goals. And if you feel there's room to grow because you're performing, then you'll invest more. If there's not, you won't. We're always a very value-centric pitch. We want to solve business problems for customers. What we're trying to put in front of them is showcasing how they can, in fact, improve their reach across formats. They can get into a more curated, creator-led world that might have a broader impact outside of the traditional campaign goals. That's why the sponsorships scenario is important. Or if we're thinking about matching brands with creators, it becomes important because I want to put them at the epicenter of influence with consumers. When they start to understand the power of that influence in having some integrated content with it, that sometimes increases investment, and most times, it improves their performance and their brand because they're well integrated into communities. So when I'm doing sponsorships or showcasing sports or showcasing creator integrations, that's why we do it—because it's a way for them to get more in-depth, more into the platform.

TV Upfronts

Behind YouTube's New Pitch to Secure TV Ad Dollars and Build Brands

As the company enters another upfront, here's how conversations with advertisers have evolved

Bill Bradley

About

Subscriptions

Events

Publications