Why Placement Targeting is Overrated - Top 2 Reasons

VidTao Weekly Newsletter - Why Placement Targeting for YouTube Ads is Overrated - here are our top 2 reasons why... VidTao YouTube Ad Newsletter Why Placement Targeting is Overrated - Top 2 Reasons In this week’s VidTao newsletter, we’re going to cover something we get asked about again and again: YouTube ad Placement Targeting. Let’s get started... Placement Targeting for YouTube Ads: Our Verdict Make no mistake: the ability to hyper-target & run your ads on specific YouTube videos & channels is very exciting, in theory. But in practice... YouTube ad campaigns using placement targeting usually fall flat. At least that’s our experience. At our YouTube ad agency Inceptly, we manage over $5+ million per month in YouTube adspend & continue to thoroughly test every targeting option under the sun. Based on what we have experienced again and again, here are the top 2 reasons why we see Placement Targeting fail & why we think it’s overrated: Why Placement Targeting for YouTube Ads is Overrated Reason #1: Poor Volume Ever launch a placement targeting campaign and it barely delivers? You know the story: You build your list of placements using one of the many free or paid tools out there, generating a list of videos & channels relevant to your product that you can run your ads on. (We even built out this feature inside VidTao for our own internal use. But since we don’t run much placement targeting, it’s just sitting there gathering dust. Feel free to reply to this email if you want to check it out for yourself in your own VidTao account) With that list of placements in hand, you excitedly create campaigns targeting these specific videos & channels, dreaming of a flood of high-intent, quality clicks to your product. But then you launch the ads… And usually? Crickets. A handful of impressions, sparse views and even fewer clicks. Here’s why: Because most individual placements - even ones with millions in views - are DEAD in terms of actual usable traffic volume. Look inside any YouTube organic content account and you’ll see this kind of pattern play out for most videos: We don’t have any data direct from Google on this, but having been under the hood on many top organic channels, we see it again and again: The majority of organic views usually happen within the first 30 days, and especially the first 72 hours of a video’s launch. This is because most organic views are aided by massive boosts from the YouTube algorithm, in particular the suggested videos and the “browse” feature. Google’s AI will push or "kill" videos in the first 24-48 hours based on viewer signals indicating whether or not the content might be interesting for other users. (Spend some time researching a concept called “View Velocity” to understand more on this topic) This leads us into major issue with placement targeting: When you select placement targeting, most of the time you are selecting the most relevant videos, without taking into consideration when the video was released. So even if you select a video with millions of views, you still might not see much traffic by placing your ad on that video. Again, so when you use video placement software to filter your videos by views, and build your campaign off that, and then nothing happens? It’s because you are likely targeting dead inventory. ***Note*** In some cases, Google’s AI will pick up a video again, weeks, months or even years after a video was uploaded. As a result, suddenly it will see another major spike in traffic. But we have no idea if/when this might happen as it is completely dependent on Google’s AI and user behavior. Just because a video has an insane number of views now, doesn't mean the video will continue to get views at that scale in the future. And this is a problem we see again and again from conversations with advertisers frustrated with their results from placement targeting, when it comes to campaigns not spending. In these instances it’s more a question of the inventory you target, than about your campaign setup or bidding strategy. But that’s not the only problem with Placement Targeting on YouTube. Why Placement Targeting for YouTube Ads is Overrated Reason #2: Cost of Traffic The other issue is cost of traffic. Advertisers choosing placement targeting are targeting an inherently limited inventory. Because of this, the moment a view becomes available on a particular placement, we have willingness from advertisers to pay for their ad to appear. And as in any auction, more bidders willing to pay more money means you’ll need to pay top dollar to win that auction and get your ad to show on that placement. In your market there’s a good chance you have hundreds of advertisers targeting those exact placements you’re trying to target, driving up the cost of traffic as a result of everyone trying to out-bid one another. “Ok, placement targeting is not the answer. What to do instead?” That, my friend, is the topic for a future newsletter! - Sponsored - VidTao is brought to you by Inceptly High-Performance YouTube Advertising agency. Inceptly builds YouTube ad creatives & manages over 5M USD/month in YouTube ad spend for companies like ClickFunnels, Descript, MindValley, Advanced Bionaturals, Organifi, and many more. Are you spending over $1k/day on ads and looking to scale your business with YouTube ads? Schedule your free YouTube ad brainstorming call here:>>inceptly.com/call What are your YouTube ad questions? Hit *reply* to this email and let us know, and we’ll make sure to cover your question in an upcoming newsletter. Have a great week! The VidTao TeamVidTao.com Are you are spending over $1k/day on paid traffic and want to scale with YouTube ads? Schedule your free YouTube ad brainstorming call here: inceptly.com/call Get this free newsletter & free access to VidTao.com: The Free Tool to Discover & Track Your Market's Best Youtube Ads. VidTao.com is brought to you by Inceptly.com - High Performance YouTube Ad Creative & Media Buying Agency Managing $5M/month+ in YouTube Ad Traffic Vidtao 2407 Ward Road, Sacramento, , California, 95827 [Unsubscribe](