How to Increase your Presence Online; A Guide to YouTube Advertising

Are you a small business owner or an ambitious entrepreneur venturing into the world of marketing? You have your product or service, and now you need to let your potential clients and customers know about it. Perhaps you have already dipped your toe into the social media pool but are not seeing the results you had hoped for. Whatever your reason for finding yourself here, you have come to the right place. We are going to walk you through how to get started with YouTube advertising. 

It’s straight forward to execute, and the results can be staggering for your business. It’s easy to track the campaign’s success, make decisions based on what’s working and what’s not. This short guide aims to help you get started and answer your questions. 

First things first!

The first item on the list is to start a YouTube channel to make the most of YouTube advertising. Now we know that sounds a bit scary but trust us, it will get easier! Think about how you felt taking your first selfie? How easy is it now? You may have heard a lot of talk about algorithms and that videos are preferred. Well, they are! Ask yourself this, do you prefer to read up on something or have someone who has done that reading and research tell you about it and demonstrate it for you? 

It’s the same for your customers. Most people ask a question in Google by typing keywords into the search bar and play a YouTube video to get the answer. Plus, you can be multitasking if you just have the audio on. It’s important to meet your audience where they are, after all, YouTube has 2.3 billion users worldwide as of 2021. 

Creating your free YouTube channel

Think about the story you want to tell about your brand and who you are aiming for in terms of your audience, i.e., your customers. After all, the point is to convert your viewing audience into customers. You want to generate content that relates to them and shares the offering you are providing through your business. Be clear and concise in your messaging. Complete the following steps for your YouTube channel and video marketing efforts. 

• Create video campaigns with your phone by sharing your company’s offering; you can include a demonstration of the product or service. Share recent customer testimonials or ask an emotive question to intrigue your audience. Be clear about what you want the viewing audience to do when they have seen your content at the end of your video.
• Use that video or a section of it to create your first YouTube advertising campaign.
• Choose the people you wish to target; be specific and include demographics that will narrow it down to the exact people you are aiming to communicate with. Age, city, interests are great options to help you do this.
• Decide the goals you have for the campaign, i.e., increase traffic to your website by 10% or increase the number of subscriptions to your newsletter by 20%. Be specific about what you want to achieve with your YouTube advertising campaign. 
• Decide on your budget.
• Track your success and the return of investment you are getting.
• Make informed decisions about running future YouTube ads based on your objectives and the metrics you are observing. 

6 types of YouTube advertising to choose from

Consider which YouTube campaign format will be best for your video marketing. Here is a list of what is available to you:

1. Display ads – they appear to the right of a video on YouTube and are for desktop advertising only.
2. Overlay ads – they show up in the bottom 20% of a video and typically look like banner ads.
3. Skippable video ads – they are at the beginning, middle or end of a video.
4. Non-skippable video ads – they appear at some point in a video. 
5. Bumper ads – they are very short videos, 6 seconds or less and play before, during or after a video.
6. Sponsored cards – they appear over the top of a video while it is playing. 

All YouTube advertising will boost brand awareness, so think about your audience, and meet them where you think they are. Remember, you can track the success of the campaign and make changes in the future to get even better results. 

Best practices in YouTube advertising

Here are some helpful things to think about to boost your presence with YouTube advertising:

1. You should be thinking of your audience as your followers and the community you are serving. Build content that is interesting to them and helps them in some way. Think service over sell.
2. Be emotional, connect and engage with your audience.
3. Play with the features available to you, creative content is fun to do and is compelling to your audience and potential customers.
4. Banner images and video cards are great tools to encourage a call to action from your audience. Be clear about what you want your audience to do after viewing your advert.
5. Make sure your video length suits the type of campaign you are running from the selection YouTube advertising offers (options are listed above).

Need some assistance?

Check out our Google Ads Creator. At Clever Ads, we help businesses advertise more effectively online with YouTube campaigns. We ensure compliance with the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) for the keyword(s) you are trying to target. This ensures you rank well in the algorithms. Take advantage of our tools such as the keyword  planner,  campaign  auditor, Google  promotional  code,  campaign  translator and  metrics  app. 

Three points to remember 

1. Start! Have fun creating engaging and compelling content. 
2. Analytics are your friend, get comfortable reviewing them and making decisions because of them. 
3. Optimize your efforts with these  advertising tools available.

What are you waiting for?

Start YouTube advertising today and boost your company’s reach in a matter of minutes. It’s the getting started that trips most people up. Don’t let that be you! If you need any assistance, feel free to reach out to us at Clever Ads.