Why You Shouldn't Be Late to the YouTube Party (Archive, 2021)

Recorded in 2021 during Simon's s.media agency era — a team compilation making the early-mover case. Published as part of a dated historical record; costs and timings are as they stood in 2021.

Did you miss the last party?

Going back to the start of PPC and SEO and all those wonderful web things — did you feel behind the curve? That you'd missed the boat? It was a great opportunity for brands to get in front of a whole new realm of customers, lots of brands invested heavily, and some had to invest even more to catch up.

You might feel the same about YouTube. To many brands it's somewhere with a few videos and a bit of music. There's a lot more depth to it — it's owned by Google, after all, the audience targeting is amazing, and they can't fill the real estate, so the opportunities are everywhere. Maybe you've dabbled: tried it in-house, or through an agency that dabbles in it the way they dabble in everything. My challenge: have a good look at where your customers are and what the opportunities on YouTube actually are — because for most brands it's probably one of the best bang-for-buck marketing channels there is right now.

Why was it so much cheaper?

With YouTube advertising you'll convert customers for less than traditional PPC or other traditional advertising. As more businesses flock to search, keyword bids only go up and won't stop rising. YouTube was still relatively new as an ads platform and comparatively unknown, so the cost was far less — around a tenth of the cost of traditional PPC and Facebook ads at the time. Getting in while costs were low was the whole point: take advantage before the crowd arrives.

How does video get you to the top of Google?

One of the biggest benefits of starting early: you could get onto page one of Google search results within weeks. The future of search is video — plenty of people disagreed, but Google follows consumer trends, and more people want to watch than read. They want to see it, hear it, engage with the personality of the brand — and you can't understand personality by reading; you have to watch and listen to the person. By advertising and publishing on YouTube you climb Google search; and the video-ranking work we did could put videos at the top of YouTube search within 48 to 72 hours, feeding through to Google's top results and featured content for the keywords in your industry.

What does this do for your SEO?

SEO ranking has changed, and rich, quality content is what viewers want. Articles still do well — but video offers instant gratification: rather than reading a guide and parsing someone's prose, you watch, and an automatic connection forms between the consumer and the person or product on screen. Google takes notice of platforms with genuinely rich video content, where people go to answer their questions — from "which product is right for me" to "how do I style my hair". Put rich content out on YouTube, support it with accompanying SEO strategies, and you stay at the rankings where people find you. The way in: research your target field, find the gap, work out which questions you can answer for your audience — and answer them with your product in its best light.