YouTube’s new monetization policy

Early this year, Youtube has released a new monetization policy. The question is that how this new monetization policy will affect the YouTubers? Many of YouTube Video creators depend on YouTube as a source of their income as they spend their time and effort to produce appealing contents for their audiences. The story started when Several big-name advertisers suspended ads on YouTube because their ads were served on some of the YouTube content that contains hate speech or supports terrorism. On the past Five years ago, YouTube was flexible with YouTubers to create video contents online and earn money based on the number of subscribers, shares, comments and likes. This model helped YouTube grow into the web’s biggest video platform, and known brand started to create 30 commercial ads to show it on YouTube. 

Does YouTube demonetization affect advertising?

Yes, YouTube could lose $750 million in revenue this year over advertisers halting business, according to analyst firm Nomura Instinet. 

More than 250 brands, such as PepsiCo, Starbucks, Wal-Mart, and McDonald’s, are boycotting YouTube and have pulled their advertising from YouTube. The advertisers in those brands declared that their ads were running on content that their organization does not stand for or support. This conventional story sparked in Britain when some advertisers have noticed and investigated that their ads served on YouTube videos which include hate of speech, terrorism, and other offensive content. For more Information about the changes in YouTube’s new monetization policy please check out: Video monetization criteria

On one hand, As a digital marketer, I believe that organization has the right to know where their ads are being served and on which contents because each company stands for its own value, mission, and reputation.On the other hand, as a youtube content consumer, I believe The Youtuber communities have to ensure the contents they produce to the world is free from hate speech, terrorism, and other offensive content. Also, Google plays an important role in monitoring and controlling the unwanted contents to satisfy both Youtubers and Advertisers 

Youtube Video Ads VS. Facebook Video Ads

Facebook and YouTube are both important channels for video marketing. Online video contents over recent years are showing no signs of slowing. According to Cisco Forecast, the video will represent 69% of all consumer-based Internet traffic by 2017; this is expected to rise to 80% by 2019.

Youtube Video Ads VS. Facebook Video Ads 

Meanwhile, another study from Business Insider estimates that video advertising will account for 41% of total desktop display-related spending in 2020 in the US. however, there are some differences between these two channels with some advantages and disadvantages.In this blog, I will compare both channels and give some statistical data and some evidence to support my comparison.

Audience:

Facebook

• 500 million people are watching videos on Facebook every day (TubularInsights). 
• 85% of Facebook video is watched without sound (Digiday). 
• 78% of online audiences are already watching video on Facebook Live. 90% think the video quality is the most important aspect of Facebook Live videos.(Source: Livestream and New York Magazine Survey) 

YouTube

• People spend more time on YouTube than Facebook and when people looking for a video. 
• In an average month, 8 out of 10 18-49 year-olds watch YouTube 
• 31.8 million users aged 18 to 24 in the United States accessed YouTube at least once in the past month, accounting for 98% of internet users in that age demographic. 
• In the last month, the 18-24 age bracket spent an average of 10 hours and 15 minutes on the site.

Source: Brand Watch

Targeting:

Facebook

• To watch a video ad on Facebook, a person has to be logged into his or her account. That lets advertisers target their Facebook video ads very specifically to a potential audience's age, gender, location, and interests. 

Youtube

• YouTube offers similar targeting categories, but they do not match Facebook’s specificity at scale. Some advertisers have compensated by contextually targeting their YouTube ads, aiming them at channel categories like fashion and do-it-yourself. 

Cost:

Facebook

• Facebook's tool offers a fixed cost per thousand impressions and estimated impressions per day. 
• Facebook’s tool sells video ads through auctions. 

Youtube

• YouTube asks the brand to enter the maximum it would pay for a completed view. YouTube then estimates the average cost per view and how many views a day. 
• YouTube ads are sold as a package though, with other media such as in-stream video ads, display ads, or featured video listings. 

Autoplay vs. Skippable

Facebook

• With Facebook Video Ads viewers simply have to keep scrolling down. 
• Facebook charges advertisers by the view and starts counting views after a video has played for three seconds. Facebook reports details like how many views lasted for 50%, 75% and 100% of the video so that advertisers can calculate the effective cost of an autoplay ad. 

Youtube

• YouTube Ads have to be actively skipped or closed. 
• Viewers can skip the YouTube ads after 5 seconds. If they do not skip the ad, the YouTube video view count will be incremented when the ad has been completely viewed or at the 30-second mark. 

As a digital marketer, you have to select which channel that you are going to use that match your goal and marketing strategies to get the optimal results when you about executing your marketing campaigns.

Case Study: How does Dollar Shave Club use data analytics to ensure its digital marketing strategies?

In this blog, I will talk about How Dollar Shave Club uses data analytics to ensure its digital marketing strategies, and I will cover their e-mail marketing and video content marketing as these were the main important part of their digital marketing success as a startup business.

Dollar Shave Club is a company started in 2011 by Michael Dublin and Mark Levine in Venice, California. Their business is selling cheap blades than the ones available on the market. However, instead of using traditional retail channels they have decided to sell directly to their customer using a subscription model. As an online business, increasing their conversion rate as well as the number of products ordered by their current customers are the Dollar Shave Club’s goals. As any startup business, Dollar Shave Club faced a problem with implementing sampling program strategy. The company had a program where it sent samples to customers to entice them to buy new products. Dollar Shave Club found that blanket sampling is very costly. Moreover, the company didn’t have the right tool to analyze data that might help it better target the samples. Hence, they decided to use Looker Data Sciences Inc. SaaS to analyze all their data to leverage this business opportunity.

“The result is impressive; Dollar Shave Club’s sampling program is able to achieve a 100% return on investment.” (1) Dollar Shave Club is now able to know exactly what sample their clients will like based on their previous purchases and types of subscriptions.

Email marketing:

Dollar Shave Club used data analytics to better personalize email marketing. Data was being collected from email promotions, Web site traffic, and volume of customer help requests, but unfortunately, Dollar Shave Club couldn’t take advantage of that data. Dollar Shave Club was starting using Looker to analyze data and provide a better business solution. As a result, Dollar Shave Club discovered that customers who buy the Shave Butter product are likely to buy other products as well. As well, Dollar Shave Club used Looker to do A/B testing of email campaigns. Dollar Shave Club made some optimizations to the collected data to improve targeting, the brand persona, and content creation strategies. Better data analytics has helped Dollar Shave Club to strengthen its e-mail marketing program based on customer preferences.

Dollar Shave Club email marketing

Dollar Shave Club email marketing

Video marketing:

Everyone knows how video marketing has shaped the success of Dollar Shave Club. YouTube was where they began back in 2012. Basically, their first video went viral. As a result, within the first 48 hours of their video going live, the company generated 12,000 new customers. This one of the most successful startup story that utilizes digital marketing to target their audience.

Everyone knows how video marketing has shaped the success of Dollar Shave Club. YouTube was where they began back in 2012. Basically, their first video went viral. As a result, within the first 48 hours of their video going live, the company generated 12,000 new customers. This one of the most successful startup story that utilizes digital marketing to target their audience.

“We do use irreverence and humor as a really critical mechanism to deliver that relatability,” says Dollar Shave Club CMO Adam Weber, “That’s what we really aim to do from a tonality standpoint that I think is different than how brands have talked to guys in the past.”(2)

Dollar Shave Club uses video as an amazing platform for storytelling.  Videos reach a large number of consumers and establish a much deeper emotional connection with video than you can in other creative venues. Telling stories via video offers a lot of unique capabilities that something like television doesn’t offer.

Unlike traditional TV advertising, people are watching Dollar Shave Club video. The 94-second spot is entertaining, engaging, and hilarious. Dollar Shave Club uses humor, social media, and originality to connect with customers.

HubSpot shares a number of compelling stats that show why diversifying content marketing to include video are a smart move:

• 92% of mobile video consumers share videos with others
• More than a third of all online activity involves watching videos
• More than a third of consumers trust video ads
• 80% of users can recall a video ad they viewed in the last 30 days
• Enjoyment of video advertising increases purchase intent by 97% and brand association by 139%

What the FAQ Marketing Campaign:

On their latest marketing campaign, which is called “What the FAQ?”, It’s a video series that Dollar Shave Club has basically used to address a lot of barriers that were hearing their customers talk about as to why they didn’t want to sign up.

“The videos answer questions around contracts, quality of razors, what members think of the razors, if it's possible to switch razors, what happens if you don't grow enough hair to justify a monthly subscription, what makes DSC so special compared to other services and why people should try DSC in the first place.The campaign will live online in pre-roll ads and other formats, including use as modules serving as actual FAQs on the website, Mr. Brownstein said, adding that it has production quality that would allow adaptation for TV if needed.”(3)

As a startup business, Dollar Shave Club has a unique idea and business model that cannot be duplicated. It is true, at their beginning data analyzing and interpreting were their real struggle. However, after implementing the right business analytics tool, Dollar Shave Club had leverage that opportunity to derived massive growth in ROI and number of subscribers. Video marketing and email marketing were their most powerful tool that Dollar Shave Club has utilized to engage with their customers and that made a difference in the company success.