YouTube is perhaps the most powerful platform on which a business can expose itself to millions of viewers at a time. With so many people available to watch videos in diverse formats, the possibilities for advertising are greater than ever – but it also can be quite easy to mistakenly shoot at your feet.
Most advertisers make a big mistake while ignoring placement targeting, the factor that people forget, who sees their ads, and most importantly, where those are to be placed. If placed even slightly incorrectly, the advertisements may cost the client money and create some distance between themselves and the audience. One must know how to get to the right audience, optimize placement, and track results for a successful running campaign.
This article addresses five common mistakes an advertiser makes on YouTube, along with solutions that should generate better results.
1. Ignoring Placement Targeting Options
Most marketers consider only demographic and interest targeting, leaving the placement options altogether. YouTube has a specific placement ad facility, such as channels, videos, or topics, that assists advertisers in reaching their perfect audience. By not using placement targeting, your ads could be shown to viewers who would unlikely convert, leaving you out of pocket. Make regular reviews based on placements to ensure your content is reaching the correct people.
2. Using Broad Targeting Without Refinement
Even though broad targeting appears to be the avenue to reach the maximum number of people, this will lead to the wasting of ad dollars. Unless an ad is audience-refined, chances are the advertisement will simply get served to people who do not care about the product or service being advertised. Therefore, interest targeting should be done via YouTube Ads placement targeting, retargeting, and custom audiences so that the ad reaches those who will most probably engage.
3. Skipping Mobile Optimization
Mobile devices are used for 70% of all views on YouTube, meaning that a significant part of the advertisers are producing videos for desktop use only. Ads not optimized for mobile devices may appear cropped, unreadable, or simply ugly on the devices, resulting in lower engagement rates and increased costs. Ensure that your creatives are made for both mobile and desktop so that the chance of their success is maximized.
4. Neglecting Ad Frequency and Duration
Ad fatigue can develop with high frequency of the same rate in advertising to the same individuals for a long time; it gets to a point where the target audience becomes unresponsive to your promotions. On the contrary, it may sometimes keep viewers from actually becoming customers. Thus, frequency monitoring not only can adjust the length of ads but also keeps the audience from being bored and makes impressions unworthy of wasting. Short, catchier content usually gets better performance on YouTube than long videos.
5. Failing to Track and Optimize
Missing out on monitoring metrics for advertising performance and thus changing campaigns is the last professional mistake displayed by most advertisers. YouTube obviously has extensive analytics on viewership, clicks, conversions, and all that jazz. Save yourself from losses by ignoring this data. Regularly check performance reports and adjust targeting, creativity, and placements so that you can achieve maximum returns on your investments.
All in All
Avoiding these mistakes will result in marked improvement through results with your YouTube advertising. The one that needs most focus is that of placement targeting; this is all because the criteria involve who gets to see your content as well as how you spend the money. Right placements, optimization on mobile, frequency management, and continuous tracking of results save you money while accessing the right audience. Smart targeting and strategy make every dollar count in your next campaign!