Online shopping has evolved rapidly over the years, with increasing digital avenues for reaching people. Navigating the digital landscape and knowing what tools to use can be quite a challenge.
Even within the suite of YouTube products, between different types of YouTube ads and additional tools, there are several effective ways to drive shopping among viewers. In fact, 75% of viewers agree that YouTube enhances the traditional shopping journey by delivering unexpected inspiration. Here are four ways to take advantage of YouTube’s online shopping boom.
Set your foundation
Video action campaigns will help scale your video ads across the YouTube Home feed, watch pages, connected TV, search, and more. To encourage viewers to shop, attach a product feed to your Video action campaigns from the Google Merchant Center. Having browsable product imagery alongside your ads helps direct viewers to specific product pages on your website, creating a seamless path to purchase. On average, advertisers who add product feeds to their Video action campaigns achieve over 60% more conversions at a lower cost.1
Gratis, a Turkey-based retailer, launched a private-label beauty line when stores were still closed due to the pandemic. It knew it had to turn to online options to drive sales, so it added a product feed to its Video action campaign. Each creative showed users relevant products and drove them directly to those product pages. The strategy fostered a 64% conversion rate uplift, lowered the cost per conversion by 45%, and raised click rate by 1,602%.
Expand your reach
Next, using your Video action campaign assets, create some Discovery ad image assets and expand your reach with Google’s personalised feeds. Your ads will show up for viewers across YouTube’s Home and Watch Next feeds, plus Discover and Gmail. You’ll catch your viewers’ attention as they browse through all three Google platforms. More than 60% of advertisers who combine Video action campaigns with Discovery ads see incremental conversions at or below their original cost-per-action.2
Dr. Squatch, a Los Angeles-based men’s personal care brand, faced the challenge of growing its market share in an extremely competitive space. After seeing some success with its Video action campaigns, it expanded its video ads to include Discovery ads. With this addition, Dr. Squatch saw its annual revenue increase by 400%, and its year-over-year click-through rate jump by 33%.
Leverage YouTube creators’ influence
Lastly, if you want to take your ad campaigns to the next level, use YouTube BrandConnect and creator promotions to leverage the unique influence of YouTube creators. Creators often talk about their favorite brands and products in an authentic, positive way that resonates with their viewers.
YouTube BrandConnect offers tools and solutions that help advertisers with creator campaigns from beginning to end — starting with pairing advertisers with relevant creators, and progressing to measuring end results and understanding ROI. Advertisers can turn any content created in partnership with creators into an in-feed ad to amplify the viewership. According to boutique research agency Talk Shoppe, viewers in the markets we’ve studied say they are 33% more likely to purchase something promoted by influencers on YouTube when compared to competitive video platforms.3 And over half of YouTube viewers say that sponsored or branded content on YouTube makes them more likely to consider a brand.4
Creators often talk about their favorite brands and products in an authentic, positive way that resonates with their viewers.
As a long-established beauty brand, L’Oréal was looking for innovative ways to leverage its influence network to drive traffic to its online store. L’Oréal Thailand promoted four creator videos as YouTube ads, and as a result gained purchase intent lift that exceeded the industry average by 4X — at a 35% lower cost per view than the industry average.
Take these steps to build out a strong repertoire of YouTube ads to encourage viewers to shop. And remember, different methods resonate with different viewers, so be sure to keep an open mind and see what tactics work best for your brand.
