YouTube Brandcast 2023: Big On Bluster, Short On Substance

YouTube took over the Hordern Pavillion in Sydney for its Brandcast extravaganza and sales pitch to the advertising industry. However, while the entertainment was good and the drinks flowed slightly too well for one B&T staffer, agency staff were left slightly underwhelmed by the announcements.

Those announcements were new AI-driven solutions for Demand Generation, letting advertisers’ best-performing video and image assets be integrated across YouTube’s different inventory, arriving early next year. A New 30-second non-skippable ad on Connected TV coming in October. An expansion of Shorts advertising and a Connected TV ad that will display when a viewer pauses their content.

“While the overall narrative of Brandcast boasted of reach, a commitment to innovation and future-readiness, I couldn’t shake off a feeling of something crucial missing,” Trent McMillan, chief digital officer and founder of Kaimera told B&T.

“Yes, there was a notable mention of aligning CTV ads with the tried-and-true TV 30-second format, a staple in the advertising industry since the 1960s. Though despite YouTube’s continuous emphasis on its impressive reach and its notable pivot towards Connected TV (CTV), there seemed to be a glaring gap in the dialogue surrounding integration with broader industry measurement and reporting solutions.”

And YouTube certainly was talking up its reach.

“People have never had so much choice of what they watch or how they watch it,” said Caroline Oates, Google’s head of YouTube, deals & programmatic sales.

“YouTube is the number one video service that viewers across Australia and New Zealand say they love the most, reaching more than 17 million Aussies [and] three and a half million Kiwis every month.”

Oates continued to say that YouTube has the “viewer side of the equation figured out” and that it was 67 per cent more effective than linear TV and drives 43 per cent higher ROI, according to Nielsen MMM meta-analysis.

But, for McMillan, this still wasn’t quite enough.

“In a time where platforms like VOZ and Automatic Content Recognition (ACR) have become increasingly useful tools in the industry, facilitating nuanced tracking and understanding of audience engagement, their absence in the conversation felt like a significant oversight. I may have been optimistic in thinking YouTube would be aligning with the industry, though this gap in addressing how YouTube is leaning into the broader CTV conversation rendered the event somewhat incomplete, leaving me slightly underwhelmed.”

Someone who wasn’t underwhelmed, however, was Mark Ritson. The potty-mouthed marketing professor has long been a friend of YouTube and took to the stage with Lucinda Barlow of Uber and Kathy De Lullo of Mondelēz International.

“I’m fascinated by all advertising media but YouTube especially interests me and has done for a few years. When you look at the data, it has this very unusual capability. Obviously, it’s video but we can use it both to aim at the masses to do top-of-funnel, long-term emotional brand building as a compliment, supplement or even a replacement occasionally for linear TV. Also, its targetability makes it a really good bottom-of-funnel activation medium, as well,” he explained.

De Lullo, meanwhile, explained that the company pulled its Cadbury TV spend over the crucial Christmas period and went solely for digital — with YouTube being a major piece of the pie.

“On the media side, we started with a very clear hypothesis that TV-sized scale investment in digital should give us TV-sized results and maintain the ROI. Hypothetically, we really wanted to match the volume sales, delivery of TV and increase the ROI,” she said.

“Leaving TV off the schedule made my heart pump quite a bit. It was a big call but it was the right call as it turned out. The effectiveness of YouTube trumped TV by 36 per cent and, aside from that, we were able to grow our sales by 13 per cent. And we also gained five points of market share. So Santa was very, very happy last Christmas.”

Jane Combes, national head of strategic investment and partnerships at OMD, to B&T that these case studies were not only useful but also great examples of why YouTube “unapologetically put out a call to arms to re-think television.”

“YouTube subtly tapped into a growing industry need (rather than want) to measure, to be accountable and to drive scalable results across the funnel. Whether it was sales uplifts, ad recall uplifts, salience or preference, it felt like the case studies showed its all possible,” she added.

” It should be compelling enough to drive a rethink in approach, particularly as the gap between Television/BVOD and the platform offering closes. The new CTV solutions will no doubt provide a more immediate source of growth as they look to bolster the big screen experience, competing for TV dollars, particularly as the market adjusts to thinking of YouTube in a more diverse, expansive way,” she said.

Maya Richardson, Zenith’s national commercial director & head of investment Brisbane, was also very happy that the old-school ad formats are coming to YouTube’s CTV offering.

“In welcome news to brands (and our creative agency partners), the 30-second TV spot is back. Pared back cutdowns, like 15 and 6-second bumpers, will be augmented with the traditional workhorse of brand building, which is a direct reflection of the increasing shift to audience viewing on connected TVs,” she said.

However, she said it would be “interesting” to compare the level of engagement on YouTube’s new interactive ad formats to other BVOD services and that the platform needed to provide “holistic measurement that includes linear TV and all other video formats, ensuring that we have the right combination of linear and online video investment.”

“The Brandcast upfront was a slick and well-choreographed affair. Beneath the gloss, the ambition to strategically target a greater share of marketers’ investment currently going into linear TV and compete against the more interactive BVOD formats was clear. Their combination of scale, innovation and impact makes them well-placed to deliver on brands’ short- and long-term business objectives, which is key if they are to attract a bigger share of traditional TV budgets,” she added.

Will YouTube ever get the bigger share of TV spend that it desires? While these new tools might help, it’s clear the platform still has a way to go.