A version of this article was previously published by Ad Age.
To unlock growth this holiday season, you’ll need to connect with shoppers where they’re already turning to discover gift ideas, compare options, and make decisions. And you’ll need solutions that enable your brand to break through the noise and compel action. That’s where YouTube comes in.
YouTube is the no. 1 platform consumers say they use for holiday shopping, compared with video and social platforms.
According to a survey conducted by Ipsos, YouTube is the no. 1 platform consumers say they use for holiday shopping, compared with video and social platforms.1 This indispensability is driven in part by how YouTube uniquely meets shoppers’ full range of needs in this busy time, from quickly surfacing what’s trending to delivering trusted reviews.
Let’s take a look at how marketers can tap the platform’s influence across culture, creators, and conversions to move holiday shoppers from discovery to decision faster and drive better ROI.
Make big cultural moments even bigger for your brand
TVs are now the most popular devices for watching YouTube,2 and, according to Nielsen, YouTube has been no. 1 in streaming watch time in the U.S. for two years.3
From football kickoffs to holiday concerts, YouTube is where people flock to for major cultural moments. For example, Taylor Swift announced her new album on YouTube, and, at its peak, more than 1.3 million viewers were simultaneously watching the two-hour episode of the New Heights podcast. YouTube is where these big moments become even bigger through entire ecosystems of related content — from reaction videos to analysis — that extend impact far beyond the original event.
Today, powerful cultural moments on YouTube are even more shoppable. With YouTube shopping ads on connected TVs, consumers can explore and interact with products right from their couches, then seamlessly complete their holiday purchases on their phones.
Walmart leveraged this seamless shopping experience for “Background Joys,” a holiday campaign with shoppable ambient rooms, a YouTube trend that pairs soothing sounds with specific immersive spaces. Think: a cozy diner from your favorite TV show. These 20-minute episodes, featuring ASMR — another popular YouTube trend — and festive music, allowed direct product purchases. Walmart combined YouTube Mastheads with a robust YouTube media plan to achieve a 2% lift in consideration and ad recall. It also drove a 16% increase in “walmart holiday” searches and outperformed competitors, demonstrating YouTube’s power in creating authentic and effective holiday campaigns.
Tap into trusted creators to accelerate purchase decisions
In today’s retail landscape, YouTube plays a unique and powerful role as a discovery and decision-making engine. A Material survey found YouTube’s influence cuts down the average U.S. online video shopper’s journey by six days.4
YouTube’s influence cuts down the average U.S. online video shopper’s journey by six days.
This influence is rooted in the credibility of the platform’s voices, with 82% of U.S. viewers saying YouTube has the most trusted creators.5 Holiday shoppers, who are often short on time and overwhelmed with options, turn to these trusted creators to filter choices and build confidence in their purchase decisions.
Marketers can leverage this influence with the Creator partnerships hub, where they can find relevant creators, brief them, and kick-start a partnership. Last year, Sephora successfully tapped the power of trusted YouTube creators to address a major consumer pain point: coming up with gift ideas. They partnered with seven creators of various audience sizes, different niches, and relatable holiday stories to showcase the brand’s curated gift sets. This led to a 82% relative lift for the search term “sephora holiday.”
Drive better results when it matters most
The paths of today’s shoppers are increasingly nonlinear, with people moving fluidly across streaming, scrolling, shopping, and searching. Demand Gen campaigns are the best way for advertisers to capture interest or drive engagement during these complex journeys, prospect for new customers, and, critically, drive conversions. You can get the most from Demand Gen this holiday season by enabling shoppable features such as checkout links, which now use new signals to direct people to checkout when it’s clear they’re ready to buy.
Last holiday season, e.l.f. Cosmetics saw a 25% jump in revenue growth, with Demand Gen being the most efficient drivers of purchases.
Advertisers on average are seeing a 26% year-over-year increase in conversions per dollar spent, and we’re not done yet. For this holiday season, we launched two new features for Demand Gen to help omnichannel retailers: optimizing for omnichannel sales to reach people no matter how they prefer to buy and local offers to show real-time product availability to nearby shoppers.
Last holiday season, e.l.f. Cosmetics leveraged Demand Gen in tandem with other YouTube solutions to reach and convert shoppers across their journey. The beauty brand partnered with a creator to feature their Halo Glow Liquid Filter in a gift guide, used Video reach campaigns and Video view campaigns to build mass reach and consideration, and utilized Demand Gen to drive people through to purchase. This comprehensive Google and YouTube strategy delivered exceptional growth over Black Friday and Cyber Monday. Searches for “halo glow liquid filter” increased by 5,000% and first-time purchasers increased by 11%. The brand also saw a 25% jump in revenue growth on platform, with Demand Gen being the most efficient driver of purchases compared with competitors.
Ultimately, with Demand Gen and YouTube’s other updated shoppable solutions, you have more opportunities than ever to tap the platform’s influence and increase the effectiveness of your holiday campaigns.
