"Moz the Monster" has been officially crowned the UK's most popular Christmas ad 2017, topping the YouTube Ads Leaderboard for November. Director of Marketing Becky Brock tells how John Lewis now witnesses a "unique moment in advertising" each Christmas and uses YouTube for "discoverability" and on-demand viewing.
This article was also featured on Campaign.
For many, the John Lewis Christmas ad now signifies the start of the festive season, something we are really proud of. Each year, when the film launches, we experience what is a unique moment in advertising: people actively seek out our ad online. This behaviour naturally means that YouTube, as the best platform for discoverability of video content online, has been at the heart of our online strategy for many years.
As consumer behaviour has developed, YouTube has been at the forefront of new consumption trends – our Christmas ad is now enjoyed ‘on demand’ at any time. We now see the majority of our YouTube viewing from a mobile or tablet device, so our campaign is enjoyed in a variety of moments outside of the traditional front room screen, enhancing our overall reach.
The platform also provides our customers with the opportunity to delve deeper into the brand story. Whether with behind the scenes content or related gifting ideas, we use it to provide deeper engagement with our Christmas narrative.
"Our strategy was no different in 2017, with the additional focus on ensuring that we allowed users of the channel to enjoy our content upon launch, while, as a brand, taking the utmost care to ensure the ad was viewed within a brand safe environment."
The YouTube Ads Leaderboard is a list of the top 10 most popular video ads in the UK each month. The ranking is determined using some of YouTube’s strongest signals of viewer choice – number of views within the country, view rate (how much of an ad people choose to watch), and percentage of organic views versus paid views.
Created by adam&eveDDB, the John Lewis ad had just over 9 million views by December 7. Marks & Spencer’s "Paddington & the Christmas visitor" by Grey London had racked up just over 6.5 million views, making it the second most popular Christmas ad on YouTube. Sainsbury’s "Every bit of Christmas" by Wieden+Kennedy, had amassed nearly 4.5 million, at number 3.
