Big Advertisers Leaving YouTube/Google

[TylersMagic]

Advertisers have the ability to control what videos or genre of videos their ads appear on and who they appear to. I Would put the blame more on the advertisers than on YouTube. If they switch to Facebook, they would face the same problem, their ad could appear next to a hateful post or on a hateful page.
If they want to solve the problem, they could target their ads better. Also I don't think many people would take an ad appearing on a video as an endorsement from either the video maker to the advertiser or the advertiser to the video content, unless it was obvious like the YouTuber appearing in the ad.

 

[Crown]

Advertisers have the ability to control what videos or genre of videos their ads appear on and who they appear to.

I agree, but as an adwords user myself, it's a very time-consuming process to find the placements video by video. I have the time to do it, but I doubt huge advertisers do. Big advertisers like the ones mentioned in the article usually have time-senstitive advertising campaigns that they need to get out to as many people as quickly as possible nationally and sometimes internationally. Example a new movie coming out that has mainstream appeal. I'm guessing what has happened is that they've selected some of the top channels and checked "put ads on all videos for this channel" or maybe even they're just used keywords.

I think that the new AgeGate feature that everyone is moaning about is actually Youtube's attempt to address this. ie, It's more than just protecting the kids, it's also about effectively filtering out the "inappropriate" or "non-advertiser friendly" content for the advertisers.

 

[xingcat]

I think the days of machine-gunning advertisements onto any and all things that YouTube creators put up online will be over in a few years. Yes, messaging is one thing, but also there's a huge issue with advertisements just not getting to the right audience with such a scattershot approach. There was an idea that if you put up enough ads everywhere for a very low price, you'd have a decent ROI on it, but considering the age of the average YouTube watcher (quite low) and what advertisements are usually produced on YouTube, it's not working out for many of them.

 

[JesusGreen]

This is why I'm (somewhat begrudgingly) in support of the whole "advertiser friendly content" thing they've been trying to do over the past few years. I've so far been unaffected by the system other than a couple of videos that were automatically demonetised and then remonetised anyway.

The thing is by being a bit stricter on what content can or cannot be monetised they make the site more appealing to advertisers as a whole. More appealing to advertisers means better ad revenue, which'd be great because CPM has been steadily decreasing over time. I can't give specific numbers since I believe that would be breaching TOS, but suffice to say my CPM now has almost halved since a year ago. It's possible that's just my channel but from what I've heard CPM has been steadily decreasing for a while now.

 

[Lekjih]

I'm less than impressed with this. Racists still need to know who to buy their shampoo from xD

 

[How To For Kids]

Advertisers will always be where the most views are. I think that youtube and google will solve this. They are quite capable.

 

[FamilyToyReview]

For now - Marks and Spencer, UK government, RBS, Lloyds and HSBC (the fourth largest bank in the world). Sky and Vodafone most probably are next.

The reason: these brands ads were appearing alongside rape apologists, anti-Semites, hate preachers and so on videos. Basically the brands were sponsoring the organizations behind these videos.

Here is the complete article:

bbc.com/news/business-39325916

The last sentence of the article is quite interesting:
"Every incident like this gives Facebook an opportunity to steal a march on Google," he said.

In anyway if Google does not fix this issue - and if it does not fix it fast - the good days of YouTube are behind us (I think).

The weird thing is Facebook has the same problem. There are tons of hate, gore, violence, propaganda, and stolen movies on facebook. But they're not being targeted like Google. I think Facebook is just as bad if not worse than Google. There are some pages that livestream pirated movies on facebook. And I think facebook's authentication system is weaker than google.

Seems as if this witchhunt is more than just about principle. Probably some political element involved. Europe already has it against Google with their antitrust lawsuits. If it really were about the bad content, then they should also declare removing ads from facebook, twitter, and the rest of the internet.

I wish more was said about this.

 

[chottom]

The weird thing is Facebook has the same problem. There are tons of hate, gore, violence, propaganda, and stolen movies on facebook. But they're not being targeted like Google. I think Facebook is just as bad if not worse than Google. There are some pages that livestream pirated movies on facebook. And I think facebook's authentication system is weaker than google.

Seems as if this witchhunt is more than just about principle. Probably some political element involved. Europe already has it against Google with their antitrust lawsuits. If it really were about the bad content, then they should also declare removing ads from facebook, twitter, and the rest of the internet.

I wish more was said about this.

You may have a good point here.
Last year both in Europe and US important political decisions were influenced by "faked news" (usually sponsored by Russian special services) and social media and news websites played important role in it.
May be this is a way to tell them (the social media and especially Adsense/Google which is the main reason many news websites to exist) to start to introduce some fake news check ups or the money will go away.
Of course this is just a speculation of mine.

 

[clerick]

I've said in other posts but I used be a tv director for sports, talk shows and news. All tv shows must inform advertisers of the content of the program if it's scripted (usually meaning not live) and give them a chance to endorse with ad money or withdraw. For things like news, you can't do that but they give out an expectation of what will air and what things will never be aired. Maybe for example if there's a crime scene you won't show blood, etc.

So why should YouTube be any different?

Because that's why television is terrible. It has to abide the whims of advertising money, and that dictates what kind of content is acceptable or not and is controlled by their viewpoint. Turning youtube into TV will be horrible and produce the same garbage.

 

[PictureFIT]

Because that's why television is terrible. It has to abide the whims of advertising money, and that dictates what kind of content is acceptable or not and is controlled by their viewpoint. Turning youtube into TV will be horrible and produce the same garbage.

YouTube has to abide to the whims of advertising as well. Where else are they going to get the funds to keep their service afloat? As much as some people might not like YouTube having to "control" the content that is advertiser-friendly, it is the gist of running a business. After all, you're still allowed to post non-friendly material. Just don't expect to make money out of it.