How To Get Longer Views Of A YouTube Ad

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Quick Personal Message From David

Very few things hinder views and attention length of views of your YouTube ads more than the nasty, dreaded [SKIP AD]!

  • We spend countless hours filming and producing a video ad.
  • We study and interview to identify a potentially-receptive audience.
  • We spend hard dollars to target that audience on YouTube with the right message at the right time.

The ad shows and five seconds later…….

Bane of video content producers is "Skip Ad"!

….they’re gone.

The best way to get more views and longer views is to produce content that is targeted to your audience and delivered when they are most receptive to your message!

However, due to desensitization of audiences (and our learned habit of “skipping ads” – Thanks TiVo) , even the best material falls victim to our noisy digital environment.  

Try one of these techniques on your next videos:

Eyes Up And Left

The quickest way to prevent "Skip Ad" is to ensure viewer is looking somewhere else!

If you’ve watched my Killer Video webinar, you saw this scene. Whether you recognized it or not, it was completely intentional!

At three seconds (and until around eight seconds – see red arrow above), the scene pulled out and a basic textual graphic appeared in the upper left corner of your screen. 

  • I looked at it.
  • I pointed at it.
  • Following my visual clues, you probably looked at it too.

At five seconds (when YouTube’s [Skip Ad] button would have appeared), you weren’t looking at the bottom right of the screen (where it would have appeared).  

This technique uses our human tendency to follow the visual clues given by others in deciding where to pay attention.  Magicians exploit this tendency as a primary foundation for their acts. 

As content producers,  we can utilize this moment to grab our potential audience’s attention and deliver some real value to the relationship.  

Note: We better have an engaging hook or connectable story once we have grabbed the attention.  There is little difference from a conversion perspective between an ad skipped at eight seconds than one skipped at five!

Specifically Identifying Your Audience

If you are selling to everyone, you are selling to no one!  [Seth Godin Quote]

Consider how we seek to attract attention on different platforms:

  • YouTube – You are trying to avoid the [Skip Ad].
  • Facebook – You are trying to interrupt their timeline scroll.
  • Instagram – You are trying to get them to interact with your Story.

In each of these situations, your content (that is being targeted to an audience) must motivate an interaction (with an individual)

In the Killer Video template, there was a division introduced between a Teaser and an Introduction.

Most of us use an Introduction to:

  • Identify ourselves
  • Give a preview of what we will talk about

This typical Introduction pattern is ineffective because (for our potential audience – who did not know us, was not searching for us, or our content) they do not care who we are or what we want to talk about!  We are an interruption to what they selected! 

If we are to earn the interrupt, then our first interaction needs to quickly and specifically identify to whom we are talking and how we intend to help them

The Teaser model affords us the opportunity to do just that. 

Don’t – “Hi, I’m David.  Today, I want you to check out my webinar on Knots.”

Do – “Hey, Scouters!  Do you feel that imminent feeling of Doom knowing that you have got to teach a group of youth to tie knots…..and you don’t even know how to tie them yourselves?”

The latter beats the former for a couple of important reasons:

  1. The former communicates the story from the perspective of the storyteller; not the audience.  It speakes to the identity and intended outcome of the narrator; not the listener. 
  2. The latter speaks to the emotions and feelings of the audience member; not the group.  By immediately speaking to the current need-state, it fosters a relationship (and suggests possible satisfaction of the need – even if it is just being realized). 
  3. The latter (specifically identifying the target) opens the opportunity to produce multiple Teases (for each of many market sub-segments).  All members of an audience are not uniform.  The more directly (and earlier) that you can speak to each sub-segments unique characteristics and need; the more likely that you will earn their attention. 

 Note: This is a point where some content producers might argue.

  • But then it limits the size of my potential audience
  • But that would take more time to develop Teasers for each individual market sub-segment.       

When you only have a few seconds to interrupt your audience’s actions, it needs to be crystal clear to whom you are speaking!  If you have to invest a little more time developing multiple interrupts targeted to more specific characteristics and if you have to be more focused in targeting your sub-segments, the net outcome will be better attention (and better conversion).  

Gary Vaynerchuk mentioned this idea in a speech to the University of Alabama Football team.  Check it out.  

Recap

This material is a piece within the Killer Video category produced by SirusDigital. The cornerstone piece of is a free webinar that you can view starting at this post.

  1. How To Get Longer Views Of A YouTube Ad
  2. Quickest Tactic To Make Your Videos More Effective
  3. Supercharge Your YouTube Endcards
  4. Biggest Mistake Video Creators Make

Extra: List of SirusDigital Apps And Tools

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