YouTube's most-watched-video lists are full of viral hits and popular music videos. But the majority of videos uploaded to Google's (GOOG) video site are hardly watched by anyone.
Some 53% of YouTube's videos have fewer than 500 views, says TubeMogul. About 30% have less than 100 views. Meanwhile, just 0.33% have more than 1 million views.
That's not a huge surprise. But it highlights some of the struggles Google could have selling ads around all those unpopular videos, despite the money it has to spend to store them.
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Not really. Storage costs are minimal. Bandwidth is what is costly. And if the videos are almost never shown, they consume almost no bandwidth.
So the need to sell ads against a video is proportional to the video's popularity.
That might be for an individual video, but if over half of the total storage costs are wasted on never watched videos, that still sums up...
I haven't had a chance to look at the states from YouTube Insights yet, but I'm pretty sure engagement is high. Her channel has over 10,000 subscribers, and many of them add comments and post video responses. Whenever she posts a new video, there are thousands of views within 24 hours, and in some cases 10,000-20,000 views within a week.
I only watch about 1 in 20 videos that I find on youtube all the way through. For those embedded within outside webpages I will view 1 in 4 to completion, but youtube doesn't own the page wrapping the content here so monetisation is nonexistent.
If Youtube search worked, and was able to filter out camwhore video responses and useless slideshows (amusingly most have the audio disabled due to copyright) that number would be a lot higher. As it stands, none of this crap is monetisable. If youtube ran prerolls, I wouldn't bother with the site. 95% of midrolls I won't see, and postrolls I'll skip. I imagine CPM on banner ads accompanying 'camwhore video user doesn't want and is likely to navigate out of within 5 seconds' is likely to be very very low.
It matters to me in terms of popularity of the video producer. I'm looking for ways to leverage that fan following. If I know that most videos don't attract viewers, but my video producer is attracting thousands of viewers consistently, that's a selling point for that video producer and I will try to leverage that, both on and offline.
From YouTube's perspective, the company is seeking out and partnering with YouTube creators who have a following. They are putting ads on those videos and offering to give the creators a percentage.
So it does matter if one video has 1 million views versus 1 millions videos with one view.
"But it highlights some of the struggles Google could have selling ads around all those unpopular videos, despite the money it has to spend to store them."
Partner a gets (and I can't remember if this is correct) a 45% rev share on the 1,000 video plays they've received across 1,000 videos.
Meanwhile:
1,000 publishers individual earn 45% rev share across the 1 video a piece that each get a single view.
Google makes the same 55% from the CPM.
Now:
1,000 random people earn 0% off of the 1 video a piece that each get a single view. Google makes 100% of the CPM, although that doesn't include overlay/lower third advertisement.
Simply put, Google makes the same amount of money either way. The impetus to drive video views is put on the publisher, and overall plays *do* matter, but the amount of times an individual title is played is irrelevant. Certainly, there are minor cost-of-business issues (storage, bandwidth), but on a whole 1,000 views is 1,000 views.
My understanding of partnerships is that they are not offered to everyone who puts up a video. These arrangements are only offered to producers with significant traffic.
Not every video has an advertising overlay.
The musician I have been referencing does have partnership status with YouTube, does have advertising overlays, and does receive income from YouTube.
I have checked videos done by others who have less traffic. I don't see Google ads at the bottom of those videos.