Buying Masthead Ads on Youtube

November 12, 2021
Updated:
May 1, 2023

Buying Masthead Ads on Youtube

Abby Costello

Masthead Ads on a large platform like YouTube offers your brand great exposure. A masthead ad is a large ad placed at the top of YouTube’s homepage, on mobile devices and desktop, for 24 hours. Acting as a digital billboard, you can use photos, videos and social media sharing buttons to gain as much brand exposure as possible. These ads are normally purchased on the terms of cost-per-day by country. YouTube is now experimenting with purchasing their ads on a cost-per-thousand (CPM) basis.

How Brands Can Benefit

Masthead ads on youtube

In the past, advertisers were paying for a masthead ad on YouTube’s homepage, so they were paying for brand exposure without a specific target audience. They were able to choose which country they would like to advertise in, but they couldn’t use user history to target their ads. With YouTube’s masthead improvement, advertisers can now customize their audience. Ad campaign flights can run anywhere from one day to a full week. Ad placement is remaining a reserved buy, but YouTube guarantees impressions from their masthead ad.

How it Works

Masthead ads have some unique benefits. Their watch time on YouTube’s homepage has grown ten times in the last three years. The ad recall has also improved, with an average lift of 92% and a 46% lift in purchases. YouTube offers a tool so brands can test their ad and see what it would look like and how it would perform on YouTube’s homepage. The ads on the homepage run without sound, but once someone clicks on the video they are taken to the brand’s channel. Brands have the ability to customize their ad title, description and the call-to-action button that is shown next to the video.

Reaching a target audience is becoming easier. YouTube is the biggest online video platform, so what better place to advertise. Google did some research and found that the ads on YouTube’s homepage increased brand exposure. Users were four times more likely to search the brand and engage in more videos. With YouTube’s new improvements to their masthead ads, brands can target their audience, expect more exposure and are guaranteed impressions.

Related Articles