• by Matt Hulett , January 13, 2015

YouTube is omnipresent and far ahead of the others to serve as the de facto platform for brands. However, what it offers, beyond the other de facto platforms to reach consumers, is that it houses the opportunity to serve as a platform for your brand’s monetization. Sound familiar? Yes, we see history replay itself over the years. Just as the blogging industry upended the digital publishing and web publishers disrupted traditional publishing. 

There were a lot of fits and starts, and mistakes were made in every era, leaving me to wonder, will the players leveraging YouTube learn from the mistakes of yesteryear to deliver value and reach an audience that has been traditionally nearly impossible to market to directly? 

YouTube is today’s most enviable content platform: one billion uniques with more than six billion hours of video are watched each month; 100 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute. For Millennials, YouTube is the only game in town. But as history has shown us based on entertainment platforms of the past (television and blogs are no exception), in order for companies to monetize their brands on YouTube, they first must realize it’s not about the money … yet. It begins with adding value and making a deep connection with your audience. 

Taylor Swift's recent YouTube stunt is case in point. A work of true marketing genius that left young fans (Millennials) misty eyed was a brilliant move for her brand. She differentiates herself from her competition and reinforces her reputation as a wholesome Millennial entertainer in a world where narcissism is the cultural norm. She’s not selling you anything, at least not in this video, because when you focus on adding value, the money will follow. It’s the unspoken 80/20 rule that successful brands and social media experts have with their followers. I’ll give you something for free most of the time, but every once in a while I’ll ask for something in return. And customers are happy to comply.

Another challenge brands face in this digital- and social media-driven world is the risk of losing control of their brand message. However, in Swift’s case, with 11,000 comments on this video alone (many of them negative), it seems she’s not relinquishing her control of how she’s discussed as a brand so much as she’s giving her fans a voice, and empowering her advocates to come to her defense. Times have changed, and so have consumer expectations about their roles in brand conversations. And once again, history repeats itself.  Let me explain.

Where we once consulted the Oxford dictionary for a definition’s absolute truth, we now look to Wikipedia, a crowd-sourced version of a dictionary — one that gives words and definitions fluidity, with definitions evolving as their meanings and use in society changes. Users take responsibility for updating accordingly, and we’re all comfortable with this. 

There’s a valuable lesson here for brands. Our customers want a voice, they want to be part of the conversation, and in doing so they become more invested. Success comes when we relinquish control and let our customers help direct the conversation rather than trying to control it for them. 

At the end of the day, brands will follow the technology adoption curve, from innovators to laggards, and some will never incorporate a “new” platform into their marketing strategy. However, savvy companies see YouTube for what it is — a marketer’s dream. And the good news is, there’s something for everyone. Whether brands are creating their own content or aligning themselves through advertising with content created by others — be it Michelle’s Makeup Line or Atomic Tom — this is premium content and consumers are engaged. There’s no one-size-fits-all approach. 

As we’ve learned from the Internet’s past, it’s a living, breathing platform that’s constantly evolving with new monetization opportunities emerging daily. Bottom line, if brands want to reach Millennials, they need to get some skin in the YouTube game. And while our recent ancestors may have waited for Sunday night to gather ’round the TV, dinners on their laps, exposed to new brands through breaks in “The Ed Sullivan Show,” today’s generation is not so different, hungry for brand engagement in their entertainment as well. 

We’ve seen it throughout the ages, and we once again find ourselves at a crossroads. As brands, we have a choice. We can engage with our customers on this platform, or we can sit back and hope YouTube monetization never takes off. After all, television monetization never did. Just don’t tell that to the brands paying $4 million each for their 30-second Super Bowl spot.