Google Ads find their way into YouTube Mobile
March 11, 2010 - By Jose A. Gutierrez
March 11, 2010 – Google ads, particularly the ones we get to see while watching our favorite clips on YouTube, may finally begin pay for the bandwidth bill for the mobile site (m.YouTube.com) as well. On March 10, 2010 Google announced, on their Official Blog, the addition of advertising on the home, search and browse pages of their YouTube mobile website.
With the rapid adoption of smartphones and YouTube-capable feature phones, Google is wasting no time in positioning YouTube as the primary means for mobile users to find, view and share video. At the same time, Google will help advertisers (and themselves by proxy) in reaching viewers across multiple platforms. At the point of launch, this will constitute one of the largest audiences ever seen for an ad campaign on the mobile web.
Back in 2006, the search engine Google, in the never-ending expansion of its virtual empire, made headlines in the tech and financial communities, when they acquired the as-of-then, still unprofitable young start up called YouTube, for $1.65 billion. At the time, the price tag made it the biggest acquisition in Google’s, then, nine-year history.
The integration of Google services with YouTube’s ability to effortlessly upload and share videos made this a perfect platform for their media advertising strategy. What was then a unprofitable statup with great potential has now turned into the premiere video sharing platform. Today, YouTube serves hundreds of millions of videos a day and uploading 20 hours of video every minute.
For now, advertisements will be limited to the American and Japanese mobile YouTube websites. To test it out, we took a trip to m.youtube.com, via the Apple iPhone. Interestingly, in our geographic location, using AT&T’s 3G network, YouTube mobile did show the ads, as described. Turning on the WiFi, though, resulted in no advertisements resolving. Well, it’s not perfect, yet, but this is Google we’re talking about. Thusly, we have no doubt the ads will be everywhere soon!
Proof of concept Google Advertising on YouTube mobile, with ads and without ads.
Well ads are great, because they help to keep the website free to users, but putting ads on youtube for mobile phones, is just a little too much, since you are working with limited space. But hey, would you rather pay for youtube? I don’t.
But you know, as the time goes on, someone will find a way to get rid of the adds, almost like adblocker from Firefox. I guess we will see!