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Hello and welcome to another edition of Digital Marketing Week in Review by Four Dots – our weekly column where we comb through some of the most relevant news and events that took place within the digital marketing landscape over the last week or so.

Let’s see what “November 2020: Week 4” edition brings us:   

  • YouTube is Running Ads On Non-Monetized Channels, With No Cut For The Creators
  • YouTube Analytics Now Shows Traffic Sources
  • Instagram Introduces Keyword-Based Searches 
  • New Ways to Track/Monetize Content on Facebook and Instagram
  • Google’s Finishes up The Migration of Its Disavow Tool to GSC

Alrighty then, let’s dive right in! 

 

YouTube Is Running Ads On Non-Monetized Channels, With No Cut For The Creators

Quite a fuss has been raised amongst YouTube content creators as the platform has recently introduced an update to its terms of service. The change denotes that YouTube will be showing ads even on channels that chose not to monetize their content. 

Running ads on non-monetized content in and of itself could have been enough reason for agitation, but the decision that stirred the pot to the point of boiling was not to give any share from ad revenue to those channels. 

Typically, YouTube content creators allow ads to be shown on their channels by joining the YouTube Partner Program which is how they get their share of revenue generated by ads, which is (for the majority of YouTubers) the main benefit of opting for serving ads. 

Here’s part of YouTube’s announcement:

“Starting today, we’ll begin slowly rolling out ads on a limited number of videos from channels not in YPP. This means as a creator that’s not in YPP, you may see ads on some of your videos. Since you’re not currently in YPP, you won’t receive a share of the revenue from these ads, though you’ll still have the opportunity to apply for YPP as you normally would once you meet the eligibility requirements.”

A great number of creators and artists have so far been refusing to incorporate ads in their videos so their audiences could enjoy their content uninterrupted. Like good guy Gotye, for example, who turned down over 10 million dollars in ad revenue for this purpose. 

However, it seems that ads simply cannot be stopped and that we are slowly but surely approaching the plot of that South Park episode where one of the characters turns out to have been a humanoid ad the whole time. With the entire 2020 feeling like one giant ill-conceived and annoying mid-roll ad, all is very much possible.  

 

YouTube Analytics Now Shows Traffic Sources

Some good news from YouTube. Namely, the network is now allowing content creators to have more insight into where their views are coming from by adding new metrics to its video analytics reports. 

The channel owners have access to a new type of report in the YouTube Studio Analytics tab where there’s a new section titled: “How viewers found this video.”

The details about this new feature have been tackled in the recent Creator Insider video: 

The new traffic source-focused report lists the following metrics: 

  • traffic source
  • the percentage of views generated by each traffic source
  • the total number of viewers from each source

This new information could prove to be quite valuable for content creators as they can now use it to better advertise their content and make more effective marketing campaigns. Read more on the new update here. 

 

Instagram Introduces Keyword-Based Searches 

Instagram is finally upgrading its search engine functionality. The users have so far been capable of searching content only through usernames, profile names, hashtags, and location tags, which rendered a lot of content unsearchable. 

Now, Instagram users are finally able to find the content they are looking for by using keywords that may have been used in the photo/video caption section.

This should immensely improve the functionality and effectiveness of Instagram’s search, but there are still many aspects of this new feature that need to be understood and addressed. For example:

  • Does this new search algorithm understand synonyms? 
  • Will it look for exact matches only?
  • Is there an AI-based system for deciphering the contents of the photos and videos?
  • Will it first look for more recent content over older videos/photos?

We’ll find out soon enough. 

 

New Ways to Track/Monetize Content on Facebook and Instagram

Facebook is adding new ways for FB and IG users to boost the revenue generated through original content.

Creators now have more opportunities to monetize their content when it gets re-posted across the networks, while they also have more access to Facebook’s content claim tools.

The main update comes within the Rights Manager, more precisely its improved Collect Ad Earnings tool, which now lets you change the rules for recognizing duplicate content and claim revenue from that piece of content.  

Facebook match rules | Four Dots

(Image Source: Facebook)

As per Facebook:

“We’ve improved our Collect Ad Earnings tool and are expanding availability, which means that more creators will be able to collect ad earnings from matching videos that include in-stream ads. We’ve added a new filter view for spotting monetizable matches, better guidance for how to capture monetization opportunities, exportable revenue reports, and the ability to collect ad earnings while placing an ownership link on the matched video.”

This new upgrade should help Facebook and Instagram content creators to have more control over their content management options and therefore more easily boost their revenue potential. More info available in this Social Media Today article. 

 

Google’s Finishes up The Migration of Its Disavow Tool to GSC

Google has finally completed the migration of its Disavow Links tool to the new and improved Search Console interface, with the company also updating its support page so it features new guidelines. 

The Disavow Link tool is an extremely useful piece of software when you want to inform Google about spammy links that should not be taken into consideration. The need for this type of utensil rose after Google introduced the famous Penguin algorithm that tracked spammy links and penalized websites that featured those links. 

Though Google was at first reluctant to provide publishers and website owners with this type of tool, the company eventually caved in as many publishers ended up losing substantial amounts of traffic for long periods of time even though some shady links weren’t even their own fault. 

New Improvements for the Disavow Link Tool? 

Google boasts 3 upgrades being done to the tool:

  1. Improved interface
  2. Download a disavow file as a text file
  3. Error reports for uploaded files are no longer limited to 10 errors

For those interested in learning more about the tool, we recommend reading this informative SEJ’s guide.  

 

Wrapping Up

That would be all for this installment of Digital Marketing Week in Review by Four Dots. See you next week, until then – feel free to check out our previous edition!

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