Ill-Advised Ads For Google

OK, even if youre not surprised by that move, you may be surprised by Googles decision to make the new paid search ads video ads. Some early customers claim to be satisfied.

But Im not sure YouTube video advertising is such a great idea.

Advertisers accustomed to the effectiveness of paid search in driving sales are unlikely to be happy with YouTube video ads for several reasons:

• Video ads are harder to make. Paid search ads are plain text -- just a title and a description. While it takes skill and effort to craft a good search ad, I think it takes more to create a decent video. When its more difficult to make the ads, fewer advertisers will be successful.
• Fewer people will click video ads. Even if you create a good video ad, its worthless unless you get folks to click on it. Because watching a video requires more of a time commitment than looking at a Web page, not as many people will look at a video ad.
• Fewer people will buy from video ads. Its not that the video ads will be less persuasive -- perhaps theyll be more emotionally riveting and be even more effective than their plain text counterparts. No, the real reason that video ads will drive fewer sales is that they are being shown to the wrong people.

Why do I claim that video ad watchers are the wrong people? It all has to do with qualification. Think for a moment about the folks looking at paid search ads. Why are they searching in the first place? They are often trying to buy something. Not always, for sure, but often enough to make a paid search ad extremely timely. Youre reaching a potential customer at exactly the right moment with your message.

On the other hand, what are people doing when they watch YouTube? A cynic would claim they are wasting their time, but even a proponent of Web video like me would admit that they are looking for entertainment, not for products and services. In short, they arent qualified prospects. If youre showing your ads to the wrong people, it doesnt matter how interesting or inexpensive the ads are. What do those qualities matter if your ads are driving few sales?

Now, understand, video ads make sense for some businesses. I mean, if you are marketing a new movie, then it makes sense that youd be trying to get people to view your trailer. Thats how you get people to decide to go to the theater.

But most of us arent marketing movies. So, sure, go ahead and try video ads. Run an experiment to see if you increase sales based on video. But dont get carried away. If video ads dont carry their weight because other marketing tactics are more effective, shift your spending to tactics that work.

After all, youre better off driving sales than being innovative.

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