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Advertising opportunities on YouTube

Ad Specs Guide

Creating a Brand Channel

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NOTE: If you have migrated to our new design launched on March 7th, 2013, please follow the instructions specific to that interface HERE

Last updated: July 16, 2012
Overview
Setting up a YouTube brand channel account
Channel page layout and elements
Ads on your channel page
Customizing your brand channel
Selecting content for your channel
User tracking and metrics
Appendixes

Overview

This document explains how to create a YouTube brand channel page, a YouTube channel specifically designed to help you build your brand and keep your audience engaged. Your brand channel creates a destination page for your brand on YouTube, providing an opportunity to connect and create persistent relationships with your consumers.

Your channel page can show featured videos, playlists, and channels that you have selected. It can also show an activity feed that highlights recent activity in your channel. And, of course, it provides a way for users to easily find your uploaded videos, playlists, and favorite videos.

This document describes the different components of a YouTube channel page, including several channel customization options only available to brand channels, and explains how to customize them using YouTube's channel editing interface. It also describes the different channel page layouts from which you can select.

Special features for brand channels

Brand channels offer a number of features that are not available on standard channels:

  • Custom images

    • The channel banner option lets you display up to an extra 150 pixels of your channel background image above your channel content. You can also provide an image map to make the banner area clickable.
    • The watch page channel icon is a 25-pixel high image that has a flexible width, with a maximum width of 170 pixels. This image appears on the YouTube video watch page above the top-left corner of the video player.

  • Content playback and accessibility

    • You can specify demographic filters that restrict access to a brand channel (or redirect users to a different channel) based on a user's language, geographic location, age or gender.
    • You can set up a redirect to send visitors to http://www.youtube.com/YOUR_CHANNEL_NAME to another YouTube URL.

  • Tracking capabilities

    • Google Analytics lets you track user actions on your channel page, traffic referral data and much more.
    • A tracking ad unit, a 1px by 1px third-party tracking tag, lets channel owners use view-through tracking to better understand a user's behavior after the user leaves the channel page.
    • A survey tag tracks control and test groups.
    • Click-command links let you track users who click from your brand channel to other websites. You can also track post-click data associated with those users.
    • A tracking image url lets you collect statistics for views of your channel page or video pages.

    See the Additional tracking options section for more information about these features.

Setting up a YouTube brand channel account

If you do not already have a YouTube account, you will need to create one. When you click the Create Account link at the top of a YouTube web page, you will actually be directed to a page to create a new Google Account. A Google Account allows you to access numerous Google properties, including YouTube, Google+, and Google Analytics.

During the account sign-up process, you will be asked to specify a birth date, gender, and country. While this information is required to sign up, YouTube does not display your gender on your channel page, and you can configure your YouTube account settings so that the age and country do not display either.

The last page of the account sign-up process will display a button linking back to YouTube. Once you are back on YouTube, click on the name associated with your account and then click the My channel link to select a channel name. We also recommend that you make your channel private by unchecking the Visibility setting on the Info and Settings tab of the channel editing interface

Moving from setup to launch

After creating your account, send your YouTube username to your Google Account Team and request to have your account converted to a brand channel. We recommend that you then log in to your account and go to the Email Options page. On that page, choose the types of events for which you would like to receive email notifications or specify that you don't want to receive any emails for the listed events. Save your options when you're done.

You're now ready to begin uploading dummy video content and customizing your page. Do not upload the videos that you want to appear on your channel page yet. Once you receive confirmation that your account has been converted to a brand channel, you can complete the additional customizations that are exclusively available to brand channels.

The day before your campaign begins, upload the videos that you want to be visible on your channel page. Only relatively new videos are eligible to be among the "Most Viewed" videos of the day. We also recommend that you remove any dummy videos that you uploaded while designing your channel.

Channel page layout and elements

The image below illustrates the general layout of a brand channel page. The channel has a 150-pixel-high channel banner, which supports an image map so that that area can be clickable. The image pictures the channel's Featured tab, which displays a 640-pixel-wide video player in its main content area as well as a 310-pixel-wide sidebar, which displays information about the channel, links to social networks, and several content modules.

As shown in the image, the channel has 10 pixels of padding above and below the channel banner area. The modules in the left (wide) column, including the video player, are 640 pixels wide, and the modules in the right column are 300 pixels wide.

The numbered modules in the wireframe image contain the following content:

  1. The channel banner area, which is 970 pixels wide and up to 150 pixels hig, appears at the top of a brand channel page. It is only available for brand channels.

  2. The channel navigation bar displays the channel title, a button to let users subscribe to the channel, the number of current subscribers, and the number of video views in the channel. It also displays tabs for navigating to different content pages on the channel.

  3. The main content area displays content modules, including a video player and a list of featured playlists. This image shows the channel's Featured tab, which happens to be using the Everything feature tab template. The featured tab settings section explains the different template options and the modules that show up on each one. In addition, the selecting content for your channel section of this document explains what content appears on other channel page tabs.

  4. The sidebar displays information about the channel, links to social networks, and several content modules.

Ads on your channel page

Several types of ads can display on your channel page. In all cases, ads would only show up on your channel page if it is showing a video and ads would normally show up on the watch page for that video. This section explains the types of ads that could display as well as your options for hiding ads on your channel page.

  • A video could show pre-roll, mid-roll or post-roll ads. These ads would appear before, during or after the video in the video player.

  • A video can show an InVideo Flash overlay ad, which displays in the video player during playback.

  • A video can show an AdSense for Video overlay ad, which displays in the video player during playback.

  • A 300px by 250px video display ad can display in the sidebar. Please work with your account team to enable ads to display in your video player and on your video watch pages.

You can prevent ads from displaying on your channel page when the user is watching one of your uploaded videos. To do so, click the Edit button above the featured video, and check the setting to prevent ads from showing in your videos on your channel page. Note, however, that the switch will not prevent ads from displaying on your channel page if the user is watching a monetized video that you did not upload.

If you do not want any ads to display on your channel page, avoid adding monetized partner videos to your favorite videos or playlists. A video is monetized if an ad unit displays on the video's watch page.

Customizing your brand channel

The channel editing interface has five tabs that display the options for customizing your channel's content and appearance.

* The Custom Tab tab only displays if your channel is configured to display a custom tab.

Appearance

The Appearance tab lets you select branding images that will appear on your channel and video watch pages. You can also select a background color for your site, which will display on any area of the channel page that does not display your channel background image.

The appearance options are described below:

Avatar

Your avatar is a square profile image that appears on your channel page as well as several other places across the YouTube site, including your channel page, video watch pages for your uploaded videos, search results, comments that you have left, and so forth. We recommend that you upload an image of a product, logo or spokesperson closely associated with your brand.

Specs

The following list defines avatar requirements:

  • Size – 1600px by 1600px. Since smaller versions of your avatar may appear throughout the site, ensure that the image is recognizable when resized to 36 pixels square.

  • Image type – JPG, GIF, BMP, or PNG. (Animated GIFs are not allowed.)

  • Content – Pictures may not contain nudity, artwork, or copyrighted images, all of which violate our Community Guidelines. In addition, alcohol advertisers may not use images of celebrities.

  • Other regulations – Images must comply with FTC regulations regarding endorsement and necessary disclaimers.

Updating your avatar

You can update your avatar via your channel page or your profile setup page. The instructions below explain how to update the image via your channel page:

  1. Log in to your account and navigate to your channel page.

  2. Click the Edit Channel button.

  3. If you already have an avatar, click the Remove button below the Avatar header.

  4. Click the Choose file button below the Avatar header.

  5. Locate and select the image that you want to use as your avatar.

  6. Preview your avatar on your channel page. If you want to keep the avatar you have selected, click the Done Editing button. If you want to revert to your old avatar, click the Cancel button.

Channel background image and banner

Your channel's background image serves as a canvas for your page, and your channel page content will be overlaid on the background image. Selecting the right background image provides a consistent and seamless branding experience to your brand enthusiasts.

We recommend that you select a background image that mirrors the look and feel of your other online branding. For example, your background image can feature unique logos, images and celebrities associated with your brand. Please make sure you comply with FTC regulations regarding endorsement and any necessary disclaimers that may be needed.

By default, your channel will display 20 pixels of padding above the top of the channel navigation bar. However, as a brand channel partner, you also have the option of including a clickable banner in your background image. Note that the banner is just an area of the background image and is not a separate image of its own.

If you want the banner to be clickable, you can specify an image map with links that point either to different areas of your YouTube channel or to external sites. The clickable banner area is 970 pixels wide and can be up to 150 pixels high. The top of the banner area is 10 pixels below the top of the page, and the channel page content will appear 10 pixels below the bottom of the banner area. If you are specifying image map code, the top left corner of your image map (0 point) will begin 10 pixels from the top and 485px to the left of the horizontal center of your background image.

The image below shows the dimensions and padding of the clickable banner area.

The following list identifies a couple of best practices for your channel banner:

  • Use the channel banner to feature unique branding, images and celebrities. Including images of logos, products or celebrity spokespeople helps visitors to your channel page to quickly associate the channel with your brand.

  • Integrate your YouTube brand channel with your other online properties to create a seamless brand experience. For example, you could link the whole channel banner area to your website or use an image map to link to different areas of your website. (To really make the user experience seamless, remember to also link your website to your brand channel.)

If you would like your channel banner to be clickable, enter your image map code in the designated field in the Appearance tab. Your image map code only needs to include the <area> tags for the image map, though you can also wrap the tags in a <map> tag.

Background image specifications

Brand channels have the option of uploading background images up to 1MB. However, we recommend that you choose a background image that is 256KB or smaller, which is the maximum background image size for standard user channels. Larger background images correlate to higher page latency, so if you upload a 1MB image, users visiting your page will have to wait longer for your page to load.

There is no minimum or maximum value for the height and width of the background image. Though the widest point of the channel page content will be 970px, the total page height can vary depending on a number of different factors, such as the channel page template that you choose.

Typically, background images are between 1500px and 2000px wide and 1200px and 2500px tall. To ensure that your background image looks good for users who have different display settings, we recommend looking at each channel page tab in several different screen resolutions.

When you upload a background image, YouTube affixes it to the top and center of the page. You also have an option of tiling the image to fill the entire page background. Background images can be tiled horizontally, vertically, or both horizontally and vertically. If you do tile your image, we recommend that you blend the edges of the image to a solid color so that the tiles fuse together smoothly. While a background image is set to scrolling by default, you have the option of changing it to fixed. In this instance, your background image will remain fixed while all standard YouTube elements scroll across and through it. Note, this can have a negative impact on image mapping.

The image can be in GIF, JPG, or PNG format, though we recommend PNG format.

Uploading your channel background image

YouTube hosts all channel background images, so you will need to upload any background image that you want to use. The following steps explain how to upload a background image:

  1. Log in to your account and navigate to your channel page.

  2. Click the Edit Channel button.

  3. If you already have a background image, click the Remove button below the Background header.

  4. Click the Choose file button below the Background header.

  5. Locate and select the image that you want to use.

  6. Select the appropriate image tiling setting from the pulldown menu. The default setting is No Repeat.

  7. Preview your background image on your channel page. If you want to keep the image you have selected, click the Done Editing button. If you want to discard your changes and revert to your old background image, click the Cancel button.

Background color

You can select a background color to fill any space below or to the sides of your background image. If a background color will appear on your channel page, we recommend that you make sure the edges of your background image blend nicely into that color.

Watch page channel icon

The watch page channel icon is a 25-pixel high image that has a flexible width, with a maximum width of 170 pixels. This image appears on the YouTube video watch page above the video player's top-left corner and links to your channel page. The banner displays instead of a button that shows your channel's name. Note that your channel name also appears in the video description area directly beneath the video player.

The watch page channel icon is only available for brand channel partners. It presents an additional opportunity to promote your brand and lets you provide a more consistent branding experience for your channel and video pages.

The image below shows a sample watch page channel icon:

To update your watch page channel icon, click the Appearance tab in the channel editing interface and then click the Choose file button beneath the Upload watch page channel icon header. Select the locally saved image that you want to use for your banner. Click the Done Editing button to save your changes.

Info and settings

The Info and Settings tab, shown below, includes fields for setting basic information about your channel and for restricting access to your channel based on user demographics. It also includes fields for defining settings for tracking and metrics.

The list below describes the fields in the Info and Settings tab:

  • The Title for your channel displays at the top of your channel content and also above the information about your channel. It has a maximum length of 30 characters. The image below shows where the channel title (and description) appear:

  • The Description displays below your channel title in the sidebar.

  • The Tags field lists keywords associated with your channel. The keywords will help users find your channel via YouTube search results.

  • The Visibility setting indicates whether you want YouTube users to be able to navigate directly to your channel and whether you want your channel to appear in search results. We recommend that you remove the check from the setting's checkbox to hide your channel while you are still developing it and then reenable the visibility setting once you are ready to publicly launch your channel.

  • The Default Tab setting instructs users which content tab ("Featured," "Feed," or "Videos") users should see when viewing your channel.

    An additional checkbox below the setting lets you specify that users who have already subscribed to your channel should always view the "Feed" tab rather than the default tab that you have selected. This option exists because subscribed users are likely to have already seen your featured video (or playlist). As such, sending them to the "Feed" tab can give them access to the most recent activity on your channel rather than directing them to a tab that might contain more introductory information about your brand that they have already viewed.

  • Advanced settings

    • The Redirect URL field lets you redirect your channel to another URL on YouTube. We recommend using the Conditional Redirections field instead, which gives you more control over where different types of users will be redirected.

    • The Conditional Redirections field lets you restrict access to your brand channel based on a user's language, location, age, or gender. For example, you could specify a filter to block users in a particular country from seeing your brand channel or to redirect users in a particular country to another channel.

      You can enter one or more rules in the field's text area. Each rule defines a set of user attributes as well as the YouTube channel to which YouTube should redirect a user who matches the rule. (Instead of redirecting the user, a rule can also just block the user from reaching your channel.) When a user tries to reach your channel, YouTube applies the first rule in the list that matches the user's attributes.

      To use this feature, enter one rule per line in the format LOCALE,AGE,GENDER,REDIRECT_LOCATION. The list below defines the components of a rule:

      • The locale specifies the user's language and geographic location. YouTube identifies the user's language preference from the browser settings specified in the user's HTTP request and the geographic location from the user's IP address.

        Locales have the format LANGUAGE_COUNTRY, where the language is a two-letter ISO 639-1 language code and the country is a two-letter ISO 3166-1 country code. Both values are optional. If you enter a partial locale, include the underscore in the locale value so that YouTube can determine whether the two-letter code identifies a language or a country. The list below shows several examples:

        • fr_CA – Users in Canada whose browser language is French.
        • _CA – Users in Canada, regardless of browser language.
        • fr_ – Users whose browser language is French, regardless of location.

      • The age attribute specifies that the user must be a certain age to match a specific rule. A user must be logged in for YouTube to apply a rule that specifies an age requirement, and YouTube calculates the user's age based on the date of birth associated with the user's account. (A user must enter a date of birth to set up an account and cannot change that date after creating the account.)

        To specify an age value in a rule, use a comparison operator (<, <=, >, >=) and a number. For example, the value "<21" matches all users who are younger than 21 years old, while the value ">=21" matches all users who are at least that old.

      • The gender attribute specifies that the user must be a certain gender to match a specific rule. A user must be logged in for YouTube to apply a rule that specifies a gender. However, please note that users do not need to specify their gender.

      • The redirect location identifies the target location for the redirect. The redirect location can either be either the name of another YouTube channel or the term "_block".

        • If the redirect location value is another YouTube channel, then users who match the rule's user criteria – locale, age and gender – will be redirected to that channel.

        • If the redirect location is _block, then users who match the rule's criteria will be redirected to http://www.youtube.com/channels. This type of redirect lets you prevent certain users from visiting your brand channel and also indicates that you do not have another channel page to which you want to direct those users.

      The table below shows some sample redirects and their resulting actions:

      Redirect Action
      _US,>=18,f,thissamplechannel Send all women in the United States who are at least 18 years old to http://www.youtube.com/thissamplechannel.
      <18,_block Block users who are younger than 18 years old and redirect them to http://www.youtube.com/members. (Note that this rule only applies to logged-in users.)
      fr_CA,frenchcanadians Send users in Canada whose browser language is French to http://www.youtube.com/frenchcanadians.
      f,alltheotherladies Send all other women to http://www.youtube.com/alltheotherladies.
      ,alltheotherfolks Send everybody else to http://www.youtube.com/alltheotherfolks. Based on the previous rules, this rule would apply to logged-out users who are not in Canada with a browser language of French. It would also apply to logged-in, male users whose browser language is French and who are at least 18 years old and not in Canada.

    • The Tracking Image URL field lets you specify the URL for a 1px by 1px tracking pixel that you use to collect statistics for views of your channel or video pages.

    • The Google Analytics Account ID field lets you enter the ID for a Google Analytics account that you want to use to track and measure traffic to your channels.

      Google Analytics provides a comprehensive view of how visitors access and interact with channels. Analytics reports provide data such as traffic referral patterns, repeat visitation, user demographics, and much, much more. Please see the Tracking with Google Analytics section for more information about this feature.

The Featured tab is an optional channel page element that lets you highlight content that you think will be most engaging to users. For example, you could use the Featured tab to highlight a recently uploaded video or the first video in a series. If you opt to display the Featured tab, you can then choose one of several templates, each of which highlights content differently and affords certain types of content more prominence than others. You can preview any template by selecting it in the channel editor and not clicking on the Done Editing button.

The table below lists the different templates, a recommended use case for each template, and the content modules that each template displays. Most modules can also be removed. The modules are explained in more detail later in this section. We recommend that you consider the amount and type of content that you have to select the template that best fits your needs.

Template Use case Modules
Blogger Channel owners who create a single-set of content that is updated regularly • Featured video
• Video log
• Featured playlists
• Other channels (sidebar)
Creator Channel owners who create multiple-sets of different themed content • Featured video
• Featured playlists (sidebar)
• Other channels (sidebar)
Network Channel owners who manage a parent Channel and have multiple Channels associated with it • Featured video
• Featured channels
• More featured channels (sidebar)
Everything Channel owners who want a mix of all the templates • Featured video
• Featured playlists
• Featured channels
• More featured channels (sidebar)
Live Broadcaster Channel owners who broadcast live events. (This template is only available for live event broadcasters.) • Featured video (or live event)
• Completed events
• Featured playlists

The instructions below explain how to enable the Featured tab to display on your channel page and to select its template:

  1. Log into your channel and click the Edit Channel button.

  2. Click the Featured Tab.

  3. Check the Enable featured tab box.

  4. Click any of the template images to immediately see a preview of your channel in that template. To keep the template you have selected, click the Done Editing button. To discard your changes and revert to your old settings, click the Cancel button.

This section describes the various modules that can appear on the "Featured" tab:

Every template includes a featured video player that displays at the top of the "Featured" tab's content. You can select any video that you have uploaded, marked as a favorite, or added to a playlist to be your featured video, and you can change the video as often as you like. We recommend that advertisers either select the video most important to their campaign or brand or choose an introductory video that explains the kind of content users can expect to find on the channel.

To select a featured video for your channel, log in to your account and click the Add a featured video button on the "Featured" tab to open the module pictured below. If you have already selected a video, click the Edit button that appears above the video player.

This module also lets you set two other options:

  • You can choose to have your featured video play automatically when a user arrives on your channel page. (Users will not need to manually click the play button to play the video.) Videos that play automatically will be included in the video's view count.

  • You can disable ads from running in your featured video module.

The Creator, Blogger, Network, and Everything templates all display a featured channels module. The module displays each channel's avatar, name, and subscriber count. For example, you might use the featured channels module to promote channels that market your brand to users in other countries or to market other brands affiliated with your own. (You can also use the module to feature channels that you don't manage.)

In addition, the Network and Everything templates display a second module that lets you highlight even more other channels on your channel's "Featured" tab.

The modules displays differently depending on the template that you have selected:

  • The Network and Everything templates display the "Featured channels" module in the main content panel and a second module for even more channels in the sidebar.

  • The Blogger and Creator templates display the "Featured channels" module in the sidebar.

The instructions below explain how to add channels to the "Featured channels" or "Even more channels" modules. Note that channels will display in the order that they are added. You can also change the module title in the editing interface.

  1. Click the Edit button next to the module title to open the module for adding featured channels shown below.

  2. Enter the name of the channel you want to feature. You only need to enter the channel name – e.g. "googlechrome" – and do not need to include a full URL.

  3. Click the Add button.

Each featured channels module can display up to 16 channels. You will see an error message if you try to save your changes and you have more than 16 channels added to either featured channels module. The image below shows how featured channels appear when the module displays in the sidebar.

The Blogger, Creator and Everything templates all display a "Featured playlists" module, which lets you highlight your uploaded videos, your favorite videos, and any of your playlists.

You can add up to 20 lists to the module, and you can also modify the module title if you wish. (By default, the title is "Featured Playlists.") The instructions below explain how to add modules to the list:

  1. Click the Edit button next to the module title to open the module for adding featured playlists shown below.

  2. Click on the "Select playlists to add" dropdown to see a list of lists that you can add to the module.

  3. Check the box next to each list that you want to display.

  4. Click the Add Selected button.

  5. Adjust the order in which items will display by dragging them into the desired order. To drag-and-drop an item, click on the icon next to the list's title and then drag it to the desired position.

  6. Click the Apply button to save your changes.

The image for each playlist is a combination of the thumbnails for the videos in that playlist. (Up to five video thumbnails may be included in the playlist thumbnail. The thumbnail for the first video in the list appears on the left side of the image with subsequent images displayed from left to right.

You can create playlists by going to the Playlists page for your account, which is accessible via the Video Manager, and clicking the New playlist button. You will then be prompted to specify a title and description for the playlist. After clicking the Create playlist button, you will then be directed to a page where you can define the playlist's settings. You can also specify videos to add to the playlist by specifying their URLs.

You can also create a playlist by navigating to the video watch page for a video that you want to add to that list. On that page, click the Add to button below the video player and then select Add to new playlist from the dropdown menu. You can then specify a title for the playlist and indicate whether it is public or private.

The image below shows how featured playlists appear when the module displays in the sidebar.

Video log

This module displays a list of videos from a selected playlist, your uploaded videos, or your favorite videos. For each video in the list, the module displays an image, video title and description, and a view count.

If you select your favorite videos or uploaded videos, the module displays the videos in reverse chronological order beginning with the video most recently added to that set. If you select a playlist, the module displays videos in the same order that they appear in the playlist. As such, if you choose to feature videos from a playlist in your video log module, when updating that playlist, you may want to add new videos to the beginning of the list (if that makes sense) so that the module content does not appear stale. You could also frequently select a different playlist to avoid the perception of stale content.

Completed events

This module displays a list of live events that have already been broadcast on your channel. For each event, the module displays an image, the event title and description, and the event date.

Custom tab settings

The Custom tab offers a dedicated and flexible space on your channel where you can augment video content with relevant promotions and information. The tab contains an iframe that displays an externally hosted gadget. All gadgets are subject to review and must conform to our gadget developer guidelines to be approved.

If your channel has been enabled to display a custom tab, your channel editor will display a Custom Tab tab, where you can customize the following settings:

  • Custom gadget settings

    • The Enable custom tab checkbox indicates whether the custom tab should display on your channel.

    • The Tab Title field specifies the text that will display in the tab itself. The title has a maximum length of 16 characters. The default tab name is Custom. If you set the title to an empty value, the tab will display "None" as its tab name.

    • The iFrame URL field, which you cannot edit online, displays the location of the externally hosted gadget that appears on your channel's custom tab. Contact your Google sales team to set the gadget URL for your channel as well as the proper height for the iframe. (The default iframe height is 600px.)

    • The Vanity URL field lets you specify a uniquely addressable URL for your channel's custom tab that is different from the channel's vanity URL. The custom tab URL will be:

      http://www.youtube.com/user/<YOUR_CHANNEL_NAME>/<YOUR_CUSTOM_VALUE>

Selecting content for your channel

While you can choose any tab as the default view for visitors coming to your site, regardless of the tab that you choose, it is important to engage users with fresh content that captures your brand image. (The Info and settings section explains how to set the default tab for your channel.)

The following list offers several recommendations on how to directly engage users:

  • Talk directly to users about your brand.
  • Highlight news, brand or product updates, contests, and other information that your brand enthusiasts value.
  • Update your featured video frequently to keep fresh content on your channel page.
  • Create playlists of your featured content so that, with little navigation, users can view multiple videos that you have selected to showcase your brand.
  • Provide information that will help users navigate through your channel's content.
  • Encourage users to share their experiences with your brand either by uploading videos that feature your product or service or by posting comments on your channel page.
  • Encourage visits to your other brand properties, including your website.
  • Music, movie and TV brands can feature previews, trailers, music videos and behind-the-scenes footage.

The following sections explain how to customize your channel's content:

Featured tab

The Featured tab is optional and designed to let you highlight the content that you think will be most engaging to your users. The featured tab templates section describes the different templates that you can choose for this tab, and the modules section explains the different modules that appear on those templates.

Feed tab

The Feed tab, which displays on all channels and cannot be disabled, lists a channel owner's activities on YouTube. This tab lets you engage with the YouTube community even if you don't have new videos to upload by taking any of a number of actions throughout the site. Those actions include:

 

  • Marking a video as a favorite
  • Liking a video
  • Commenting on a video
  • Uploading a public video
  • Adding a video to a public playlist
  • Subscribing to a channel
  • Posting a bulletin to your feed

 

You can select which types of activities will appear in your feed by navigating to the Sharing tab in your account settings and selecting the appropriate sharing settings for users on YouTube. Note that the choice you make regarding whether to share that you have marked a video as a favorite will also affect the playlists listed on your channel's Videos tab.

Activity sharing settings take effect immediately and are retroactive. For example, if you elect to stop sharing information about channel subscriptions, no subscription events will appear in your activity feed, including subscriptions that you created before changing your sharing settings.

You can opt to have the Feed tab be the default tab for users who have already subscribed to your channel rather than the default tab that you selected for unsubscribed users. This option can direct subscribed users to the most recent activity on your channel rather than to a tab that might contain more introductory information about your brand that they have already viewed. See the Info and settings section for more details.

Posting a bulletin to your activity feed

One way to engage users who visit your Feed tab is by posting a bulletin to your activity feed. When submitting a bulletin, you can enter a comment up to 500 bytes long as well as a link to a video or playlist.

In your feed, users will see a thumbnail image from the video or playlist (if you provided a link) as well as information about the video or playlist, such as its title and description. The post will also display your comment and other actions that you have taken that pertain to the video or playlist, such as marking the video as a favorite.

To add a bulletin, log in to your channel and enter your comment in the box above your activity feed. If you want to include a video or playlist in the post, paste the URL for the video's watch page or for the playlist into the link field. The click Post to add your bulletin to the feed.

A sample bulletin post that links to a video is shown below:

Enabling or disabling channel comments

You can also opt to display comments on a separate subtab of the Feed tab. If you enable channel comments, users will be able to post comments in a box that appears in the sidebar of your channel page beneath your channel title and description. Please note that channel comments are different than video comments. You can set different comment settings for your channel and for each video that you upload.

Allowing users to post comments on your channel and video pages can encourage them to interact with your brand and foster a sense of community. Empowering users to share their opinions and feedback can also help you obtain valuable, direct insight into your brand that can improve your programming and marketing decisions. At the same time, enabling users to post comments bears a certain degree of risk since comments might contain inappropriate language or display inappropriate profile icons.

To enable (or disable) channel comments for your channel, click the Settings button below the area where you would post a bulletin to your activity feed. This will open the settings box shown below:

Image of Activity Settings box, which is used to set option for displaying channel comments

Select the appropriate option from the activity settings box:

  • Allow channel comments – Your channel will display a field for users to post channel comments in the sidebar on the Featured and Feed tabs on your channel page. The Feed tab will also display subtabs for your activity feed, which will be the default view when users navigate to that tab, and for user-submitted comments. Those comments will automatically be publicly visible on your channel.

  • Allow channel comments but don't display until approved – The display settings described for the previous option are all the same except user-submitted comments will not be publicly visible on your channel unless you explicitly approve them. (You can also delete submitted comments that you do not want to approve.)

  • Disable channel comments – Your channel will not display a field for users to post channel comments. In addition, the Feed tab will always display your activity feed but will not display subtabs for switching between the activity feed and channel comments.

Note: If you do allow users to post channel comments, you can still remove comments that you find unsuitable for your brand or flag comments as spam.

Videos tab

The Videos tab lets users find all of your uploaded videos as well as your public playlists. Depending on your sharing settings, the list of playlists may include your favorite videos and the list of videos that you have marked to watch later. Finally, if you are a live broadcaster, this tab includes a separate subtab that lists past events broadcast on your channel.

By default, users will see a list of your uploaded videos when they navigate to the Videos tab on your channel. If you have not uploaded any videos, then the viewer will see a list of your playlists. The Videos tab cannot be disabled, and you cannot customize this functionality.

Users can browse through your channel's content by clicking the "Uploaded Videos," "Playlists," and, if you are a live event broadcaster, "Events" subtabs in the left navigation panel.

  • If a viewer clicks on a video, he will be directed to that video's watch page where the video will automatically begin playing.

  • If a viewer clicks on a playlist name, he will be directed to a playlist page, which lists the videos in the playlist and displays their titles, view counts, and uploader names.

  • If a viewer clicks on a playlist image, he will be directed to the video watch page for the first video in the playlist. Each video in the playlist will play in sequential order and then proceed automatically to the next video.

Sorting video and playlist content

Users who visit the Videos tab on your channel can sort the list of your uploaded videos by using the dropdown menu above the list. Videos can be sorted by upload date from newest to oldest (default) or oldest to newest. Videos can also be sorted by popularity, which is defined in this context as total view count.

Sorting by date is also supported for playlists. Note, however, that sorting is based on the the time that videos were added to each playlist. As such, if you are still adding new videos to your oldest playlist, it could be listed first regardless of the selected sorting option.

If you are a live broadcaster, your Videos tab will also display a subtab where users can see a list of past events broadcast on your channel. Completed events are sorted in reverse chronological order (from newest to oldest).

Choosing playlists to display

The Playlists tab displays your public playlists, including your "watch later" playlist, as well as your list of favorite videos if they are also publicly visible. You can customize the displayed lists by adjusting your privacy and sharing settings.

  • To hide a playlist or your list of videos to watch later, log in to your account and navigate to the Playlists tab in the Video Manager. Click the Edit button next to any playlist you want to hide, set the playlist's Privacy setting to Private, and save your changes.

  • To hide your list of favorite videos, navigate to the Sharing tab in your account settings. In the Share your activity section of the page, remove the check mark next to the Favorite a video option in the list of sharing settings for users on YouTube.

Custom tab

As noted above, the Custom tab offers an area on your channel where you can supplement video content with other promotions or information. The tab contains an iframe that displays an externally hosted gadget. The iframe has an adjustable height and can be either 640px wide or 970px wide:

  • A 640-pixel-wide gadget displays in the left (wide) column. For this gadget size, the sidebar that is also visible in the Featured and Feed tabs will display in the right (narrow) column. The gadget is positioned at the top left corner of the gadget space and has a white background.

  • A 970-pixel-wide gadget encompasses the entire space below the channel tabs. The gadget is positioned at the top and center of the gadget space and can have a transparent background.

The sidebar displays text-based information about your Channel, links to social networking platforms and other websites that you manage, and content modules. It is visible on the Featured and Feed tabs. If your channel has a custom tab with a 640-pixel gadget, the sidebar will be visible on that tab, too.

Editing the sidebar

To edit content in the sidebar, click the Edit button that appears beneath the channel navigation bar.

In the editing interface, you can modify the following display settings and values:

  • You can link your Google+, Facebook, and Twitter accounts to your YouTube profile. If you click the Show checkbox for any of those accounts, the relevant social networking platform's icon will display in the sidebar for your channel and link to your profile or feed.

  • You can display links to up to 20 URLs of your choice and set a custom title to display for each link. If the website has a favicon, the sidebar will display the favicon next to the link text. If no favicon is available, the sidebar will display a globe icon.

  • You can set values for a variety of metadata fields intended to describe the YouTube account holder, such as "About this user," "Hometown," "Occupation," and so forth. The fields will only display in the sidebar if you have set a value for that field and its display setting is set to Show (rather than Hide).

The sidebar may also display the following other types of content:

  • If your channel is configured to allow users to post channel comments, the sidebar will display a textbox for posting channel comments. The enabling or disabling channel comments section explains how to modify this setting.

  • Depending on which template you have selected for the Featured tab, the sidebar will display content modules listing featured channels and/or featured playlists.

User tracking and metrics

The following sections discuss different types of metrics and user tracking options available for your channel and your videos:

Standard channel metrics

YouTube automatically collects the number of views of your channel and the number of subscribers to your channel. Both figures can be found on your account dashboard, and the subscriber count is also visible in the channel navigation bar on your channel page.

Standard video metrics

YouTube collects the following statistics for each video uploaded to your channel:

 

  • Views, which includes all views on the watch page as well as other views using YouTube's embedded player.
  • Number of comments
  • Number of video responses
  • Number of ratings
  • Number of times the video was marked as a favorite video
  • Average rating

 

These statistics are publicly visible on the watch page for each video, though counts may be delayed up to 24 hours. In addition, the total number of video views for all of your videos is visible on your channel page and in your account dashboard.

You can monitor these statistics in any of the following ways:

 

  • Check the individual watch pages for your videos to collect the statistics.
  • Write a script that uses the YouTube Data API to retrieve statistics for your videos.

 

Viewership data

YouTube Analytics lets you analyze viewership data, based on registered users, for your videos. Analytics reports include performance metrics, engagement statistics, demographic data, and discovery sources. You can access YouTube Analytics data for your channel by logging in to your account and then navigating to https://www.youtube.com/analytics/.

Please see the YouTube Help Center for a discussion of the data available in YouTube Analytics reports.

Tracking with Google Analytics

Google Analytics enables YouTube brand channel owners to track and measure traffic to their channels. Google Analytics provides a comprehensive view of how visitors access and interact with channels. Analytics reports provide data such as traffic referral patterns, repeat visitation, user demographics, and much, much more.

Google Analytics integration on YouTube is only available for brand channels.

Setting up Google Analytics for your brand channel

  1. SIgn up for a Google Analytics account.

    If you have en existing Google Analytics login, we recommend that you create a new account by logging in and then selecting Create New Account in the dropdown menu on the top right side of the page. Although you could create a new profile within an existing account, creating a new account ensures that the data from your YouTube channel does not impact the data summaries from your other websites.

  2. Fill in the required fields for your account. We recommend that you enter your YouTube brand channel URL as the website URL for the Analytics account. After you complete the set-up process, Analytics will display code that includes a profile ID in the format UA-#######-#. You will need this value in step 5.

  3. On your Google Analytics account settings page, click the User Manager link shown in the image below:

  4. Log in to your YouTube account and go to your channel page. In the channel editing interface, go to the Info and Settings tab and enter your Google Analytics profile ID in the Google Analytics account id field. Then save your changes. Data about your brand channel will begin populating your Analytics reports as soon as you save your profile ID.

Accessing Analytics reports

The following steps explain how to access Analytics reports for your brand channel:

  1. Log into Google Analytics at http://www.google.com/analytics.

  2. Click the name of the Google Analytics account for your channel.

  3. Click the View Report link to select the appropriate Google Analytics profile.

  4. Use the navigation links in the left dashboard or in the different page sections ("Site Usage", "Content Overview", etc.) to access reports for your channel. For example, the "Pageviews" report shown below is accessible via either the left dashboard ("Visitors > Visitor Trending > Pageviews") or the Pageviews link in the Site Usage section.

    We think you may find the following reports useful:

     

    • Map Overlay report ("Visitors > Map Overlay") explains where your viewers are located geographically.
    • The Languages ("Visitors > Languages") identifies your users language preferences.
    • Visitor Trending reports ("Visitors > Visitor Trending") explain the size of your audience over time.
    • Visitor Loyalty reports ("Visitors > Visitor Loyalty") identify the number and percentage of repeat visitors to your channel.
    • Traffic Sources reports explain how users navigate to your channel, including search engine keywords, statistics about clicks from referring sites, and campaigns. By digging deeper into Traffic Sources reports, you can determine how users interact with your channel after reaching it from a link on a particular site or a search for a particular keyword.

     

    Please see the Google Analytics Help Center for more information about the types of Google Analytics reports that are available.

Understanding Analytics reports for brand channels

The following information may help you to interpret data in Analytics reports for your channel:

  • Google Analytics tracks your brand channel as well as child pages within the channel, such as the pages that show all of your subscribers or favorite videos. However, Google Analytics does not track activity on video watch pages associated with your account. Google Analytics also does not track activity that takes place within gadgets on your channel. You will need to set up a separate Google Analytics ID if you would like to track activity on a custom gadget. As described earlier, YouTube Analytics provides viewing metrics and user information for your video watch pages.

  • Since YouTube and Google Analytics use different reporting methodologies, they may provide different numbers for the same statistic. YouTube tracks channel views from the time that you create your account, whereas Google Analytics only tracks views after you have added your Google Analytics account ID.

  • The Traffic Sources reports identify referral information. In those reports, any reports that result from clicks within the www.youtube.com domain are reported under direct/none. This classification also includes visits resulting from the user typing your channel URL directly into the browser. It also includes visits for which referring information was blocked or not detected.

  • The Traffic Sources reports provide data about keywords used to reach your channel page via external search engines, such as Google, Yahoo, Ask, etc. The keywords do not include data from searches on YouTube.

  • Clicks on Promoted Videos ads do not appear as a campaign in the AdWords traffic reports, but you can track them via the Top Content report as long as the ads drive traffic directly to your brand channel. To do so, use the search field at the bottom of the report to filter for URLs containing the string "pyv". In each of those URLs, the kw parameter contains the keyword that led to the visit.

    The number of pageviews that Google Analytics provides for Promoted Video URLs may differ from the number of clicks in your campaign reports. For common causes of this discrepancy, please see this AdWords help article.

Additional tracking options

YouTube supports the following additional tracking options for brand channels, and we encourage you to use these features to track additional metrics for your channel. These options are not available on standard channels:

  • Tracking Ad Unit – Brand channel owners can provide exactly one 1px by 1px third-party tracking tag, which lets the channel owner use view-through tracking to better understand a user's behavior after the user leaves the channel page. This tag runs for the length of your media campaign. Note that third-party tracking tags cannot record page interaction data or calculate the time that the user spends on your channel page.

    You will need to coordinate with the third-party vendor to ensure that the tag collects the desired information. YouTube will not be able to run serving reports on the tag, which will be served on the page as an ad unit and not embedded into the page code. YouTube supports tags from vendors listed at https://www.google.com/adsense/support/bin/answer.py?answer=94149.

    YouTube brand channel partners commonly use one of the following types of tracking tags:

    • A standard ad tag, or impression counter, tracks the number of views on your channel page and drops a cookie to enable further user tracking. We recommend this approach if you want to see how users engage with your website after viewing your brand channel. The cookie lets you track unique views as well as view-through conversions as long as you set up the appropriate conversion tracking tag on your website.

      For example, when a user visits your YouTube channel, the ad tag will count a single view and drop a cookie on the user's browser. If the user then purchases an item on your website, the conversion tracking tag on your site will read the cookie dropped by your ad tag and assign credit for the conversion to your YouTube campaign.

      To include the tracking tag on your channel page, email the tag to your Google Account Team in a .txt file at least five days before your channel launches.

    • A conversion tracking tag reads cookies that users received when viewing your third-party served ads on other websites or other areas of the YouTube site. We recommend this approach if you want to test media placements or creatives to determine the most effective ways to drive traffic to your YouTube channel.

      The conversion tracking tag assigns credit to an ad if the user saw the ad even if the user did not click the ad. To use this tag effectively, you will need to set up your conversion tracking tag to correspond to creatives that you use to promote your YouTube campaign. Commonly used conversion tracking tags include DART Spotlight tags and Atlas universal action tags.

  • Survey tags are 1px by 1px tags that track control and test groups. YouTube has certified the following vendors for research: Comscore, FactorTG, Insight Express, Nielsen, Nielsen IAG Research, Safecount/Dynamic Logic.

  • Click-Command tags let you track users who click from your brand channel to other websites as well as any post-click data associated with those users. You can implement click tags on any links in the channel banner.

    If you are using a standard ad tag, we recommend that you set up click-command tags in the same campaign as your 1px by 1px ad tag so that you can properly track conversions.

  • Tracking Image URL – You can specify the URL for a 1px by 1px tracking pixel that you use to collect statistics for views of your channel or video pages. While tracking tags can drop cookies to track behavior, this simple pixel can only count impressions. Please see the discussion of branding options for tracking and redirects for more information

Appendixes

Appendix A: Best practices for brand channels

This section summarizes best practices that can maximize the impact of your brand channel:

  • Design – The design of your channel page should reflect your brand identity.

     

    • Select compelling channel and video page icons that display your branding.
    • Customize your channel theme and design to reflect your brand.
    • Use the video page banner graphic for branding.

     

  • Content – The success of your channel is largely dependent on the content that you upload.

    • Make sure you have a devoted liaison developing your YouTube channel.

    • Emphasize the quality of your videos over the quantity of videos that you upload.

       

      • Update your content frequently, uploading at least one to two videos each week to keep fresh content on your channel.
      • Update content on a regular schedule to help users anticipate when you will have new content at your channel.
      • Upload your video library over time to encourage repeat visitors and viewership over time.
      • Update the video featured on your channel page frequently.
      • Explain what types of content are available on your channel.

       

    • Upload at least three videos to ensure that your channel appears in natural search results on YouTube.

    • Engage your audience.

       

      • Encourage visitors to add comments and video responses to your videos.
      • Encourage visitors to rate, share and subscribe to your videos.
      • Mark other users' videos as favorite videos if they have great content that is relevant to your channel.
      • Send messages to other YouTube users who subscribe to your channel, add comments or video responses to your videos, or post other videos with content relevant to your channel.
      • Explain how users can add their own videos that might appear on your brand channel.

       

    • Promote your brand channel on your other online properties and use your brand channel to link to those properties.

    • Add in-depth brand/company profile information.

       

      • Provide your brand or company name.
      • Describe your brand or company.
      • Provide a website URL.

       

  • Administration – You are responsible for managing the content, graphics and branding on your brand channel.

    • YouTube does not prescreen the content that you add to your brand channel, though that content is still subject to YouTube's Community Guidelines.

    • YouTube publishes an XML content feed specification that explains how to provide metadata about your content to YouTube. You can also upload videos and enter video metadata manually. In both cases, YouTube provides content management tools to help you administer the availability of your content and other policies regarding the way your content is displayed. The following features are among those that these tools currently provide:

       

      • You can restrict access to your brand channel so that it can only be viewed in specific territories. (YouTube will determine whether a user can view your brand channel based on the user's IP address.)
      • You decide if other websites can embed your content.
      • You decide if your content will be accessible on non-web platforms – e.g. YouTube's mobile website, TV, etc.
      • You can change the settings for individual videos at any time.
      • You can also remove your content from YouTube, and you can turn off embedding at any time.

       

    • YouTube will display content on your brand channel in accordance with the instructions that you provide via the content management tools described above.

    • You may not brand your channel using the word "YouTube", the YouTube logo, or any other similar text or logo that might confuse users without explicit written permission from Google. For more information, please see Google's brand guidelines.

 

updated 03/20/2013

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