YouTube: No More 30 Second UnSkippable Ads

YouTube have announced that they will scrap unskippable 30 second advertisements as of 2018.

Google confirmed the plans to scrap these ads saying “We've decided to stop supporting 30-second unskippable ads as of 2018 and focus instead on formats that work well for both users and advertisers”.

These long unskippable ads are generally seen as a nuisance by many YouTube users, which have led to Google introducing shorter formats.

Google will continue to allow 20 second unskippable adverts as well as six second ads which were introduced back in April 2016.

Shorter, skippable ads are believed to be better for marketing as it encourages advertisers to be more creative about the way they use the time, as well as force them to use higher quality content to hook the viewer in.

Google has even said that skippable ads deliver strong engagement results and that the viewers that completed a 30 second skippable advertisement were 23 times more likely to visit or subscribe to a brands channel, watch more of the brands videos as well as share the brands videos.

This announcement has come shortly after Facebook announced that they were scrap pre-roll ads, which means that they will now only allow mid-roll ads on their platform.

The scrapping of unskippable ads is not only good for the viewer but also the advertiser; an unskippable ad is seen as a nuisance, which results in viewers clicking onto another page or switching tabs while the advertisement plays. However, skippable ads, generally holds the viewers’ attention for at least 5 seconds before they can skip the ad, which gives advertisement a small window to grab the viewers’ attention and draw them in so that the viewers actually watch the entire ad.

So hopefully, we can expect to see a lot more high quality video advertisement in the future.