YouTube – snapshot (Photo credit: tarop)

From the Dollar Shave Club to the taxidermy mastery of Chuck Testa, YouTube has shown itself to be an indispensable tool for businesses with creative campaigns to market themselves. Yet, until now, YouTube lacked the insightful and statistics-heavy tools that many brands use on sites like Facebook for evaluating their advertising campaigns. In a blog post on the YouTube blog, Baljeet Singh, a group product manager for YouTube, has introduced Google AdWords for video.

“With a global audience of 800 million monthly visitors to YouTube, every day can feel like you’re advertising in the Super Bowl, and one video can launch a business,”Singh wrote in the post.

Google AdWords for video will offer several ways for a businesses advertisements to gain visibility and micro target users who show interest in their products or industry. Combining YouTube with the Google Display Network, which includes millions of websites, allows brands to decide whether they want to pay to have their content searchable by a specific keyword or in connection with common interests or searches.

AdWords will also allow businesses to better understand the effectiveness and efficiency of their ad campaigns on YouTube. Tools will allow businesses to see how many people stayed to watch the entire video, visited the company website, stayed on the channel to watch another video and if they shared the video or subscribed to the channel after viewing an ad. In conjunction with AdWords will be TrueView video ads which allows for less wasteful spending, ensuring creators are only charged when people are truly engaged by the video and not those who skip the video or are repeat viewers.

To get the initiative rolling, Google and YouTube are offering $50 million in free advertising to help 500,000 businesses get into the online video world. Companies new to YouTube will receive a $75 credit when they sign up, enough money for a video campaign to reach 1,500 customers on YouTube for one month. YouTube is also offering an Advertiser Playbook sharing tips on how videos can help your business and the My Business Story channel, which are free tools you can use to create your first video. A so-called ambassador program, comprised of nine businesses who have built a following through successful through video campaigns, will be another resource for businesses that are new to YouTube to learn how to grow their brand.

Source :- http://www.huffingtonpost.com

Related articles

• Google AdWords for video rolls out of beta and is now available for every business (thenextweb.com)

The opening studio logo from The early 1960s Metro Goldwyn Mayer cartoon logo (As seen in Gene Deitch’s Tom and Jerry cartoons.) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Google is adding 600 movies from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer to the titles it has available for rent on YouTube and also Google Play, its digital content store for Android-powered mobile devices.

MGM, whose film library includes classics like “Rocky” and “Rain Man,” joins five other major studios offering movies for rent through Google: Viacom Inc.’s Paramount, Comcast Corp.’s Universal, Sony Corp.’s Sony Pictures, Time Warner Inc.’s Warner Bros. and The Walt Disney Co.

Several smaller studios including Lions Gate Entertainment Corp. and The Weinstein Co. also rent movies online through Google.

YouTube is available on computers and mobile devices, as well as on Google TV, an Internet-connected TV platform available on certain Sony televisions and Blu-ray players and the Logitech Revue set-top box.

Google Inc. is based in Mountain View, Calif.

Source :- http://www.huffingtonpost.com

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• YouTube, Google Play to add 600 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer movies (ctv.ca)

Just several weeks after Google’s controversial privacy policy changes went into effect on March 1, the company has

Image via CrunchBase

announced the arrival of a new feature called Account Activity.

According to a March 28 blog post by product manager Andreas Tuerk, this new offering will send you a monthly password-protected report laying out information such as log-in, email, and web search activity — essentially a collection of user dataGoogle has stored and is now sharing across many of its services, a move thatconcerned some consumer groups and users.

According to The Verge, the new feature works with both regular Gmail accounts and Google Apps users with custom domain names.

Signing up for the Account Activity beta will allow you to easily track how you’ve been using your Google account. For example, you can view devices and locations where you’ve logged in, what browsers and/or platforms you’ve used to do so and what authentication changes may have been made to your account.

In addition, you’ll be able to see the places you’ve visited and tracked through Google Latitude; stats and trends in the emails you’ve sent and received; and the types of searches you’ve conducted, along with your top queries.

LOOK:

Active YouTube users who have linked to their Google accounts can view how many videos they’ve uploaded in a month, which of them was most popular, and a list of viewers’ locations.

LOOK:

What do you think of Google’s new Account Activity feature? Let us know in the comments!

Source :- http://www.huffingtonpost.com

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Once upon a time, back in November of last year, the New York Times reported that the Walt Disney Company and Google’s YouTube had struck a deal: the pair would spend $10 million to $15 million to create an original video series that would be featured on Disney’s YouTube channel.

An awesome added bonus: Disney would feature full-length episodes from some of its most popular television series on YouTube — for free.

According to an AllThingsD report on March 5, this part of the agreement just recently went into effect. In the last few days, full-length episodes from Disney original series like “The Suite Life of Zack and Cody,” “The Proud Family,” “Hannah Montana,” and more have cropped up on Disney’s YouTube channel. Right now, there’s a total of 67 uploads.

The Verge pointed out that the original content Disney said it would be creating for YouTube — a webseries based on the mobile app “Where’s My Water?” – has yet to pop up on its channel alongside the company’s full-length television series episodes; however, Disney has uploaded nearly a dozen of its minute-long “Last Minute Book Reports” videos, a series also run as podcasts on its website.

This news may be exciting for some older Disney fans who have likely grown up to be savvy web-users (and might feel a bit nostalgic…). Along with more recent TV hits, Disney’s YouTube channel features episodes from long-lost, off-air series like ”Lizzie McGuire” and “Even Stevens,” which had been popular in the early 2000s. But, unfortunately, there are only a few of each of those so far.

To find out what other shows you can watch on Disney’s YouTube channel.

Source:- http://www.huffingtonpost.com

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• Disney Channel content hits YouTube (slashgear.com)

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On Monday, Nielsen released the results of a study on the most popular smartphone apps in the Android market.The rankings were based on how many people had used the app during the previous 30 days. The data was collected through proprietary device meters that had already been installed on the participants’ phones as part of an ongoing smartphone study. The results were broken down by age groups: 18 – 24, 25 – 34 and 35 – 44. Several of the apps were similarly popular across all three groups. Facebook and Gmail, for example, had been used by at least 70 percent of all participants, regardless of age. Other apps showed more surprising results. Angry Birds was most popular among the oldest group, (35 percent of 35 – 44-year-olds had used it) and least popular in the younger demographic (22 percent of 18 – 24-year olds had used it).

When compared to the top free iPhone apps, the results indicate that Android users are somewhat less creative than iPhone users when it comes to their application choices. Six of the top seven most-used Android apps come pre-installed on Android phones, while none of the top seven iPhone apps come preloaded. Check out  below to see the most used Android apps for people aged 25 – 34. 

• Android Market - Percentage of 25-34 year olds who had used their Android Market app in the past month: 92

• Facebook - Percentage of 25-34 year olds who had used their Facebook app in the past month: 81

• Gmail - Percentage of 25-34 year olds who had used their Gmail app in the past month: 80

• Google Maps - Percentage of 25-34 year olds who had used their Google Maps app in the past month: 79

• Google Search - Percentage of 25-34 year olds who had used their Google Search app in the past month: 78

• YouTube - Percentage of 25-34 year olds who had watched videos on their YouTube app in the past month: 56

• Angry Birds - Percentage of 25-34 year olds who had played Angry Birds in the past month: 29

• Pandora Radio - Percentage of 25-34 year olds who had played Pandora Radio in the past month: 28

• Quick Office - Percentage of 25-34 year olds who had played Quick Office in the past month: 27

• Advance Task Killer Free - Percentage of 25-34 year olds who had played Quick Office in the past month: 26

• Words With Friends - Percentage of 25-34 year olds who had played Quick Office in the past month: 22

• Amazon AppStore - Percentage of 25-34 year olds who had played Quick Office in the past month: 22

• Adobe Reader - Percentage of 25-34 year olds who had played Quick Office in the past month: 22

• The Weather Channel - Percentage of 25-34 year olds who had played Quick Office in the past month: 18

• Yahoo Mail - Percentage of 25-34 year olds who had played Quick Office in the past month: 17

Related articles

• Which Android apps are the most popular? (news.cnet.com)

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Now, companies large and small — from Coca-Cola and The New York Times to your local bike shop or animal shelter — can set up their own Google+ profiles and connect with other users. Already, some pages have attracted thousands of followers. (Mashable’s Google+ page, for example, currently boasts just under 30,000.)

Google’s social network has experienced remarkable growth since its launch over the summer. The company announced in October that Google+ membership had reached 40 million, and the web giant continues to pursue new customers by gradually integrating its various web products with Google+. Earlier this month, Google rolled out a new Google+ sharing button for YouTube and new Google+ extensions for the Google Chrome browser. In addition, a ” target=”_hplink”>controversial update to Google Reader recently tied the product more closely to Google+, although users didn’t take to the change as willingly as they seem to have welcomed Google+ Pages.

Initially, Google actively tried to keep businesses out of Google+ by deleting non-human profiles. Google has finally changed its tune to match those of Facebook and Twitter, both of which have embraced the presence of brands in the social space.

The MSNBC-owned Breaking News has compiled a list of top news organizations to add to your circles on Google+. We chose nine that showed particular spark, be it frequent posts, interesting content or great photos. Check out the news organizations you need to be following on Google+.

• PBS - Embedded videos, frequent posts and links to interesting content, even if it’s not PBS, are what make the Public Broadcasting Service’s Google+ profile worth a follow.

• The Atlantic - Instead of just using snippets, The Atlantic’s Google+ posts seem specifically tailored for, well, Google+. Many are expandable and tell enough of the story that if you just want a quick overview, you wouldn’t even have to go to The Atlantic’s website. They also give a great daily run-down of top stories.

• Time - On the Time profile, you can check out Time covers, find the Google+ profiles of the magazine’s writers and read about what’s going on at their offices. For example, on Tuesday they apparently held a discussion with Brian Williams, Jesse Eisenberg and other celebrities about who should be named 2011′s Time Person of the Year.

• The Wall Street Journal- The Wall Street Journal already has over 9,000 followers, so it’s no surprise that they have a lot of chatter on their profile in the form of comments and shares. Because the comments come right after each post, they are actually easy, and dare we say enjoyable, to read. Is it possible that Google+ will usher in a new era where comments aren’t the worst things on the internet?The photo banner across the top of The Wall Street Journal’s profile features drawings of Barbie and Snoop Dogg, which should not be overlooked.

• Mashable - Besides having lots of photos, Mashable does a pretty good job keeping the page updated with posts from their website, although oddly they all seem to be about Google+.

• The New York Times - According to their profile, The New York Times readers wanted to see photographs and international news on Google+. Which is exactly what the Times gave them when they put out a call for their “Picturing 7 Billion” project in honor of the Earth’s population passing 7 billion people in late October.

• Al Jazeera - The English version of the Arabic-language news network has original embedded videos, articles and more. It’s a great way to follow Al Jazeera if you don’t have TV.

• The Huffington Post - Whether you’re in the mood for “Obama Healthcare Reform Ruling” or “Panda Pees On Sleeping Pal’s Face” The Huffington Post’s Google+ profile is the page to be at.

• Breaking News - MSNBC’s Breaking News page posts the most recent reports from a variety of national and local news outlets.

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• Introducing G+ Business Pages (seo.com)
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Justin Bieber has become the first person in history to get 2 billion views on YouTube according to social media monitoring company Famecount.

It seems only fair that Bieber should be the one to break this record, since his career may never have been possible without YouTube. According to a Billboard profile, the Canadian teen began posting videos of himself singing cover songs at age 12. The videos were discovered by a talent scout, Bieber was signed to Usher’s record label, and four years later he’s so famous that a lock from his formerly floppy hair sold for over $40,000 on eBay earlier this year.

YouTube has long relied on user-generated content, like that of the young Bieber, but that may be changing. On Friday, Google’s video site announced that they would be adding 100 new video channels with original content paid for by YouTube. Celebrities who are already signed on to make videos include Madonna, Amy Poehler, Shaquille O’Neal and Deepak Chopra.

Check out our List below to see which stars are getting the most play on YouTube.

• Justin Bieber - Total upload views of the Justin Bieber’s official Youtube channel: 2,005,750,829

• Lady Gaga - Total upload views of the Lady Gaga’s official YouTube channel: 1,884,714,763

• Rihanna - Total upload views of the Rihanna’s official YouTube channel: 1,715,373,887

• Eminem - Total upload views of the Eminem’s official YouTube channel: 1,518,412,058

• Shakira - Total upload views of the Shakira’s official YouTube channel: 1,219,321,792

• Black Eyed Peas - Total upload views of the Black Eyed Peas’ official YouTube channel: 1,114,831,071

• Britney Spears - Total upload views of Britney Spears’ official YouTube channel: 1,016,386,053

• Beyonce - Total upload views of Beyonce’s official YouTube channel: 1,015,063,204

• Chris Brown - Total upload views of Chris Brown’s official YouTube channel: 869,800,231

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Image by Shekhar_Sahu via Flickr

Got a Google TV? Time to download the update!

On the heels of Ice Cream Sandwich, Google’s big upgrade to its Android operating system, Google has also announced (via a post on the Google TV blog) some major updates to the Google TV software.

The new software brings some cosmetic changes, as well as more functionality. Aesthetically, Google says it has updated the appearance of YouTube on the TV screen, as well as the main interface of apps. Below, the new homescreen:

We’ve improved search across the board for content from Live TV, Netflix, YouTube, HBO GO, and more. But what if you don’t know what to search for? There’s now an app called “TV & Movies” that let’s you easily browse through 80,000 movies and TV episodes across cable or satellite, Netflix, Amazon, YouTube, and many other sites. If you’ve opted in to recommendations, we can better predict what you want to watch next.

Finally, Google announced that app developers can now develop new apps for Google TV as well as adapt existing apps for the Google TV software; those apps will be available for download through the Android Market for those with Google TVs.

The software updates will begin rolling out to those with Sony televisions with Google TV next week, with Logitech Google TV boxes coming soon thereafter.

Google TV was announced to much fanfare in May 2010, with the first models released in October of that year. At an original price point of $300 for a set-top box, sales of the Logitech Google TV were a huge disappointment and caused major losses for the company; units now sell for $99, the same as competitor Apple’s TV set-top box.

And that road may get rockier still. The Apple rumor mill has ground out another whopper: Apple may be developing an HDTV set. A line in Walter Isaacson’s biography of the Apple co-founder set off recent speculation about an Apple TV set. “I’d like to create an integrated television set that is completely easy to use,” Jobs said, according to the bio. “It would be seamlessly synced with all of your devices and with iCloud,” Jobs also said to Isaacson. “It will have the simplest user interface you could imagine. I finally cracked it.”

Source :- http://www.huffingtonpost.com

Related articles

• Google TV gets updated with simpler interface, app dev tools (macworld.com)
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On October 19 in Hong Kong, Google took the wraps off Android 4.0 (aka Ice Cream Sandwich), the biggest update to the company’s popular mobile operating system since the tablet-optimized Android 3.0 (aka “Honeycomb”) debuted in early 2011.

The Ice Cream Sandwich release brings a new focus on ease-of-use and aesthetics. While Android 3.0 focused solely on large-screen mobile devices, Android 4.0 improves many of those features and scales them down for use on mobile phones, too. “We tried to create a palette and a language and a sense of being that’s clean and modern and graphic, but isn’t a straightjacket.” Matias Duarte, who head Android’s user experience team, told This Is My Next. “We’ve taken what Honeycomb has done and pumped up the snooty design quotient, and we’ve toned down the geeky nerd quotient. We’ve made it a lot more accessible. But we haven’t taken it in a new direction.”

See the biggest new features Google’s Android 4.0 has to offer (below), then check out Samung’s Galaxy Nexus, the first device built specifically for Ice Cream Sandwich.

• More Camera Features - What’s different about camera functions in Android 4.0? A whole lot, starting with Instagram-esque photo-editing tools and deeper integration with social networks. TechCrunch is gaga over the improvements, lauding the “image stabilization, improved autofocus, and integration with other apps for sending photos or instant upload to Google+. Oh, and who could forget built-in face detection, panorama and time lapse modes, and on-the-fly photo retouching and enhancements.” Like Apple’s new iOS 5, Android users will also be able to access the camera right from the lock screen.

• Sleeker Look - Ice Cream Sandwich’s totally revamped interface places even more emphasis on Google’s search bar and aims at making Android more user-friendly. Among the new features are a new typeface called “Roboto” with more rounded letters, as well as scrollable and re-sizable widgets. The snazzy UI also places more of an emphasis on finger gestures.

• New Security Feature - Android 4.0 users can rest easy, knowing that their devices will feature the nifty Face Unlock, which scans the user’s face before unlocking the gadget.

• Data Management - A data management tool will help the user understand the amount of data their favorite apps use. This tool will also let the user set data limits for herself, and it will send warnings to notify the user when her data use approaches those limits.

• Revamped Browser - Not only will it look sleeker on handsets, Android’s native browser will now place more emphasis on tabs and offline productivity. “Users can keep up to 16 tabs open, view a live preview of each and quickly switch between them,” explains By Genius Report. “Tabs can be closed by flicking them off of the screen much like webOS or RIM’s tablet OS. Google also automatically syncs bookmarks to your Android browser from Chrome, and users can save pages for offline reading.”

• More Robust Gmail - Gmail users, rejoice! Here’s what’s new with Google’s celebrated email app, according to TechCrunch: “Gmail now supports two-line previews, and sports a new context-sensitive action bar at the bottom of the screen. Gesture support allows you to swipe left and right between emails.” Boy Genius Report notes that Gmail will support offline search, too.

• Improved Voice Dictation - Though it’s no Siri, Google has upgraded its hands-free speech recognition feature, which lets users dictate text, send messages, open media files and more. Per PCWorld: “ICS voice command software now has a hands free feature that lets you activate voice actions just by speaking to your phone instead of pressing a button.”
  “play music, search the web, and dictate notes, SMS and email messages.”

• NFC Sharing - Google touts the security of its Android Beam wireless transfer system, which lets users share content between devices equipped with Near-Field Communication (aka NFC) technology. Engadget explains how the system will work:
  Much like HP’s ill-fated Touch-to-share functionality, it will let you simply tap two NFC-enabled devices together to share a piece of information. That will work with a range of apps and services in Android, including YouTube videos, contact information, maps, web pages” and more. While you can transfer content from apps, you can’t transfer the apps themselves, but Engadget notes that Android Beam “links to apps in the Android Market.

• Virtual Buttons - Designed with an eye toward button-free Android handsets, version 4.0 of Google’s operating system relies more on finger gestures and integrates navigation buttons and music controls into the user interface. The feature could lead to a new generation of sleeker devices with fewer hardware buttons.
  But will these virtual buttons get in user’s way? TechCrunch says no: “[T]hey smartly disappear when viewing video or in widescreen mode.”
• Notifications Upgrade - ”The notification window is now slightly translucent with a glowing dot when you pull it downward,”according to This Is My Next. “Notifications can be swiped away one at a time, mirroring webOS 3.0 behavior. You can access your notifications on the lock screen if you’re not using a passcode, and you can jump quickly to your settings through the window shade.”

• Universal Android OS - Version 4.0 will work on any Android device, be it tablet or smartphone. “Ice Cream Sandwich is the OS that’s supposed to put a damper on all that fragmentation talk,” writes VentureBeat. “[T]he 2.X OS for phones and the 3.X OS for tablets will give way to the 4.X OS for all Android devices.”

• Social Integration - ICS bakes deeper social integration into many apps. Perhaps the most social is the “People” app. BGR writes that this new app “pulls in contact information and photos from social networks for your whole address book. Whenever a contact updates his or her info, it is also automatically updated on your phone.”

• When Will It Be Available? - Though Ice Cream Sandwich officially launched on October 19, many Android phones won’t run the new software immediately. The Galaxy Nexus will ship in November with Ice Cream Sandwich preloaded. But when will it be available for other devices? And for which? Google’s Gabe Cohen offered Engadget some insight into Google’s plans for the OS. “Currently in the process for releasing Ice Cream Sandwich for Nexus S,” he said, adding that all devices running Android 2.3 (aka “Gingerbread”) should “theoretically” be able to run Android 4.0. However, he didn’t share a timeline.
  Pocket Lint obtained confirmation that ICS will be coming to the newly announced Motorola DROID RAZR “at the start of 2012.”
  HTC phones may not be ICS-ready for some time, though. According to an HTC statement, posted by Engadget, the manufacturer is “currently reviewing its features and functionality to determine [its] upgrade plans.”

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• Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich now official (engadget.com)
• Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich: Brilliant Thievery? (informationweek.com)

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Software company SmartBear recently released the seventh installment of their quarterly Web Performance Index for Social Networks. It ranked which social media sites were the fastest and which were the most reliable in the third quarter of 2011.

The findings are based on data collected by SmartBear’s AlertSite, which monitors the home pages of these five sites across 12 U.S. cities, collecting data every five minutes between 6 a.m. and 11:59 p.m. EST.

To collect the data on social media speed SmartBear times how long it takes the website to load completely. According to PC Magazine, this includes “images, JavaScript, Flash, and third party objects.” The sites availability depends on how often it loads completely in under 60 seconds.

Although it was slightly faster in the second quarter, the speed winner is the same social media behemoth that has taken home the top prize every quarter since SmartBear launched its performance index.

However, according to SmartBear, it’s Twitter, the site ranked #4 in both rankings, that’s the most interesting. Even though this micro-blogging platform “didn’t win, place or show–and in fact, even dipped slightly in both website speed and availability,” the fact that it was even close to the benchmark average is impressive.According to a post written by SmartBear’s Gary Beerman for the company’s official blog, this site experienced remarkably high levels of use four separate times in the third quarter. Wrote Beerman, “Once upon a time, such high traffic and tweet frequency likely would have taken Twitter offline and sent its availability for the quarter plummeting.

Check out below to find out if your favorite social media site is wasting your time.

• Facebook - Average Response Time: .73 Seconds, Benchmark Average: 2.29 Seconds

• LinkedIn - Average Response Time: 1.33 Seconds, Benchmark Average: 2.29 Seconds

• YouTube - Average Response Time: 1.58 Seconds, Benchmark Average: 2.29 Seconds

• Twitter - Average Response Time: 2.73 Seconds, Benchmark Average: 2.29 Seconds

• Myspace - Average Response Time: 5.09 Seconds, Benchmark Average: 2.29 Seconds

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