How to Sponsor YouTubers and Book Influencer Content That Converts

As we’ve discussed in our YouTube sourcing and vetting chapters, YouTube is the most expensive platform for booking influencer partnerships; and there’s a good reason for that.

Intent on YouTube is a totally different ball game compared to other social platforms. People make their way to YouTube to leverage its search engine capabilities and find products, rather than just mindlessly scrolling to pass the time. This means there are a LOT of high-intent eyes you can get your products get in front of—if you know how to book the right content.

In this chapter of the Field Guide, we’re going to cover everything you need to know to book the right YouTube influencer content to meet your campaign goals.

What content to book on YouTube

When it comes to choosing types of content in book on YouTube, influencer marketers have a few different options. Because video is the only format on the platform, your choice will come down to your campaign goals and how you want your product to be presented.

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What is the difference between YouTube Shorts and long-form videos?

YouTube is pushing short-form video in a bid to compete with TikTok, but be aware that YouTube Shorts and traditional long-form are suited toward different goals. Leveraging short-form video in YouTube partnerships may be cheaper upfront, but doesn’t offer enough enough airtime to properly feature your product and drive conversions. So, you should really see YouTube Shorts as more of a brand awareness play, rather than for direct response campaigns.

Long-form YouTube videos are a super high-intent format, as consumers who seek out videos on different products are usually doing so because they are committed to making a purchase. This makes YouTube ideal for in-depth product features or reviews—and as Sarah explains—for producing evergreen content that powers your brand over the long-term:

"When thinking about YouTube partnerships, what's different about YouTube as opposed to Instagram and TikTok is it is much longer form in terms of minutes, but also in terms of how long it really lives on the internet... YouTube can really still find it within Google search algorithm.”
_{Sarah Crow, Head of Creator Success at Superfiliate.}

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Dedicated videos

In a dedicated YouTube video, the creator is making an entire video focused on your brand and product. This is most common for products where more time is required to educate consumers, such as in-depth reviews or how-to guides, or products which are high consideration due to the price tag.

“I like to have a longer runway to tell our brand and product stories. YouTube’s algorithm loves retention and if you can find an influencer who is an unbelievable storyteller and is good at engaging viewers over a longer period of time, you have yourself a very special opportunity - as most marketing placements offer a minute or much less to deliver our campaign messages.”
_{Lissa Regets, Fractional CMO and Growth Marketing Leader at Ideabox.}

So, how effective are dedicated videos on YouTube for brand promotion? Dedicated videos are the most type of expensive content you can book on YouTube, as it requires a lot more time and resources on behalf of the creator to produce. Dedicated videos should be used sparingly, as they take up a lot of budget and have more limited use cases. As Milan shares, dedicated YouTube videos can be a good fit for long-term partnerships, or where it fits really seamlessly into their regular style of content:

”Sometimes that can happen when the YouTuber has already partnered with the brand multiple times, or it's very clear that the YouTuber is a huge fan of the product. In that sense, it would be very organic for them to talk about the product for a whole video, if the creator feels comfortable with that. And again, if it makes sense for them to organically fit that in their line of videos that they have on their YouTube channel.”
_{Milan Freeman, Influencer Marketing Expert and Strategist.}

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Integrated mentions

An integrated mention is when your product is organically featured or mentioned as part of a creator's regular YouTube content. Integrated video feels very organic to viewers, rather than a straight ad placement. For this reason, they tend to be perform better and be more cost-effective than more formal dedicated videos.

Common types of integrated product mentions within YouTube content include product hauls, GRWM (Get Ready With Me), and morning routine videos. These formats provide a lot of opportunities for influencers to subtly mention or feature products as part of their regular content, without it feeling like an outright promotional video.

It’s super important with integrated videos that creators are given creative freedom with how they produce the content. Your influencer knows their audience and has the analytics to show where brand mentions are most likely to perform well, so defer to their expertise:

“If you want to have a 1-2 minute integration, you want to allow the creator the flexibility of where they want to put that. Some creators do really well if it's in the beginning, some creators do better if it's in the middle of the video. If it's a super long form video, you might want to get to the ten minute mark so that you can capture the audience's attention.”
_{Amber Kai, Head of Creator and Brand Partnerships at Sequincial.}

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Short ad spot

This is where a creator gives your brand a quick shoutout, usually right at the beginning of a video after the intro. Short ad spots are cost-effective and good for building brand awareness, especially when it’s a partnership with a new creator. However, there isn’t room to provide any product or brand information, so they aren’t as effective for direct response campaigns.

Setting goals for your YouTube partnerships

YouTube partnerships are longer term than partnerships on other social platforms, so it’s crucial that you book the right type of content. This starts with knowing what you want to accomplish with a YouTube campaign. So, how do you set campaign goals for YouTube partnerships?

If you’re booking creators on YouTube for a product launch, your likely goal is to increase sales of that specific product. This sets the stage for the type of creator you want to work with (i.e. someone who is very comfortable with giving product reviews) and in turn, the type of content that you want to book. If it’s a creator you’ve worked with in the past who frequently plugs your brand, consider a dedicated video. Otherwise, an integrated mention is usually best.

If you’ve had YouTube partnerships before, now is the time to look at what’s worked for your brand in the past and what hasn’t—or if you’re completely new to this channel, to think about what you want to get out of booking YouTube content. As Amber explains:

“What are your KPI's? What are the things that are going to make this particular campaign or intro to your brand interesting and successful? All of that needs to be figured out before you even send an email, because it's going to determine the caliber of influencers that you're ready to work with.”
_{Amber Kai, Head of Creator and Brand Partnerships at Sequincial.}

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Give creators everything they need to succeed

Whenever you’re booking YouTube content, you want to equip influencers with everything they need to dive into production and create kick-ass content. So, it’s important that you are organized when it comes to providing resources like:

• Brand guidelines for creators
• Product information
• Technical requirements i.e. lighting, video quality
• Your process for content approvals
• A thorough creative brief

Having all of these assets in a tidy package ready to go will not only make your campaigns run more smoothly—it also improves your relationship with creators. There’s nothing that influencers (and their agents) love more than a brand who has all their ducks in a row!

Pro tip: Never forget to brief influencers on the fundamental details. Basic things like link and code placement are often overlooked in creator comms—and as Kendall explains, can come back to haunt you later if you don’t give precise instructions:

”Make sure any of the affiliate code discounts are above the fold on video descriptions, and obviously making sure that they're mentioning the code when they do the ad read. Bonus if they can show a green screen of the website and them entering the codes!”
_{Kendall Dickieson, Head of Social and Influencer at Graza.}

A good rule of thumb: Is something so obvious that it doesn’t feel worth mentioning to a creator? If it does, you should DEFINITELY mention it!

For more on content approvals and creative briefs, check out our dedicated chapters.

Managing all of these conversations and back-and-forth can be overwhelming, especially when you have a small team. To take the pressure off, Danielle leverages an agency to ensure Mudwater can both source the right creators and keep communications tight:

“We also use an agency to help us because a lot of those conversations are long and we need a little bit more eyes on them. So we'll say like we want to go into these niches. Also this agency is working with other brands and like gardening pops off so that makes sense for us. Or, they have just eyes on other industries that are or other niches that are performing.”
_{Danielle Murphy, Influencer and Partnerships Manager at Mudwater.}

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How can YouTube ad spots be used in influencer marketing?

Once your influencer partnerships are humming along, consider combining organic creator content with paid YouTube ads. You can run an creator’s integrated as a dedicated video ad, which gets your brand in front of a larger audience while still leveraging the trust and authenticity of influencer content. A little-known fact about YouTube ads is that you can set them up using a pay-per-view model. YouTube classifies a ‘view’ as someone watching at least 30 seconds of your ad or clicking through to your website. As Ashley explains:

“I could run an ad and I could set it up to only pay per view. So if I have a 30 second ad and they watch 27 seconds and skip, I just got free advertising! You can set it up in a way where if they do watch all of it or click, you're only paying a couple of pennies.”
_{Ashley Brock, Founder of Digital Marketing Academy.}

When using YouTube ads, it’s super important to get your brand name and promo offer in that first 5-7 seconds, as the ‘skip’ button kicks in at the 7-second mark. This means that if a viewer does choose to skip the ad (A.K.A you aren’t paying for that view) you’re getting free brand exposure!

With the right partnerships and integrations of branded content, influencer content on YouTube can be incredibly powerful for driving both brand awareness and conversions. Because YouTube creator partnerships tend to be a bigger lift for influencer marketers, it’s important that you lay a really solid foundation before opening up discussions with creators. Make sure you understand your goals for the platform, and which video formats are going to serve these needs best. Do this, and you’ll be on your way to booking YouTube content that fits your objectives.

Let’s take a dive into booking content on our next platform: TikTok!