Every Monday, we take a look at a significant marketing statistic and how it relates to the music industry. Today, we share our YouTube view rate for pre-roll ads and explain the tactics used to achieve it. Originally sent out in our Weekly Stat email.

54%

A Wavo benchmark: on average, the percentage of YouTube pre-roll ads that are played for at least 30 seconds.

How We Do It 

Video advertisers compete for people's attention, and on content-rich platforms, there is only a limited supply to go around. So what can be done to get more? Make videos more extreme? Show them more frequently? 

Part of what makes a video effective comes down to best practices, like using bright colors and HD content, or consistently displaying the artist's face. But equally as important is tailoring paid music videos to blend into the environment where they are located.

On YouTube, this means choosing native ads that look and sound like organic videos in the queue. As people increasingly favor streaming recommendations over seeking out specific songs themselves, well-placed pre-roll ads don't feel like a disruption, but part of the overall listening experience.