It was only a matter of time, but YouTube started to roll out notifications to it’s commercial partners that it intends to offer an ad-free version of YouTube for those who care enough to pay a monthly subscription fee.
While the fee hasn’t been confirmed yet, I’d guess its likely to be in the £4.99 to £7.99 per month range.
Why are they doing this?
Well it’s true a lot of people are annoyed that so many ads are appearing before they view the video they clicked on from the search results, it’s probably down to Amazon Prime & Netflix services.
Just Ad Free?
I think for this to work they’ll need to include some premium benefits far beyond ad-free. Whether that’s exclusive footage via new series production or perhaps live streaming from sporting events or Concerts, just blocking advertising is just not a strong enough standalone proposition.
What about YouTube partners?
For years businesses with high volume have benefited from a revenue share on the advertising displayed before or during their videos. This has to be a concern for the small to medium sized guys. If a sizeable portion move to ad free, the chances that the revenue on subs could possibly be split is very remote.
Watch This space for Ad Free YouTube
Only if YouTube really pull out the stops on content or movies “a la Netflix” can this make a massive dent in revenues. It’s certainly one to watch though (pun intended) especially if you are earning cash each month from allowing YouTube to run ads. You;ll either need to scale up or look to attract a different revenue stream!
What’s your take? Would you pay to not watch ads or do you already use an Ad blocker? Comment below and let me know