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YouTube Shares Insights into Key Areas of Development, Including Shorts, NFTs and the Metaverse

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YouTube Moves Away from Original Programming to Focus on Creator Funding Initiatives

What’s coming next for YouTube, and what should you be planning for in your digital marketing process?

Today, YouTube’s Chief Product Officer Neal Mohan has shared an overview of his top areas of focus for 2022, and where he sees the most potential, including new developments for creator funding, evolved live shopping, the potential integration of NFTs, the metaverse and more.

There are some interesting notes, which could assist in your strategy.

First off, Mohan says that live-streaming will be a key focus for the app, as it looks to build on the momentum of live-streams over the past two years.

Mohan says that daily live-stream watch time more than tripled between January 2020 and December 2021, and YouTube will look to capitalize on this with new elements like collaborative livestreaming, and live-stream shopping.

YouTube tested various live-stream shopping events last year, including its “Holiday Stream and Shop” event, a weeklong live-stream activation in partnership with creators like MrBeast, the Merrell Twins and Gordon Ramsay.

The event drove over 2 million views and 1.4 million Live Chat messages, underlining the potential of live-stream shopping – which every social app is now looking to develop.

But YouTube, with its vast array of established connections, and huge audience reach, may be best-placed to see the most success. And with TikTok also looking to lean into live-stream shopping, you can bet that YouTube will be keen to build on its efforts, and muscle out the competition where it can.

Speaking of TikTok, Shorts is another area of focus for YouTube, with its TikTok-like clone gaining significant momentum over the past year.

YouTube Shorts

Last month, YouTube reported that Shorts has now surpassed 5 trillion all-time views. And while that’s not the same as monthly active users, or individual user engagement, it does underline the rising interest in short-form content, which YouTube is keen to build on as it works to hold onto its crown as the leading online video provider.

As explained by Mohan:

“Building on a feature we introduced last year that lets you remix audio from videos across YouTube, we’ll introduce new capabilities that empower creators to express themselves even more – new video effects, editing tools, and more. And to help Shorts creators engage with their audience more personally, we’ll also introduce the ability to reply to individual comments by creating a Short.

YouTube’s also exploring more Shorts monetization options, including improved exposure for Shorts stars in BrandConnect (its creator marketplace), the expansion of Super Chat to Shorts clips and shopping options within the Shorts format.

eCommerce has significant potential in this element, with the Chinese version of TikTok ‘Douyin’ already generating the majority of its revenue from eCommerce integrations with its video clips.

Douyin shopping

TikTok is also working to integrate more shopping tools, and it’ll be interesting to see how YouTube’s push to merge Shorts and shopping aligns with TikTok’s own developments on this front.

In terms of newer tech, Mohan has also hinted at a future integration of NFTs for YouTube creators.

“For example, giving a verifiable way for fans to own unique videos, photos, art, and even experiences from their favorite creators could be a compelling prospect for creators and their audiences.”

It remains to be seen whether the current NFT trend will hold, or whether it’s a short-term fad, though it is also worth noting that there’s more to NFTs, as a process, than profile pictures, which have been the main usage of the option thus far.

Whether you see NFTs as holding potential or not, the fact is that we will increasingly be trading in digital items moving forward, for varying purpose, and the NFT process could play a key role in buying and selling unique digital goods – even if they’re not cartoons of monkeys and cats.

Mohan has also hinted at the metaverse, and the next stage of digital connection.

“We’re thinking big about how to make viewing more immersive. The first area in which you can expect to see an impact is gaming, where we’ll work to bring more interactions to games and make them feel more alive. It’s still early days, but we’re excited to see how we can turn these virtual worlds into a reality for viewers.

The broader metaverse concept remains an evolving idea, and there are various paths that its development could take. It’ll be interesting to see how YouTube looks to integrate such, and what comes of these new experiments as a window to the app’s next stage.

Mohan says that YouTube’s also working on new additions for YouTube Studio that will help creators come up with the most effective, new content ideas for their audience, while it will also continue to develop new ad offerings to target people viewing YouTube content on Connected TVs.

“TV was once again our fastest growing screen in 2021 — as of January 2022, on average viewers are watching over 700 million hours of YouTube content on TV daily. And in the year ahead, we want to give these viewers easier navigation and even more interactivity. One of the ways we’ll do this is through a device that you always have within reach: your phone. Soon, we’ll be unveiling a new way for viewers to use their phones while they watch YouTube on their TV to read or leave comments, share videos with a friend, and much more – stay tuned.”

The expansion of YouTube’s TV integration could help to maximize engagement on the biggest screen in your home, which could present significant opportunities for advertisers.

There are some interesting notes here, and some valuable points of reference for YouTube’s ongoing development.

As noted, YouTube remains in a battle of sorts with TikTok for video supremacy, but where YouTube remains well ahead is in creator monetization, and providing pathways for its top stars to make real money from their efforts. That will remain a key consideration moving forward, and it’ll be interesting to see whether YouTube can press this advantage in 2022, in order to win out on several fronts.

You can read Neal Mohan’s full 2022 overview for YouTube here.


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Snap On How It Empowered Women’s With AR Storytellling

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Snap On How It Empowered Women’s With AR Storytellling

Snapchat has won the AR/VR category at The Drum Awards for Creativity. Here is the award-winning case study.

In France, like many western countries, public space lacks monuments honouring women. What about empowering Women’s Legacy through Augmented Reality? As a storytelling company, Snap knows that stories have the power to change hearts, minds, and behaviors. Stories create empathy, which can inspire behavior change across Snap and the broader industry. And although our industry is data-driven, we understand numbers are not a substitute for lived experience. The differing lived experience of underrepresented groups can reduce feelings of belonging, which in turn reduces opportunity to realize potential. Snap’s goal in inspiring empathy is to create a shared culture of belonging for all.

To celebrate International Women’s Day, March 8, 2023, Snap’s AR Studio has been honouring 8 emblematic women in 8 major French cities (Paris, Lyon, Marseille, Bordeaux, Lille, Strasbourg, Metz and Nantes) through a unique augmented reality experience: “March 8, 8 women”. “March 8, 8 women” has been a unique opportunity to demonstrate Augmented Reality’s impact in supporting Great National Cause (French president Emmanuel Macron has declared Equity a priority for 2023), while showcasing Snap’s creative and technologic leadership in AR.

While as many women as men have marked the course of history, the vast majority of sculptures in the urban space in France (squares, gardens and streets) honour male characters. Snap’s AR Studio has thus imagined augmented reality statues of women who have left their mark on history in the fields of politics, arts and letters or resistance. These augmented reality statues are installed next to the physical statues of their male counterparts – hence creating a silent dialogue between two historical figures, a male & a female, a physical & a virtual, both having lived in the same era, walked similar fields, achieved close successes.

Each of these 8 virtual statues honours the achievements of the following 8 great women in history and helps to commemorate their contributions to French society:

Simone Veil: Champion of women’s rights, emblem of the 1975 law that legalized abortion, and the first female president of the European Parliament. Her augmented reality statue will be positioned next to the physical one of General Charles de Gaulle on the Champs-Elysées roundabout in Paris.

Simone de Beauvoir: An acclaimed writer and philosopher of the existentialist movement. As an anti-conformist, she advocated for the emancipation of women in her writings, such as her 1949 book The Second Sex, and became one of the pioneers of French feminism in the 20th century. Her augmented reality statue will be placed next to the physical one of 20th century poet and writer Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, at Place Bellecour in Lyon.

Elisabeth Vigée Le Brun: Admitted to the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture in 1783 and the official painter to Marie Antoinette, she achieved critical and popular success in the artistic world despite the many obstacles facing female artists of her time. Her augmented reality statue will be placed next to the physical one of 18th century artist Pierre Puget, in the Parc Borély in Marseille.

Françoise de Graffigny: One of the most emblematic female figures of 18th century French literature, best known for her philosophical essay Letters from a Peruvian Woman published in 1747. Her augmented reality statue will be positioned next to the physical one of renown philosopher Montesquieu, at Place des Quinconces in Bordeaux.

Manon Tardon: Figure of the French Resistance and Free France, she was present on May 8, 1945, in Berlin when the surrender of Nazi Germany was signed. Her augmented reality statue will be positioned next to the physical one of World War 2 hero Philippe Leclerc de Hauteclocque, at Square Amiral Halgan in Nantes.

Josephine Baker: An American-born singer, actress, feminist, showgirl, and French resistance fighter, Josephine Baker was a spy for the Free French Forces, an emblem of the Paris of the Roaring Twenties, and an influential figure in the fight against racial segregation. Her augmented reality statue will be placed next to the physical one of resistant fighter Jean Moulin, at Gare Centrale in Metz.

Olympe de Gouges: Principal author of the Declaration of the Rights of Woman and the Citizen published in 1791, she is considered one of the French pioneers of feminism. Her augmented reality statue will be positioned next to the physical one of French Revolution leader Jean-Baptiste Kléber, at Place Kléber in Strasbourg.

Hubertine Auclert: Journalist, feminist activist, and founder of the society Le droit des femmes in 1876, she advocated for women’s economic independence, the right to education, and equality in marriage and divorce. Her augmented reality statue will be positioned next to the physical one of early 20th-century activist Léon Trulin, at Place du Théâtre (not far from the Lille Opera).

“Through this innovative experience installed in 8 cities in France, we want to pay tribute to 8 women who have changed French history and society through their actions, their writings, or their positions. Thanks to Snap’s augmented reality technologies, we were able to celebrate those 8 women by building their statues in the public space by placing them alongside statues of men. By establishing a silent dialogue between these historical figures, our wish is to raise public awareness of the fight for women’s rights.” — Donatien Bozon, AR Studio Director.

To design this outstanding augmented reality experience, AR Studio Paris teamed up with French Women’s Rights advocate and influencer Aude Gogny-Goubert, drew inspiration from academic essays (Women & cities, Presses universitaires François-Rabelais, 2004), and requested the patronage of SnapWomen EMEA, a Snap’s Employee Representative Group supporting Equity. An all-female panel vetted the 8 female historical figures (and their male counterpart), from more than twenty curated candidates.

It took AR Studio Paris and its partners a total of 3 months, from ideation to launch, to create true virtual monument as close to physical ones as possible. 3D artists and producers scrutinized the physical statues in order to develop a virtual counterpart replicating sculpting techniques and materials. AR engineers exploited Snap Inc. proprietary technologies (Location AR, Environment mapping, Surface Tracking…) to bring this augmented reality experience to life.

The AR experience “March 8, 8 Women” has been available since March 8, 2023, sharing, with Paris, Lyon, Marseille, Bordeaux, Lille, Strasbourg, Metz and Nantes citizen and visitors, 8 permanent virtual monument exclusively available on Snapchat… thus building momentum to advocate Equity across France.

Snap believes that augmented reality—digital content overlaid over the real world—represents the next major shift in computing. Like ephemeral messaging and vertical video, Snap also pioneered augmented reality. Today Snap is leading in AR, from a technology, scale, and creator perspective. Snap’s vision for AR is rooted in innovation and stems from our desire to solve problems for our community in a creative way through human-centric design, and the desire to create a more positive reality rather than escape the problems our society faces. As it turns out, Snapchatters love the world around them and the friends and family they share it with, so why not use technology to enhance it for the better?

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An Overview of the Evolving Data Landscape Powering AI, VR, and More [Infographic]

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An Overview of the Evolving Data Landscape Powering AI, VR, and More [Infographic]

While AI and large language models (LLMs) become more commonplace, it’s worth considering the amount of computational power, and data storage, that these systems require to operate. 

Demand for high-grade GPUs, for example, is still exceeding demand, as more tech companies and investors look to muscle in, while the big players continue to build on their data center capacity, in order to beat smaller systems out of the market.

That, inevitably, means that control over many of these new processes will eventually fall to those with the most money, and even if you have concerns about next-level computational power being governed by CEOs and corporations, there’s not a heap that you can do about it, as they need an established holding to even get in.

Well, unless a government steps in and seeks to build its own infrastructure in order to facilitate AI development, though that seems unlikely.

And it’s not just AI, with crypto processes, complex analysis, and advanced scientific discovery now largely reliant on a few key providers that have available capacity.

It’s a concern, but essentially, you can expect to see a lot more investment in big data centers and processing facilities over the coming years.

This new overview from Visual Capitalist (for Hive Digital) provides some additional context. Here, the VC team have broken down the current data center landscape, and what we’re going to need to facilitate next-level AI, VR, the metaverse, and more.

It’s an eye-opening summary. You can check out Visual Capitalists’ full overview here.

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30 Quick Ways to Increase Your Website’s Conversion Rate [Infographic]

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30 Quick Ways to Increase Your Website’s Conversion Rate [Infographic]

Looking to drive more direct conversions from your website listings this holiday season?

The team from Red Website Design share 30 ways to improve your website conversion rate in this infographic.

Here’s the top five from the list:

  • Include as few fields as possible on forms
  • Use testimonials
  • Clearly state product/service benefits
  • Include subscriber and social media follower counts
  • Write clear, compelling copy

Check out the infographic for more detail.

A version of this post was first published on the Red Website Design blog.

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