Google has taken a pro-creator stance – Industry on move to monetise YouTube Shorts

In 2020, YouTube launched the YouTube Shorts feature to compete against TikTok. The Google-owned YouTube Shorts is catching up quickly, and the firm has seen promising results in its early monetisation efforts on the short-video creation site.

YouTube Shorts currently has over 1.5 billion signed-in users per month and over 30 billion daily views.

Philipp Schindler, Senior Vice President and Chief Business Officer at Alphabet (Google’s parent company), said that consumers are increasing and consuming short-form videos obviously and they are seeing this across multiple platforms, including YouTube.

“We’re continuing to see good user engagement on YouTube. Early results in Shorts’ monetisation are also encouraging, and we’re excited about the opportunities here,” Schindler said during a call with analysts late on Tuesday. “We’re excited about the opportunity,” he added.

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Google to monetise YouTube Shorts soon

Adgully reached out to experts across industry to get their reactions regarding Google’s move to monetise YouTube Shorts soon.

Neel Gogia, Co-founder, IPLIX Media:

“We are truly moving towards a creator-dominated world and this move is a true testament to it. This will help creators sustain themselves in the long run and reduce their reliance on brand associations. Hence, it is truly a win-win situation for all. I am certain that announcements like this will entice more people to join the industry and in turn, help in its growth.”

Tejas Patil, Content Creator:

“Monetisation of shorts is the most awaited feature which, I'm sure, a lot of creators were waiting for. With short form content on the rise, this provides an additional incentive for creators to put forth authentic quality content along with countless views and reach that shorts are gathering.

Also, not to forget the fact that monetisation of Shorts paves the path for short form creators to have a sustainable content creation journey.

And if the monetisation rules for Shorts are the same as long form content, then it will promote creators to create a brand value from this content and demotivate creators who push out anything only for the sake of views.”

Shahir Muneer, Founder and Director, Divo:

“This will be great considering YouTube’s track history of sharing revenue with content creators and with Google’s large ad inventory, there can be a good upside for Shorts content creators to be able to monetise their content, which otherwise is limited to none with others.”

Rohit Agarwal, Founder & Director, Alpha Zegus:

“It was very predictable, honestly. YouTube was pumping huge money (and interest) in shorts for a while now by offering more visibility to Shorts over other formats. Their algorithm also gave a very good boost to creators who were uploading shorts to the point that creators started making new channels exclusively for Shorts. As soon as they started seeing more and more creators make Shorts (again, due to higher visibility), they started moving towards an inevitable monetisation model. Without a doubt, all content companies are moving towards short form video content models, and YouTube is now going to accelerate their efforts in this space with the monetisation.”

Shajesh Menon, Founder and CEO of Younion:

“No surprises here, we saw this coming! With TikTok’s exit from India and Instagram following its footsteps, why would YouTube leave the opportunity behind?

The recent address by the Head of Instagram, Adam Mosseri, on improvements to make the platform experience better received a lot of flak with people wanting to bring back the “old” Instagram – a feed that never missed content from friends, more photo-sharing, less video-churning. YouTube probably sees this as an opening. The platform has always been creator-forward and big on long-form content, but with the rules of engagement changing, monetizing Shorts was inevitable. After all, the whole idea of content democratization is not a fad, and is here to stay.

What’s interesting is how Google has taken a pro-creator stance and packaged it as the ‘YouTube Shorts Fund’ - a step to support how creators make money. It offers creators a monthly “bonus” and is seemingly transparent about it. However in reality, it takes a lot to go truly viral and getting a bonus isn’t the easiest thing. Some creators have started viewing this as an opportunity to use short-form content for brand sponsorships, but will that work? Or will Shorts fall short of market expectations? Only time will tell.”

Jag Chima, Co-Founder, IPLIX Media:

YouTube shorts have picked up pace in the last couple of months as it now averages at 30 billion daily views. Both from a creators’ and brands’ perspective, it has become a platform that cannot be skipped. This clearly indicates that short-form content is not a fad as it is becoming a go-to option. This announcement will definitely give an incentive to creators to produce more short-form content. On the other hand, it will also reduce creators’ dependence on brand associations, thus, providing them with creative space to generate innovative and engaging content.

Rishabh Shekhar,Co Founder, Pepper Content:

Having been in the creator economy space since 2017, we have witnessed the evolution in this industry both from the creator and brand side. The new provision by YouTube to monetize YouTube shorts is just another step towards revolutionizing the space for creators. Over the years, as Pepper Content we have realized the need for democratizing the creator economy, and the new initiative by YouTube definitely adds on to how social media has served for and by the people. With the changing trend of users consuming short-form content, this will certainly add to their seamless experience. At the end of the day, social media platforms are contesting for the viewer's attention span and this is a step further to making the space more interactive for them. 

Lavinn Rajpal, Co-founder & Managing Director, Chimp&z Inc:

While TikTok has been monetizing the shorts format for years now, I am personally calling this move a TikTok killer. YouTube having its enormous subscriber base has launched a perfect move to get its audience back on the platform for short format videos too. While FB & Instagram is also moving its focus on short format videos, YT will be generating more ad revenue than ever over the best set of years because of this decision.