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YouTube to help ad makers create ads
MUMBAI: YouTube‘s latest venture – ‘holding the hands of advertisers‘. Even though viewership for online video streaming sites is constantly on the rise, advertisers have remained a little hesitant about massively increasing their spending for online video ad time, largely because they‘re not entirely clear on whether they should just repurpose television advertising or create a variant in order to take maximum advantage of this still-new medium.
Luckily for them, YouTube announced plans to help 100 major advertisers adapt to the possibilities and realities of online video advertising. During an appearance at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity on Thursday, Google‘s vice president and global head of content at YouTube, Robert Kyncl, said that “the type of creative experiences and what works well (on YouTube) just can‘t be done on television.”
He explained that YouTube can go beyond the 30-second spot, and that the advertisement can be an entire show. “On television, advertisements don‘t have the creative freedom, can‘t have the two-way conversation, and don‘t have the sharing or amplification effect content receives on YouTube,” he said.
Brands taking part in the program include American Express, General Electric, Johnson & Johnson, and PepsiCo. Kyncl said that, in the program, “Advertisers will receive the same white glove treatment as top content creators do.”
The intent of the program is to demonstrate the value of YouTube as a setting for advertising, but as Kyncl told the Guardian, it isn‘t to suggest that YouTube is simply a replacement for television in that sense. He explained that advertisers working with creative agencies are generally used to doing fewer TV ads at a higher cost.”We‘re talking about creating an ongoing conversation with audiences … Not just TV ads four times a year,” he said. “Advertisers need to rethink their cost structure; it is practical to produce many more ads through YouTube.” Kyncl stressed that this plan is about working like a content creator and not just an advertiser.
The program launched with a pilot this September, with four advertisers being invited to a week-long retreat and workshop in YouTube‘s headquarters in Los Angeles to discuss ways in which they could better take advantage of the Internet and YouTube.
This isn‘t the first time that YouTube has reached out to customers like this. In 2007, the company launched a partner program for content creators similar to this new scheme that‘s grown into a massively successful undertaking with millions of partners taking advantage. If the advertiser program is as successful, then YouTube and its business partners will likely be very happy.
Applications
Canva acquires animation and AI startups Cavalry and MangoAI
The deals strengthen Canva’s push into enterprise and AI-led design workflows
AUSTRALIA: Global visual communication platform Canva has stepped up its acquisition drive, buying UK-based 2D animation platform Cavalry and US-based AI startup MangoAI to deepen its AI-powered creative stack.
Cavalry, whose tools are used by brands including Amazon, Meta, Google and Netflix, will strengthen Canva’s motion design capabilities. The deal builds on Canva’s 2024 acquisition of Affinity, which has crossed four million downloads since launch. With Cavalry, Canva now counts seven Europe-based acquisitions, underscoring its global expansion strategy.
MangoAI, an early-stage startup focused on video advertising optimisation, will integrate its reinforcement learning systems into Canva AI. The move aims to enable brands to generate personalised marketing content in real time, cutting production cycles while improving campaign performance. MangoAI co-founder Vinith Misra will join Canva as reinforcement learning lead in its research lab.
Canva co-founder and chief operating officer Cliff Obrecht said the acquisitions reflect the company’s ambition to make professional-grade creative tools more accessible without sidelining human creativity. The goal, he said, is to bring everything from vector to motion design into a single, integrated suite.
The company now reports 265 million active users, including 31 million paid subscribers, and $4 billion in annualised revenue, up 36 per cent year on year. The latest buys further position Canva against rivals such as Adobe and Apple’s Creator Studio as it pushes deeper into enterprise workflows.
Canva head of pro design marketing Liam Fisher, said AI is intended to act as a creative assistant rather than a replacement, reinforcing the primacy of craft and individual design judgement.
