What’s the Most Lucrative Video Content?

If you’re making videos for money, the category you choose is as important as anything. Here are some sought-after topic areas for text ads on a display (not click through) basis. But first some notes, with special attention to the third.

• All categories have ranges, and those are based on “inventory” (advertisers seeking videos, and competitively driving up the “CPM” or “cost per thousand displays”).
• CPM is far from the most profitable ad format. InVideo ads or CPC (cost per click) are better. And pre-rolls with optional skipping (which relieves the advertiser from any cost, and deprives YouTube and the creator), are the most valuable… if completed.
• The lucrative pre-rolls are often for travel, retail, entertainment and CPG (consumer packaged goods) brands. Most likely these are targeted less around certain content areas and more based on the audience’s demographics (since these are often planned by former TV buyers). A buyer who is a veteren of paid search will likely prefer to target based on search or content relevancy, and will more likely want to pay per click than displayed ad.

But here are the categories with the highest current upside for CPM (cost to get 1,000 ads displayed beneath the relevant video) as reported by Google Videotargeting Ad Placements.

1. Finance- Almost $10
2. Real estate- Up to $9
3. Computers and Electronics- Almost $9
4. Home & garden- More than $8
5. Beauty and Fitness- just north of $7