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YouTube is rolling out a major redesign of its app over the next six months that caters to the way people are increasingly watching content on the platform now — on their smart TVs.
Why It Hits: As user-generated content becomes more cinematic and mainstream, YouTube’s glow-up feels like a blurring of the line between the “premium” movies and shows of the professional entertainment industry and content made by digital creators.
Behind the Curtain: YouTube wants to feel a little more like Netflix.
- On the YouTube TV app, the platform will soon roll out “immersive previews,” which generate a cinematic trailer of videos that will automatically play on a creator’s page.
- Channels will also get a more prominent “subscribe” button, and content will now be organized by episodes and seasons so that they feel like TV shows.
- The app will automatically generate QR codes for links in video descriptions so viewers can easily navigate to them (a feature that could make ecommerce skyrocket).
The Future: YouTube clearly has dreams of dominating a bigger screen, especially after Nielsen reported that YouTube accounts for 10.6% of all TV viewing last month (Netflix accounted for 7.9%). Additionally, revenue tied to TV viewership has jumped 30% for creators over the past year and 400% over three years… making a redesign a winning combo for creators and advertisers. With so much focus on TV, maybe YouTube will even try to relaunch its Originals program… but this time, starring popular creators.
Go Deeper: YouTube didn’t forget about its community-building — introducing a Discord-like chatroom on creator pages and a fresh promotional tool for smaller creators.
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