YouTube Ad Sequencing Campaigns allow you to tell your brand story in an order that you define through the Google Ads interface. This allows you through the Google predefined definitions to Introduce & Reinforce, Prompt & Inspire, Attract & Direct and Engage & Differentiate. Although perhaps more alluring is that you can define your own custom sequence through sequencing.

Before You Begin

YouTube sequence campaigns have three core considerations compared to other video campaign types available which include:

  • Keyword, topic, and placement targeting is unavailable.
  • Frequency capping is set to either once every 7 days or once every 30 days which means a person will not see the sequence or a single step
  • Videos are not isolated to sequence progression within the campaign, if you are running separate video campaigns using the same videos they will progress through the sequence automatically.

The second consideration is important as this removes the possibility of split-testing two different sequencing campaigns using the same creative for example.

How Users Progress Through Your Sequence

The key element to YouTube Ad Sequencing Campaigns is that you are able to guide a targeted user through your selected videos in a sequence via the interaction you choose. The user will see the first video of your sequence and only move to the next video once they have completed this interaction which you define at the Step Transition stage with the choice of:

  • Impression
  • View
  • Skip

Your selection is going to define your campaign’s reach as if you use an impression based sequencing campaign then this is going to move users through your sequence who have started your video which is essentially everyone that the video is served to more or less. If you use a view based sequencing campaign which we recommend this is going to qualify users through to the next stages of the campaign which will limit impressions through the sequence but means the relevancy of the defined sequence makes more sense to the user.

It is important to note that you can change the step transition through the course of the sequence, so for example in a 4 video sequence you can have the first step requiring a view to qualify the user then the next two steps an impression transition to ensure delivery of the mid-sequence videos. Finally you can require a view on the 4th transition to the final video to ensure that the user is still engaged with your brand before the final step.

Why Run YouTube Ad Sequencing Campaigns versus other campaign types? 

The attraction of running YouTube Ad Sequencing campaigns is the control of narrative that they enable when approaching it from a brand viewpoint. There is no other campaign type on Google that let’s you sequence adverts in such a way to tell a story across multiple touchpoints to encourage action and brand recall. As an entry point to YouTube advertising for larger brands who desire control across their brand image and story there is unlikely a better option.

The out of the box options through sequencing are listed below including an automatic option from Google. It is our overall suggestion that you pursue defining your own custom sequence for the best outcome for your brand and use the other sequence types as a guideline for what is possible.

Sequence Type Description
Custom Sequence Lets you control the order, depending on a viewer’s interaction with a previous step.
Automatic SequenceGoogle controls optimises the order of the sequence for you.
Introduce & ReinforceIntroduce your brand with a long video before moving to shorter form videos.
Prompt & InspireIntroduce your brand with a short video before moving to a longer form video ad.
Attract & DirectIntroduce with a short video ad and engage them with a long video ad before delivering a final short video ad with a call to action.
Engage & DifferentiateEngage the users with four short form video ads to tell a story and carry a single coherent message across all four.
YouTube Ad Sequencing Campaign Types

How To Setup Your First YouTube Sequencing Campaign

Within your Google Ads account you will want to setup your Video Campaign in the same way as any other campaign by first hitting Create Campaign and then Awareness and Consideration.

You will then see the below screen in which you will want to select Video which will then show you the Campaign Subtypes of which you select Ad sequence.

Fill in your Campaign Name and choose between a Target CPM or Maximum CPV bidding strategy. If you are unsure, we suggest a Target CPM bid strategy at a level you are comfortable with.

Fill in your overall Campaign Total Budget along with your start and end dates if applicable. At this stage you can select a Product or Brand for lift measurement which we advise you to do so before then selecting your Locations of advertising.

Important step is then People who you want to reach, your targeting section with allow you to define Demographics and Audience Segments that you are choosing to target.

After Additional Settings that include your product feed and frequency capping you will then find the sequencing templates shown below. Our recommendation is to select the Custom Sequence.

Google Ad Interface showing Sequence Templates for YouTube Ad Sequencing Campaigns

After choosing your sequence template you can then add your Video Steps through your YouTube URLs, a quirk of the setup is each Video is considered a separate Ad Group which you name during the Sequence Step window.

In this window select your video, the video ad format, URL and the Target CPM/CPV Bid for this step. For the first instance you will not have to select the transition type but for all following steps this will be an option as seen below, automatically this will be selected an Impression and we recommend switching this to View for the first transition.

Google Ad Interface showing Step Transitions for YouTube Ad Sequencing Campaigns

After this you can create your own custom sequence as you wish. There is also the option of creating secondary and tertiary flows based on interactions for example if a user skipped one of your videos you could create a secondary sequence to try and reengage this user whilst users who viewed progress on the original sequence. Below is how your campaign interface will look as you start to define your sequence with multiple paths:

Google Ad Interface showing the stages of the YouTube Ad Sequencing Campaign

They key to any successful YouTube campaign will come back to the creative so ensuring that you have the YouTube video assets available for a sequencing campaign is vital. You can consider videos such as Brand Videos, Review Videos, Founder Videos and UGC to create your sequence and consider including a mix of video types so you can appear across YouTube shorts also during your YouTube Sequencing Campaigns.

After these steps you are ready to launch, good luck!