Mission: Control (and flexibility)

This is the second post in the “BizBlog Series,” which was formally its own blog. Check back each week to see articles about partners and advertisers on YouTube, or search under the label 'BizBlog'. 

There is an audience for every kind of video on YouTube, from beauty videos to Ultimate Fighting. Because of this diversity, it's important that we provide advertisers with tools that give them control of where their ads are shown, and to whom. Innovations like the Video Targeting Tool and re-marketing are only two of the many ways we've given advertisers greater control of their YouTube presence and helped them get in front of the exact audience they want to reach.

While advertisers have great targeting options for their ads (like overlays and in-stream ads), sometimes they want similar controls when it comes to their videos themselves. For example, gaming companies or movie studios may wish to upload trailers to YouTube that highlight content rated for audiences above a certain age. Or, alcoholic beverage companies want to ensure that the videos they upload as part of their campaigns are only made available to registered users above the legal drinking age.

For these reasons, we're pleased to offer a new feature that allows select advertisers to voluntarily age-restrict watch pages for their videos. This is a long-requested feature by many advertisers interested in promoting their products, but who want to be sure that they comply with their own industry guidelines regulations. Advertisers have always been able to age-restrict their channels generally, but to date only users could flag specific videos that they thought should be age-restricted under our Community Guidelines. Now, advertisers can do so proactively, and can choose different ages depending on their needs. Several advertisers have already tested this new feature, including alcoholic beverage companies. Through age-restricting, companies like Pacifico have uploaded their videos to YouTube with confidence that they will only be viewed by the right target demographic.

We're constantly looking to build tools and features that make YouTube a safer place for users, partners and advertisers. We hope that voluntary age-restricting will increase advertiser flexibility and control while staying true to our responsibilities as a trusted video platform.

Advertisers wishing to age-restrict their content should reach out to their account representatives.