Last week, YouTube encountered an ad revenue decline for the first time since the parent company Alphabet began reports in 2019. YouTube experienced a third Quarter decline in earnings with ad revenue falling 1.9% to $7.07 billion in comparison to the previous year. 

Companies have been cutting back on ad expenditure across all media channels. Perhaps this is not surprising given relentlessly gloomy economic news. Predictions of worldwide recession are being made and blamed on a stream of ongoing factors including the Russian-Ukrainian war, post-Covid fallout, energy crises, inflationary pressures and central banks raising interest rates. But are these valid or even relevant factors affecting online economic trends? To what extent could they impact the growth and development of online creative industries? And if they are influential, is their impact short term or more worryingly long term to the health of online content activity? 

What do you think? Let us know on LinkedIn. 

Online content creation has benefited from the long term and sustained growth in digital advertising expenditure. But this overall positive trend, faltered this summer with a flattening out of advertising revenue compared to previous years. This may indicate we have reached an inflection point (at the end of the Second Quarter) in long term ad revenue growth. Or it may simply be a ‘blip’ as companies take stock of economic headlines.

Sundar Pichai, Alphabet CEO’s position is optimistic for the long term. YouTube remains a “big priority” for the company; “We remain focused on long term growth for our community of viewers, creators and advertisers.”

There are also good reasons to expect short term ad revenue to remain buoyant as we head into the final Quarter of 2022. The World Cup is about to kick off and Midterm US elections are taking place, both of which are traditionally drivers of increased ad expenditure. There’s also Thanksgiving, the run up to Christmas, Black Friday and Cyber Monday, all perennial boosters to advertising activity and reasons to expect aggregate spend and CPMs to remain healthy as we see out 2022. 

Of course, we are only reporting on a collection of opinions; no two economists seem to agree what’s in store for the world economy. And predictions for online activity and ad revenue vary too. So, what content creators are sensing and experiencing is important and should be shared. We’d like to hear your opinions on LinkedIn.

But whatever your opinion, we do appear to be facing a period of uncertainty. Perhaps this is the time for professional content creators to pause, reflect and consider their financial position going forward. That’s where we may be able to help. As our CEO states “Viewture is here to offer financial solutions to the uncertain future that others are predicting. Our advice to channel creators would be to look at ways to protect your income via structured finance offers as well as careful financial planning for the longer term.” 

Whatever the future holds, Viewture may be able to help by laying out alternative strategies and tools designed specifically for creators seeking greater financial stability in the future. 

Shape Your Future.