April UK online video views were up 47 percent to 4.7 billion from the year before, clocking up 971 million ad views in the process, comScore (NSDQ: SCOR) says. But the winner is clear – YouTube is still swallowing the lion’s share of views, with videos watched 2.4 billion times in the month, up 58 percent from last year.
That’s despite BBC.co.uk and ITV.com views growing faster, at 67 percent and 102 percent respectively. And despite its video advertising efforts still being nascent, YouTube also served by far the most ads of any UK multmedia site – 621 million of them.
The takeaways are clear…
— Everyone is trailing YouTube by a country mile.
— Content makers (if they aren’t already) should consider syndicating through YouTube to benefit from its scale.
— Most of YouTube’s dominance is down to hosting UGC clips, which will naturally draw more clicks than longer shows – but, if it ever achieves this kind of audience on premium long-form shows, it will be a force to be reckoned with as a TV aggregator, too.