How to Use an Existing YouTube Video as a Pre-Roll Ad？

What are Pre-Roll Ads on YouTube

YouTube pre-roll ads are video ads shown before the video a viewer wants to watch. They can be made skippable or non-skippable, depending on your campaign settings. Brands and creators often use them to target specific audiences.

Since pre-roll ads play before selected content, they tend to grab viewers' attention better than mid-roll or display ads. Advertisers can leverage YouTube’s targeting features—filtering by interests, demographics, or video placements—to ensure their ads reach the right people.

Using a YouTube video as a pre-roll ad is an effective and budget-friendly way to promote content, drive website traffic, or grow your channel.

Types of YouTube Pre-Roll Ads

YouTube features three main categories of pre - roll ads, each with distinct characteristics:

Skippable video ads enable viewers to bypass them after 5 seconds have elapsed.

Non - skippable ads must be viewed in full before the target video starts. These ads usually last between 15 and 30 seconds.

Bumper ads are brief, non - skippable ads, with a maximum duration of 6 seconds.

Notably, although YouTube provides various ad formats for YouTube Shorts, pre - roll ads are currently only applicable to long - form videos.

How Do YouTube Pre-Roll Ads Work

YouTube pre-roll ads empower marketers to serve highly targeted video ads to the ideal audience, frequently aiming to drive immediate conversions. By positioning relevant ads before viewers who are already interested in similar content, advertisers can engage potential customers at the perfect time. For instance, advertising your product before a competitor's tutorial video can expose your brand to an attentive and relevant viewer base.

An increasingly popular approach is leveraging an existing YouTube video as a pre-roll ad. Be it a professionally produced product advertisement, a corporate overview, or content from an individual's channel, using an already-uploaded video guarantees smooth adaptation for YouTube advertising, eliminating the need for extensive reformatting.

How to Use an Existing YouTube Video as a Pre-Roll Ad

If you want to create an ad on YouTube, the first step is to establish a new ad campaign in Google Ads Manager.

1.To get started, simply click on the “+” icon located at the top of the screen.

2.Google will assist you through a series of setup procedures according to your campaign objectives. However, if you'd rather bypass this guided process and directly create a YouTube video ad, in the campaign objective menu, select "Create a campaign without guidance". After that, pick "Video" as the campaign type.

3.The last step in the setup process involves choosing a campaign subtype. Select the option that most closely aligns with your requirements to move forward.

4.After your campaign is created, you can customize important details like the campaign name, budget (determined by cost per view), and target audience. These elements play a vital role in the success of your campaign, so invest time in fine - tuning your strategy. When defining your target audience, take the following aspects into account:

Purchase Viability: Can your target audience actually afford and purchase your product?

Product Reach: Is your product available across all locations? If not, you need to decide whether to increase brand awareness in areas with low product usage or concentrate on driving sales in regions with high demand.

User Characteristics: Which age groups and genders are most likely to be interested in your product?

Related Preferences: What interests do your potential customers share? Placing your ads in contexts related to these interests enhances their relevance.

Although it might seem appealing to target a wide audience, a more focused campaign usually yields better results. Ads that don't resonate with viewers are more likely to be skipped.

5.Near the bottom of the campaign setup screen, locate the Create your video ads section.

6.Finally, uploading an existing YouTube video is simple. Simply paste the video URL into the campaign manager. If you want to add multiple videos, expand the Ad creation box and upload up to 30 different videos. However, to maintain a consistent message, it’s best to limit your campaign to 1-3 highly relevant videos.

Length and Specs Guidelines

Although using an existing video as a pre-roll ad streamlines the process, it's essential to make sure the video complies with YouTube's advertising guidelines for optimal performance on the platform.

Video Dimensions: 1920 x 1080 pixels (horizontal), 1080 x 1920 (vertical), 1080 x 1080 (square).

Aspect Ratios: 16:9 (horizontal widescreen), 1:1 (square), 4:3 (horizontal).

Supported File Types: MPG, MOV, AVI, MP4, WebM, among others.

File Size Limit: Up to 128GB.

Video Length: It's advisable to keep the video 15 - 20 seconds long. For pre-roll ads shown on TVs, the maximum length can be 30 seconds.

Additional Necessary Elements: A thumbnail image, a video description, and a URL linking to a website or landing page.

To expedite the preparation, think about using free online video editing tools to cut down long videos to the recommended 20 - second duration and video resizing tools to ensure the content fits the required dimensions of 1920 x 1080 pixels (horizontal), 1080 x 1920 (vertical), or 1080 x 1080 (square).