Games publishers are quickly catching up with YouTube content creators for view time on games-related videos, according to YouTube.

Speaking at the White Nights Conference in Prague, YouTube head of gaming content and partnerships for CIS and Italy, Darya Rubashna, said that in 2015 publisher videos accounted for just two per cent of total view time.

By H1 2017 however, publishers were competing with content creators by creating gaming videos that took up 42.9 per cent of total view time.

Rubashna said this was driven by publishers like Supercell and Outfit7 creating highly engaging content on the platform such as Clash-A-Rama and the Talking Tom animations, which have racked up millions of views.

Best practice

For the best examples of how publishers are increasing engagement on YouTube, Rubashna said developers should look at the likes of Riot Games, Supercell, PlayStation Access and Bossa

While many publishers have an irregular upload strategy focused largely on trailers, companies like Riot Games upload videos on a regular basis, and integrate their marketing strategy into their content upload strategy.

Rubashna said that some publishers also successfully partner with content creators for some of their videos, enabling them to reach not just their typical viewers, but the audience of the influencers they work with. This could come in the form of a content creator starring in a game trailer, for example.

These successful publisher channels are now making videos that were previously produced only by the influencers themselves.

Rubashna ended the talk with five key takeaways for how publishers can improve their YouTube engagement:

1. Don’t let marketing beats define your content
2. Build a community of influencers
3. Listen to your fans
4. Act like a creator, not a brand
5. Combine your live and VOD strategy