YouTube offers more viewer details

New York: YouTube is giving contributors more details about who is watching its video clips and when, offering advertisers additional insights they can use to target their pitches.

The launch of Insight yesterday came as Google looks for ways to make money off its $1.76 billion purchase of YouTube in 2006. Despite growing interest in online video ads, many marketers have stayed away from user-generated video like what is on YouTube.

Marketers who buy ads on YouTube already get a bevy of statistics about the performance of their ads. The new program breaks down viewership by day and shows the states or countries where most viewers are.

A movie studio that uploads a trailer for free on YouTube could use those details to see where the clip is most popular and perhaps buy ads targeted to users in that region - on YouTube and even on television.

But contributors also can benefit from the new program, said Tracy Chan, a YouTube program manager. Until now, those users got limited information, such as how many times their video was viewed or commented on.

The tools "give a lot of context around the performance of video over time, where are your audience coming from and how your message is connecting", Chan said.

A band could use that information to plan stops on a tour, while video producers who find their viewership peaks on Wednesdays could release new clips then. Likewise, producers who see their shows peaking after three weeks would know to release a new episode every three weeks, and someone whose material turns out to be popular in Spain might want to release the next video in Spanish.

"With this information, you can concentrate on creating compelling new content that appeals to your target audiences and post these videos on days you know these viewers are on the site," YouTube officials said in a blog entry.