YouTube has emerged as the most-watched connected television (CTV) platform in India and Japan, according to Google. The surge in viewership is prompting advertisers to increasingly integrate CTV ad campaigns into their media strategies, said Dan Taylor, Vice President of Global Ads at Google, during a recent virtual media roundtable.
In India, 85% of viewers prefer watching YouTube on CTV over traditional linear television, as per Google data. Moreover, over 50% of these viewers spend more than 21 minutes watching content, indicating strong engagement levels. Globally, audiences consume over one billion hours of YouTube content daily on TV screens.
Taylor noted that YouTube's momentum is especially strong across the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region, where CTV watch time has more than doubled in most countries over the past 3&ndash;4 years. In Taiwan, watch time has tripled.
Highlighting Google&rsquo;s commitment to AI-driven advertising, Taylor said the tech giant continues to invest heavily in tools that enhance brand marketing. &ldquo;Google is an AI-first company with a full-stack approach to AI innovation,&rdquo; he said, adding that the company's entire AI infrastructure extends to Google Ads.
Among the new tools, Google introduced the Imogen3 feature under its Gemini project, enabling advertisers to use text prompts to generate images with faces for various ad campaigns across platforms like Performance Max, Demand Gen, Display, and Apps.
In India, brands like Puma and Zepto are already seeing results. Puma used Performance Max to efficiently target in-market users, achieving a 35% lower cost per sale and a 66% higher ROI compared to other paid channels. Quick commerce brand Zepto leveraged Veo Craft to create video assets in hours rather than weeks, doubling the scale of its campaign while achieving 11% more efficient installs.
YouTube Shorts is also seeing rapid growth, with views on TV screens more than doubling in the past year. Beauty platform Tira used Shorts to run a video reach campaign, resulting in a 228% average lift in relative search interest.
Taylor also referenced a joint study by Boston Consulting Group (BCG) and Google, which revealed that companies integrating AI tools deeply into their workflows reported 60% higher revenue growth. Real-time optimisation, faster creative production, and intelligent audience targeting are transforming the advertising landscape.
&ldquo;AI is not just improving campaign performance&mdash;it&rsquo;s reshaping how creative content is produced, measured, and delivered,&rdquo; Taylor concluded.
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Source : Business-standard

YouTube has emerged as the most-watched connected television (CTV) platform in India and Japan, according to Google.

YouTube Emerges as Top CTV Platform in India; Google Leverages AI to Transform Advertising