Hello Insiders.
We have been getting a lot of questions about the YPP application process
secondary review, rejections, duplication, all sorts of those things
so this video is hopefully going to be answering all of those questions.
My name is Barbara and we have a special guest here.
Thanks. I'm Harris. I'm a PM for the YouTube Partner Program
and I've seen lots of those questions on this channel and on social
and wanted to make sure people had some good info
so went and talked to the team that owns our policies
and is doing all the application reviews and all that stuff
and I've got some good info to share with you today.
Let's start with the one everybody's asking.
What is the status of our YPP application process?
Yeah, so as a lot of people know, we started a process of reviewing
all the channels that are already in the Partner Program
as well as all the new applications of creators wanting to get into the program
and it's really all about making the program stronger
so that it's more productive for creators who wanna earn money.
We've gotten to kind of a milestone where we've now responded to everybody
who was waiting at least 30 days for their application to be addressed.
Exciting thing is we've welcomed lots of new creators to the program.
Thousands of channels from hundreds of different countries covering
all kinds of different topics.
Politics, sports, religion, law, yoga.
Channels teaching you how to play guitar.
There's even one that we found about the sport of jai alai.
Do you know that sport?
Not at all.
Point is, there isn't any particular genre or topic
that we're looking for or not looking for.
We really want it to be a diverse program that's there for lots of different creators.
The main thing though is just making sure it's viable and strong.
I like that these niche categories are getting in there.
Now, what happens...
Some folks have been asked for a secondary review.
Talk to be about that.
We know there are many questions on it.
For certain channels, we wanna be really careful that we're not
making an incorrect decision, so for certain kinds of content
that might be kind of on the borderline, we're putting extra resources
into reviewing that multiple times.
So we have told some creators that it's gonna take a little bit longer
for us to do a second review.
And do we have a rough ETA for how long that secondary review might take?
We're hoping most will be done within the next couple of weeks
so we'll keep you updated and we'll communicate as much as we can.
We're working hard to get through that.
- Absolutely. - Yes. OK.
What types of things could get your channel held for secondary review?
We're being really careful about this process.
I mean, again, the point is really just to make sure that all the content
in the program is really adding value
and that creators who are putting a lot of work in
to do really creative, interesting stuff are getting rewarded.
But in this process, we've come across stuff
we didn't necessarily anticipate or know about in advance
and so we really are careful about trying to figure out whether these new things
really meet the mission of the program that I was just talking about, so...
So let's get more concrete. Do you hard examples of this?
One category that comes up a lot is stuff that doesn't seem to be original
that's maybe been pulled in from other places.
It's not always obvious what's going on.
It could be sort of an auto-generated voice
or videos that are just text and we're not sure where that text came from.
We've seen stuff that seems to be auto-generated animation
or just a really basic kind of kids' game being played or something like that
without a lot of additional content or narrative around it.
And so, it can be a tough analysis.
Is that meant really just to kind of in a spammy way just sort of make money?
Or is there kind of a genuine creative thing going on?
Again, we're really careful about it. We don't want to say no to stuff
that actually does have a genuine creator behind it.
We just go through a lot of analysis to try to figure out what's going on
and make a call.
Alright.
So we're going through with a fine-grained, fine-tooth comb—whatever—to really make sure
that we're letting the right things in.
- Right. - Now we've discussed all the reasons
why we might require a secondary review, could you cover why we might say no?
Sure, yeah. So there are two primary areas that the team is coming across.
One is maybe a little more intuitive.
It's just looking at whether the content on the channel is appropriate for ads.
Obviously advertisers have a lot of concerns about what their brand shows up next to
and if the majority of a channel contains content that isn't brand-safe in that way
likely we won't accept it. So that's the first.
- OK, yeah. - The second major area
that's less well known, so it's important we talk about it
is where you get a response that refers to duplication.
What's going on there is we wanna make sure that creators can get rewarded
where they're really putting their creative energy into their content
and that there's really quality stuff for the audience.
So this other category, if you hear about duplication
a lot of the time that refers to content that's coming from other sources
where the creator really isn't adding much to it.
So that could be videos from other platforms or it could be TV content.
It could be other stuff like that.
Or even, you know we talked a little before about auto-generated stuff.
We see some of the in this category too.
What about reactions or offering commentary?
Because that's something that at least I personally have seen
all over YouTube.
How does that fit in with what you're saying about duplication?
Absolutely. And that stuff is super-important to YouTube and really great for the audience.
So if creators really are adding that value—they're adding a narrative
there's commentary, there's discussion around it
that's coming from them—then that's OK.
OK, good. I love me a reaction video.
Now, what can you do if you get rejected from YPP?
You can re-apply in 30 days and...
We generally give you sort of a reason that the application wasn't accepted.
You can think about changing your content strategy a little bit
so that it kind of meets the requirements the team is applying.
I've had a lot of questions about this specifically
so I'd love to get more information about how we are making these decisions.
Machine-learning systems, people?
Give me all that information.
Absolutely. So I know a lot of people ask questions about this
and they're concerned about decisions
that might be made automatically or what have you.
- Yes. - In this case, the final call's always made
by a human being.
We use all kinds of systems, machine-learning stuff of course
to give those people information, to give them signals about what's going on
with a channel, but a person makes the final call.
OK.
Now, once you've made it into YPP, you've made it through
this application process, are you in it for life?
Are you golden? Are you good to go back to doing what you were doing before?
Well, generally, if you keep doing stuff consistent with what got you in
you should be in good shape, but we do have the team re-review everybody
in the program periodically, just to make sure things haven't changed
and make sure they're still meeting the requirements.
OK. And finally, where can I go to get more information about our YPP policies
guidelines, ads-friendly guidelines— all of those?
Tell me about all the things that, as a creator, I should be aware of.
You got it. So we do have Partner Program policies in the Help Center.
A lot of good insight on the stuff we've been talking about
could come from the AdSense policies, actually.
- OK. - And we can provide links
to those maybe in the description.
I think there was also a previous Creator Insider
that was relevant to a lot of this.
Yes. I filmed an advertiser-friendly guidelines video
which we will also link to below.
We walked through the entire ad-friendly policies doc
and talked about what's good, what's not so good
gray areas—all of those things.
- Super-important. - Yeah.
Thank you very much for coming on.
You answered a ton of questions that I know all of our viewers will be
delighted to finally have answers for.
Have any closing thoughts for the folks?
No. Just wanna thank everyone for their patience with this process
and it's gonna be really great at the end of the day
for the whole community
and really gonna improve the world for creators and for viewers
and, yeah, so thanks.
Yes, thank you.
As always, if you are digging the content on this channel, hit that Subscribe button
check the notification bell so you can be notified
about all of our upcoming videos, like this video
and if you have more questions in general about these topics
drop them down below—comments, questions greatly appreciated.
If you have individual questions about your particular channel
I have also included a link to a video down below where we have resources
where you as a creator can go to get individual support for your channel.
Thanks.