Let's tackle a longstanding debate here on YouTube.
Are affiliate links officially permitted here or not,
in the description text of your videos?
Or does that violate YouTube's terms of service?
That's coming up.
Hey, guys.
My name is Tim Schmoyer and it's Thursday, which means it's time
to do some YouTube Q&A with you guys.
A question that I hear a lot here on YouTube, is-- Tim,
are affiliate links actually permitted here on YouTube?
Can I do a review of a product or an item
and then put my Amazon affiliate link in the description text
in my video to point people there
so I get a little kick back?
Well, that is a great question.
There's a lot of debate around this.
And usually it goes back to YouTube's terms
of service section 4D, which says this--
you agree not to use the service for any
of the following commercial uses unless you obtain YouTube's
prior written approval-- the sale of access to the service.
The sale of advertising, sponsorships, or promotions
placed on or within the service or content.
Or the sale of advertising, sponsorships,
or promotions on any page of an ad-enabled blog
or website containing content delivered via the service,
unless other material, not obtain from YouTube,
appears on the same page and is of sufficient value
to be the basis for such sales.
Now before we jump into all this,
let me first say, that making business related videos that
promote your business, your product, or services,
or yourself, all that is totally permitted.
In fact, the next section of YouTube's terms
of service, section 4E, says this specifically.
Prohibited commercial uses do not
include uploading an original video to YouTube
or maintaining an original channel on YouTube
to promote your business or artistic enterprise.
But that is not what we are talking about here.
What we are discussing, in this video,
is when you promote someone else's product, or someone
else's service, or someone else's business
and they pay you to do so.
Whether that be through them actually writing you a check
and saying, hey, feature us in your upcoming video.
Or whether that means you are going to get an affiliate
kickback from any of the links that you share.
Like people click on it, it sets a cookie on their browser,
and then they browse on Amazon.
And whenever they buy from that viewing session,
then you get a percentage of the cut from that purchase.
YouTube hasn't been very clear on this affiliate
issue either way.
In fact, even in preparing for this very video,
I reached out to their policy team
and the response I got back from them
was very generic and not very helpful,
But YouTube's help section does allude to a lot
of different things across several different pages.
And I think if you stitch them altogether,
you might get an answer.
First of all, let's go to YouTube's Policy Center help
section.
And there it says this-- content that deliberately tries
to mislead users for financial gain may be removed.
And in some cases, strikes may be issued to the uploader.
Obviously, this doesn't say anything
about using affiliate links, but it does give us
some guidelines for it we are going to use them,
what we should abide by.
And the first one is, it can't be misleading.
Personally, whenever I use an Amazon affiliate link
or otherwise, I always put in brackets
right behind the link or right in front
of it, the word affiliate.
So people clearly know that if they click this link,
it is an affiliate link and I will get some commission
for the sale if they choose to buy.
And number two, it can't be purely
for your own financial gain.
You have to use a link in a way that
offers more additional value to the viewer.
So for example, if you're reviewing the product
or you're creating something and you
use a tool to create that something and someone's like,
hey, I want to create that.
How did you do that?
And you offer a link to the tool that you use.
You are offering them a value.
Saying, here, you can go directly, find it,
and purchase it yourself.
But that still doesn't really, directly answer the question of
whether or not we can use affiliate links here
on YouTube.
So I actually consulted with a lawyer
who specializes in working with online creators.
His opinion is that a sale of promotions
is too vague as to whether or not
an affiliate link is considered a sale.
He said, YouTube is probably taking a very low key view
on this right now because it doesn't
have a major direct impact on their revenue.
But they want to reserve the right to do something about it
in the event that it might become a problem in the future.
But the problem I see what this, is
that YouTube multi-channel networks
they make the bulk of their revenue,
actually, from brand integration.
By promoting other people's products, and services,
and tools.
In fact, we've all probably seen a video here
and YouTube that was hugely popular that
had brand integration built right into the video.
And that was done because money exchanged hands
with the creator and the company.
Whether or not that was an affiliate relationship or just
a direct, upfront fee that they paid
to have their brand featured in the content of that video
or whatever.
So here's what I think.
YouTube's partner policy program terms of services
says this-- do not embed third party advertising,
sponsorships, or promotions placed
on or within your content.
YouTube does allow you to upload paid product placements,
provided you give us notice first.
The first part about third party advertising and promotion
is spelled out a little bit further on that page.
And, basically, what they're saying
is that you can't burn into your videos permanent pre-roll ads
or mid-roll ads into your actual video file.
If YouTube has an ad unit that is comparable to the one
that you're inserting into your actual video,
then that is not allowed.
To me, when I look at YouTube's terms of service
at that controversial section, that
is what that is talking about because the second part
of their partner program policy does explicitly state that you
can have paid product promotion in your videos
as long as you notify them about it first.
How do you notify them?
Well, when you upload your video to YouTube
under the monetization tab, you'll
see that there's a little box that you can check there.
It says, this video contains paid product placement.
Here's the question-- Are affiliate links considered
paid product placement on YouTube or not?
Here's what the help sections says-- paid product placements
are defined as pieces of content that are created specifically
for a sponsor and where that sponsor's brand message
or product is integrated directly into the content.
A typical example of a paid product placement
is one in which the marketer pays the partner
to specifically mention their product or brand in what
would normally be the editorial part of the content.
That seems to me to fit under an affiliate relationship
when Amazon is paying you to promote one of their products.
Not what's not clear to me, exactly,
is does one of their products include Amazon S3, as
an actual Amazon product, or is it
a product that's just sold through their service.
That part isn't explicitly laid out,
but it does make sense to me that
would be contained in this definition.
Just like you would go to any retail store
and buy products that they didn't exactly, specifically,
make and own themselves as a part of their branding
but as part of products that they sell
and services that they provide.
So just check that box to let YouTube
know that your video does indeed include paid product promotion
and you should be set.
But why does YouTube want to know this in the first place?
Well, it's very important that you actually
check this box because let's say you're an advertiser of company
A and they don't necessarily want their products
and services showing up as a paid ad around content that
maybe promotes one of their competitors.
So you should know that if you check that box,
YouTube may limit what ads are displayed around your videos.
And they may actually disable monetization on it completely.
So take that into consideration as you do all this.
One other final thought is, guys,
even if your video is totally on the up and up,
you have followed every single policy guideline and rule
to the tee, there are still a lot of people out there who are
adamantly believe that you cannot have affiliate links
on YouTube.
If they see that you are using an affiliate link,
they often will flag your video for violating
YouTube's community guidelines.
And if enough people do that, you still
could have a very big headache on your hand.
So keep that in mind if you use affiliate links in your videos.
Links to all the official sources I used to put all this
together are in the description text below this video.
So go check them out if you want to read
into any of this in more detail.
And remember that I am not an authoritative voice
on this matter.
This is just my own opinion based on the research
that I've done.
So if you use affiliate links in your videos,
do so at your own risk.
I would love to hear what you guys think about all this.
Please comment below.
Do you use affiliate links in your videos or not?
Do you think that they are permitted here on YouTube
or not?
And why do you think that?
And if you do use affiliate links, how
do you use them in a way that is not misleading
and also provides additional value for the viewer?
Comment.
Let us know all that below.
And if this is your first time here,
I'd love to have you subscribe.
Every Thursday we do YouTube Q&A like this
to help you guys out with the content that you're making.
On Tuesday, we look at some online video news from the week
before.
And talk about the implications that those changes and updates
have for us as creators here on this space called YouTube.
And then on Wednesdays I give you guys
some YouTube tips, ideas, suggestions, advice,
just to help you guys out.
Because I really do believe that a lot of you guys
have messages that can really change people's lives
if those people who need to hear what you have to say
could only just hear what you have to say.
So thank you for letting me be a part of helping you guys build
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Subscribe and I will see you guys again next week.
Bye.
Man, this is a tongue-twister.
Second part of the program pol-- partner program policy.
Product placement-- paid product.
Because the second-- because the second part of the partner
program policy actually explicitly states
that you can have paid product promotion in your video.