YouTube Testing Allowing Viewers To Purchase Items Shown In A Video

Due to the YouTube adpocalpyse which saw many creators lose out on a lot of earning potential, many YouTubers have since come up with other ways to generate income. This includes asking subscribers to subscribe to them on platforms like Patreon, donations made through PayPal, or use Amazon affiliate links in which they get a cut of the proceeds.

The latter is something that Google is definitely losing out on because they essentially see none of this money, so it doesn’t come as a surprise that Google is hoping to turn things around. The company is running a small test on YouTube that would allow viewers of a video to directly purchase items that they see in the video.

According to YouTube, “We’re testing a new way for people to easily discover and purchase products featured in YouTube videos. Creators in this pilot can add certain products to their videos. Viewers can then see a list of featured products by clicking the shopping bag icon on the bottom left corner of the video. From there, viewers can explore each product’s page to see more information, related videos, and purchase options for that product.”

Presumably through this system, Google/YouTube could get a cut of the products sold, while creators can also potentially earn some money at the same time. However, given that this is a test, it is unclear when the feature will be rolled out to more users, so we’ll just have to wait and see.

Tyler Lee
Categories: General
Tags: Google, YouTube