Should YouTube Shorts be separated from the YouTube app? If yes, why? If no, why?

1. Youtube backgound and clarify:

Youtube is a democratized video streaming (recorded and live) platform where creators publish videos across the spectrum and users view/engage with the videos which in turn drives engagement for both. Youtube music is already a standalone app with an integrated youtube search/video interface. Another form of content on Youtube is shorts, for videos <=1 min.

2. Factors on which I want to answer the why?

- TAM

- Market Niche

- Industry Growth

- Macro

- Product & Business synergy

3. Youtube Shorts Goals:

Product Goals: Increase watch time in the youtube ecosystem 

Business Goals: Increase ARR for Youtube

4. Users

a) Youtube Users (demand side):

- Power Users (>3-4hrs/day weekly average)

- Medium Users (>1-2hrs/day weekly average)

- Occassional Users (<1hr/day weekly average)

b) Youtube Users (supply side):

- Active creators (>3-4 publishes excluding shorts weekly)

- Occassional creators (1-2 publishes excluding shorts weekly)

- Rare creators (1-2 publishes excluding shorts yearly [musicians' channels]) 

- Brands/Advertisers

Based on the user revenue potential and frequency of engagement, I would like to prioritize power and medium users from demand side and active creators and brands/advertisers from supply side.

5. Pain Points

Power Users: 1) While youtube does a good job of recommending relevant videos/channels, user cannot comprehend whether the content recommended is actually good and suits his/her taste. 

Medium Users: 1) Use youtube for a specific purpose with the aim of obtaining knowledge. Discoverability of fresh new content which may convert them to power users depends on them taking explicit action over and above their specific purpose.

Active Creators: 1) Need to publish a lot of long video content to hit the right engagement metrics to boost their discoverability in recommendations which is time consuming. 2) Editing, copyright guardrails etc is high effort for long videos.

Brands: 1) Un-contextual ad placement at the beginning or middle of youtube video, which affects demand side experience and high bounce rate for advertisers. 2) Collabs with active creators is dependent entirely on the creator producing highly engaged videos and maintaining a growing community. 3) Dealing with adblocking software leading to loss of relevant leads and revenue.

6. Solutioning/Rationale

TAM - The above users contribute roughly 70-80% of the network of youtube.

Market Niche - Youtube has a commanding lead as a platform for creating and consuming UGC. There are other UGC platforms like Twitch but have relatively low network.

Industry Growth - The industry is on the growth trajectory with lower attention span, quicker and impulsive decision making, live commerce opportunities etc.

Macro - TikTok and Instagram are the leaders in the shorts/reels format. Upending them would be a long term strategy. Current focus should be augmenting the youtube ecosystem to pull further ahead of the competition.

Product & Business synergy - Addressing the factors above and the pain points of users,

- Shorts can act as a quick gateway for discovering relevant content. Power users can determine within a min or two on whether the channel is worth viewing, based off on creator shorts.

- With medium users, even if their platform time is same, they can consume a lot more content through shorts than videos, which in turn can boost their engagement and potentially drive them towards becoming power users.

- Creators can market their channel much more quickly and with more novelty and creativity. They can also endorse brands which they want to and directly link up to the brand website.

- Brands need not rely only on youtube algorithms to get impressions from relevant users. They can invest in creating shorts which is much more low effort to drive inbound leads. They can also tie up with creators offline to be a part of their reels and bypass adblockers/ad skips done by users.

Therefore, shorts should not be spun off as a separate app, rather be used as a lever for increasing the youtube ecosystem with positive network effects for all stakeholders from within the app.

7. Success Metrics:

- Avg watch time per user (should increase)

- No. of searches through searchbar (should decrease)

- No. of shorts swiped away per 100 shorts (should decrease)

- CTR from shorts for brands (should increase)

- Traffic % to creator channel (should increase)

- Subscribers to creator channel (should increase)

Guardrail Metrics:

- Avg watch time of longer videos

- Dip in ad revenue by offline collab