Settings (formats, location, budget)

Go to the Google Ads Dashboard, click campaigns, then click the “+” symbol to add a new campaign.

Selecting Your Goal and Campaign Type

Depending on which goal you choose (sales, leads, website traffic, etc.) for your video campaign, Google will make either an executive decision or offer up more options and features for your campaign.
Since this is a Lead Generation Campaign for YouTube, here are our recommended settings: Choose “Leads” as your goal and “Video” as your campaign type.
We have had better performance with this goal guidance than anything else. 

Campaign’s name

Choose a name that’s relevant and easy to remember. 

Lead Forms

If your campaign is at $50,000 in lifetime spend, you probably need to use Lead Forms.
If you don’t have them, just leave it blank for now.  

Bidding Strategy

Select Maximize conversions first. The only time you need to use Target CPA is when you have achieved around 10 conversions. Why? Because your conversions will tell you how much your Target CPA should be.

From there, you should decrease your CPA by 10% every week (or two) as long as:

• Google is meeting those CPAs
• Impression rates aren’t dropping

This strategy helps you find the Target CPA that works for you, so you can scale as efficiently as possible.

Budget and Dates

We recommend you spend $20.00 daily – a pretty aggressive budget for video. While you’re not necessarily paying for “view,” the scope of what you’ll get from this budget is worth it. However, if you need to go lower than that, it’s totally fine. 

Networks

Better to uncheck “Video partners on the Display Network.” We’re going to choose the exact sites you want your ads to show inside of Placements. And you’ll learn that once we’re in the Creating Your Ad Group section. For now, only check “YouTube videos.” 

Locations and Language

However, if your target is outside of your country, you can set a different location by selecting “Enter another location,” just type the country you’re targeting. 

Make sure that you’re effectively on channels that use the language you need to target on

Content Exclusions. Inventory type.

In this section, Google asks you to choose an “inventory” that your ads belong to. Each category dictates how explicit your content is. Our recommendation is to choose “Standard Inventory,” unless you have a product or brand that specifically distinguishes you into an Expanded or Limited Inventory. 

Quick guide to help you decide which category you belong to:

Expanded inventory. Only use this if your content actually lives in this targeted niche. (e.g an “aggressive” clothing brand)

Standard Inventory. Same exclusions as expanded but less explicit. This is what we recommend.

Limited Inventory. This excludes most types of sensitive and explicit content. (e.g. churches, kids, family, etc.)

To learn more about inventory types, click on “Compare Inventory Types.”

Content exclusions: Excluded types and labels 

This is important. The reason why we recommend opting out from Embedded YouTube videos is because you might not want to show up on someone else’s website – it conveys a different intent and there’s a lower probability to convert those users. 

We also recommend you to opt out from live streaming videos, and here’s why: 
If someone’s watching a live video, they are probably highly engaged in it which means they’ll be less likely to convert. 

Conversions

If you have multi-variant conversion settings, multi-touch points, or different conversions you want to track for this campaign, click “Choose conversion actions.” Otherwise (and in most cases) just use the account-level conversions. 

Important: No matter what you do, make sure you’re tracking conversions.

Related resources:

How to Run a Lead Generation Campaign in YouTube (Free Guide)

YouTube Ads for Beginners: How to Launch & Optimize a YouTube Video Advertising Campaign

Create a Video campaign – Google Ads Help