As you’ve likely seen, YouTube recently updated its view count definition, shifting to "Total Views" as the primary public metric. Here are a few quick notes about what that means for your partnerships with brands. 

Your view count is almost 1,5x higher, but your audience hasn’t changed

Since August 27th (about midday Paris time), the public view count on the YouTube site, under the videos, has been showing all views, from the first second. 

Before this change, the views displayed under your videos were only engaged views: views from people who clicked on a video and watched for long enough or interacted quickly. Those engaged views were a better estimate of the people who really paid attention to your video than total views.

The new view metric includes all views that were previously excluded, the reason given by YouTube is that it enables apples-to-apples comparisons with both shorts (for which total views have been used since last year), and of course with TikTok videos and Instagram reels. 

Wizdeo has tracked this change, and we estimate the increase in average at 44% higher daily views for all videos on YouTube since August 27th, or in other words, “total views” are in average 44% higher than engaged views. But this average numbers conceals big differences, as you can see on your YouTube studio. For example, in the first fews days of a video, there’s a huge difference between total views and engaged views, less so when the video gets older. 

In other words, the public view count is now broader. It includes low-watch-time views that weren’t counted before, while engaged views remain a much more relevant indicator of actual audience engagement and performance.

Engaged views are crucial for brands, but they can’t see them anymore

Brands can see your new total public view count, but they don’t have access anymore to your actual engaged views, while you still do in your Youtube Studio, where engaged views continue to be tracked. 

The problem is that brands need to know engaged views: first, because all their references in terms of CPMs have been built with engaged views. If a brand is ready to pay 30€ CPM for a lifestyle creator in the US, that applies to engaged views, not total views which might be 50% higher while the engaged audience hasn’t changed. The same goes for their references in terms of conversion rates (revenue per 1000 views). A creator delivering consistently 50€ revenue for 1000 engaged views can’t be expected to deliver the same 50€ for 1000 total views….

On top of that, it would be a bad idea for brands just to recalculate all their references with total views, since those now include “non-engaged views”, which are worthless, particularly for sponsored videos with 60-90 second integrations.

Here are a few potential scenarios when brands lack of access to your engaged views will create issues: 

• Bad negotiations based on inaccurate data : if a brand assumes that engaged views represent only 60% of your total views, while they actually account for 90%, they may use this lower estimate to negotiate your rate down.

• Incorrect payment calculations for CPM-based contracts initially based on engaged views : if the payment is calculated based on engaged views, brands may use their own estimates rather than your actual data to determine the final amount they owe you.

• Challenges with renewals : even if renewals are based on revenue/ROI performance, not views, there are still adjustments to prices if the engaged views from a creator go up or down. If those aren’t known, the brand may feel that expectations were not aligned, potentially putting the entire partnership at risk.

So Brands have two solutions: either get access with your authorization to engaged views, or estimate those engaged views. In the short-term, only the first solution is workable. 

Right now: share your “Engaged Views” with brands to avoid issues. 

To protect your future sponsorship earnings and maintain a strong performance track record with brands, you should make a habit of consistently sharing your engaged views metrics.

Before negotiations: set the right baseline

Brands need to understand how many engaged views one of your videos will do in 30 days, before negotiations begin. A good practice is sharing engaged views from your 10 most recent videos, allowing brands to calculate an average and get a realistic picture of your potential performance.

You or your agent can include this information when presenting your profile and rates, alongside key metrics such as your audience demographics, geographic breakdown, sponsorship history, and other relevant performance data.

You can also opt into the YouTube Creator Partnerships (YCP) program, which gives brands greater visibility into your creator data and can make your profile easier for them to discover and evaluate.

After the campaign: share the actual results

Brands will also need your engaged views after publication :

• For payment when the deal is based on CPM or guaranteed views.
• For reporting and evaluation, so that the brand can understand whether your audience was attracted to its product or not.

Make it a habit, not a one-time disclosure

Channel performance naturally fluctuates, so sharing engaged views should be a consistent part of your sponsorship process so that brands can take the right decision. 

This transparency helps prevent surprises during campaign reporting or contract renewals, keeps expectations aligned, and ensures that your pricing remains connected to the actual value and impact you deliver to brands.

How Wizdeo is helping

As we have done for a long time with for example demographic or geographic audience data that are not available for brands, we’re going to help them get estimated of engaged views rather than relying only on creators sharing private data. 

Here’s how we’re addressing the issue:

Building tools to estimate engaged views

We are developing tools and algorithms to reliably estimate your engaged views over time, and making them available on our tool. 

Leveraging YouTube’s Creator Partnerships program

We are also joining YouTube’s Creator Partnerships (YCP) program, with the goal of eventually automating the sharing of engaged views data with brands and reducing the need for manual reporting.

Including the sharing of engaged views in our branded content deals

In the meantime, sharing your engaged views will now be part of your contractual obligations for each video published as part of a Wizdeo-managed partnership.

We may occasionally ask you to provide a screenshot of your engaged views for a sponsored video. Wizdeo will take care of reminding you when this is needed, so you don’t have to worry about keeping track of every request yourself.

If you have any questions about how this applies to your specific deal, your Wizdeo contact is here to help.