It’s a little apples-to-oranges, but more people search for video on YouTube than conduct “core” searches on Yahoo. So it’s only natural that YouTube is offering paid search ads so you can drive traffic to your YouTube clips. This clip provides a quick overview of how it works…
Suddenly it looks like YouTube has found a business model. Of course, the challenge here is the majority of searches are not for particular products and services — the most lucrative search terms — but for interesting videos. But if people begin to use YouTube as a research tool (you could argue that’s the direction it’s moving, especially since thousands of businesses already host sponsorship videos on YouTube), imagine what would happen if Google links its traditional search ads (Adwords) with YouTube search ads: you can watch sponsorship videos in traditional Google paid search results. Suddenly, under that scenario, Google could become a force in video advertising in very short order. Then who would laugh about Google buying YouTube?