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At Sync 2025, one message rang loud and clear: YouTube isn’t just part of the consumer journey, it is the consumer journey.
Sarah Byrne, Director EMEA at Google, took to the stage to unpack how YouTube has evolved far beyond a video platform. Today, it’s a full-funnel commerce engine, blending discovery, engagement, and conversion in a way few platforms can match.
From Shorts to long-form content, creators to commerce, Sarah offered a grounded, data-backed view of how YouTube connects with consumers across every screen and every stage. Her session revealed why the platform continues to turn casual viewers into loyal customers, and content into conversions.
The new normal of video consumption
We’re living in what Sarah called a “video-first world”, and no platform reflects that better than YouTube. “We are consuming video like we have never consumed video before,” she said. Viewers now move fluidly between devices and formats, and YouTube has, in her words, “been at the forefront of that transformation for years.”
What’s perhaps most striking is how dominant YouTube has become in the living room, not just on mobile. “People watch more YouTube than they watch anything else on a TV screen,” Sarah explained, underscoring how deeply it’s embedded in everyday viewing habits.
And the data backs that up. YouTube accounts for 12.5% of all watch time in the UK, “and that’s doubled year over year.” Sarah was quick to add, “I’m not sharing that as a brag, but as a reflection of what users actually want.”
What they want, she believes, is authenticity. They want creators they trust, communities they relate to, and content that feels real. “In a world where they can watch anything, they are increasingly watching YouTube.”
The $50 billion creator economy
At the heart of YouTube’s success is its creator community. These aren’t just content makers, they’re cultural architects, shaping the way we consume, react, and even think.
“YouTube creators are the ones people love,” Sarah said plainly. But they’ve also built something bigger than audiences: fandoms. “They don’t just react to culture anymore. They are culture.”
That shift is impossible to miss. From red carpets to brand collaborations, creators are now setting the tone for everything from fashion and sport to tech and lifestyle. They design content that pulls people in, not just something to scroll past.
This ecosystem didn’t happen by accident. YouTube made an early bet: treat creators as businesses, not influencers. And that’s paying off. “YouTube creators are thriving,” Sarah noted. “They’re making more money here than on any other platform.”
Over the past three years, YouTube has paid out $50 billion to creators, a figure that even surpasses Netflix’s global production budget of $57 billion in the same period.
And advertisers are part of that story too. “Every dollar spent on YouTube, 50% of it goes straight to the creator,” Sarah shared. That direct reinvestment in talent is what fuels the depth, loyalty, and quality of the content we see today.
Before wrapping that section, she threw down a challenge to brands: “Go study YouTube creators. Honestly, you could replace ‘creator’ with ‘brand’ and have your content strategy right there.”
One platform, every format
“We’re consuming more. We’re listening to more voices. And we’re looking at more and more formats,” Sarah said. It’s true, people are now engaging with 39% more creators than they were just a year ago. And YouTube is uniquely equipped for that variety. Whether it’s 10-second Shorts, hour-long podcasts, live streams, or video on demand, YouTube supports, and is growing, across all of it.
Some quick figures stood out:
- Shorts now attract 70 billion views a day.
- Long-form videos (20+ minutes) grew 16% last year.
- 30 million people watch YouTube on their TVs every month in the UK.
- A billion hours of YouTube are watched on TVs globally every day.
- 15% of that watch time is co-viewed, showing YouTube isn’t just mobile. It's a living-room experience.
But this isn’t only about scale. It’s about how discovery turns into depth.
“People discover through short form,” Sarah explained. “That discovery then leads them into long form, where they go deeper.” A good example? Meghan Trainor’s ‘I Am Your Mother’ campaign. By using Shorts, she grew her YouTube subscriber base by 1.1 million, converting fleeting moments into lasting engagement.
And there’s a clear behavioural shift happening. 60% of logged-in users now watch both Shorts and long-form content each week. For brands, that’s not just a stat, it’s a sign. A signal that audiences expect to connect with you in multiple ways, not just one.
YouTube: From discovery to decision
If there’s one message Sarah wanted the room to take away, it’s this: “Discovery starts with video, and it starts on YouTube more than anywhere else.”
In today’s non-linear customer journey, video isn’t just where inspiration begins; it’s also where decisions are made. Increasingly, those purchase decisions are happening on YouTube, or on Google Search, long before a customer lands on a brand’s website.
Throughout the session, Sarah painted a vivid picture of how YouTube has evolved into the most powerful platform for connection, commerce, and culture. From the rise of creators as businesses to the explosive growth of Shorts, YouTube’s ecosystem is not only keeping up, it’s setting the pace.
The advice to brands was refreshingly straightforward:“There’s a wealth of inspiration for brands thinking about content strategy, just look at how creators behave.”
In other words: watch what creators are doing, then act like one.
Watch Sarah Byrne’s keynote from Sync 2025 on demand now.
