In fall, I wanted to buy a raincoat to protect myself from the rainy weather. If I would ask my mother how digitalization influences my buying behavior in the case of my raincoat, she would probably say that I am going to buy it online. Of course, she is right about that. I am still a fan of real-life shopping, but it is raining. So I go ahead and do my research about offers and popularity of water-repellent clothing. But on my way towards a dry fall season, my steps go a little bit further.

After I got an overview and chose a couple of interesting raincoats, I open my website of trust: YouTube. I spend the next hour watching people, that I have never met before, unpacking their new raincoats and examining them up to the tiniest detail. I am not able to make a reasonable buying decision without watching at least 10 reviews on YouTube. In the end, I am as exhausted as if I would have tried on all jackets myself. Nonetheless, I can be proud of myself, because I have done all that without moving or changing from my pajamas into everyday clothes.

So, this means that I let people on the internet decide what I should buy. This aspect can be extremely important for companies, because I don’t trust their commercials on TV, but the opinions of random people on the internet. Brands need to recognize and use this potential in order to reach me and other people my age.

In the case of the raincoat, it would probably be sufficient to post a video where any random person talks about the product. There were not as many videos about raincoats, so I had to take what was available and rely on less known YouTubers. In other areas like smartphones or beauty however, there are so many videos that a no-name channel doesn’t suffice. In that case, I need the help of larger YouTube cannels.

Because I am on YouTube a lot, I know about different areas of the YouTube scene and recognize quickly, whether it is a popular and trustworthy channel or not. When I am looking for a new phone for example, I remember some channels from the last time. Also, I see how popular a channel is and choose accordingly how relevant this channel will be for my decision. But I don’t only base my decision on the number of subscribers; I also check how integrated the channel is into the community of other large channels. I need to have the feeling that the YouTubers are telling me their honest opinions. Trust is a very important issue. Of course I know that most products are usually sponsored, but if YouTubers only say positive things all the time, they lose their trustworthiness.

When companies promote their products on YouTube, it is not sufficient to be present. They also need to understand the culture of YouTube and recognize the most important opinion leaders in the respective area and cooperate with them.

The opinions of some YouTubers are so important, that they can become a real problem for some brands. It happens that I don’t buy a certain product because of the negative opinion of a YouTuber I trust. Companies need to be aware of what is being said about their products on YouTube and act in case of a negative assessment by an influential person. When working with a young target group, the contact to online influencers is almost as important as the contact to the most important print media.

In PR, those topics can’t be missing, because this young target audience gets a large part of their information from social media. That is why it is important to know the scene on YouTube and cooperate with the most relevant channels in order to reach and influence a young audience.