What is a bumper ad on YouTube?

Bumpers play before, during or after other videos and the viewer cannot skip them. Because every impression is seen in full, Google charges by cost per thousand impressions rather than per view. Six seconds is very little time, so a bumper does one thing: puts a name, a picture and a single idea into the viewer's head. 'New outlet in Gulberg Greens, open now' fits. A walkthrough of three treatment options does not.

Bumpers work best alongside something else. A common pattern is to run a longer skippable ad that explains the offer, then follow up with bumpers to the people who watched it, reminding them of the brand and the deadline. Another is to run bumpers around a launch or a short sale, when frequency matters more than depth. On their own, bumpers rarely produce enquiries that you can trace directly.

Making one is mostly an editing job. Cut a strong moment from existing footage, put the brand name on screen from the first frame, add one line of text that reads at a glance, and finish with the logo or location. Sound helps, but many people watch muted, so the message must work with the sound off. Most businesses can make several bumpers from one shoot.

Measure bumpers with the right yardsticks: reach, frequency, and whether searches for your brand, visits or calls rise during the flight. Google offers brand lift studies for larger budgets; smaller advertisers in Rawalpindi or Islamabad can compare branded search volume and enquiries in the weeks before, during and after. Judging a bumper by direct conversions will make it look worse than it is.