The United States is in the heart of election season, as any lawn, bumper sticker or TV ad will tell you.
And while political content once caused some brands to bristle at the idea of advertising or sponsoring, various political publishers have still found significant success attracting YouTube video sponsors in the lead-up to Election Day this year.
Data from Chartbeat shows which ones have scored significant reach for sponsors while staying the course on politics, even when coming to topics with a clear point-of-view/bias toward one side or the other.
Left-Leaning Leaders
Over the last 90 days, both The Bulwark (15.8 million) and The Daily Beast (13.3 million) are among the top 10 U.S. media pages by YouTube views for sponsored videos. And both have gotten there in part via upload volume.
The Bulwark has 57 sponsored videos in the timeframe (average of 255K views in the first seven days), while The Daily Beast has 45 (271K views in first seven). And those sponsors aren’t just coming from politically-adjacent advertisers, either.
ForThe Bulwark, recent sponsors have included ZocDoc, The New York Times, Casper, Quince, Hims and Hers, to name a few. On The Daily Beast’s side, Hims, OneSkin, Shopify, HoneyLove, Morgan & Morgan and Kalshi headline the list.
The videos these brands are sponsoring also aren’t shying away from specific topics or those publication’s left leans.
One of The Bulwark’s top videos, about Donald Trump’s sinking approval ratings, has ZocDoc as a sponsor, and Hims and OneSkin sponsor various Daily Beast videos around Trump impeachment.
As U.S. political media has become increasingly polarized, there was initially an idea that related and biased outlets would be third rails for brands. But instead, over time, those clear points-of-view have become beacons for greater attention, which ultimately matters for advertisers/sponsors if that attention is coming from the right audience.
Political Personalities Pick Up Steam, Too
While the outlets above are driven by written journalistic extensions and outlet-level brand recognition, more personality-driven political entities have also been able to net sponsor interest and dollars as election interest heats up.
ZipRecruiter has been a frequent (16 videos) sponsor of Pod Save America over the last 90 days, while The Weekly Show — the YouTube extension of The Daily Show — has featured brands like Shopify, Mint Mobile, Magic Spoon and more.
David Pakman’s page is entirely driven by a single personality, and he’s had 29 videos sponsored in the timeframe, with most of those coming from Private Internet Access.
While Pakman’s sponsorships may not be as high-profile as some of his peers, his reach very much punches at a similar weight to those larger publications (when looking at per-video performance). And sponsorship likely at a lower price for brands, too, for those looking to make an efficiency play at a similar audience.
Conservative Alternatives
Sponsored political media videos aren’t a left-only domain, either. Various right-leaning outlets also find success earning sponsored YouTube views; with some also performing at similar levels to the larger publications above (while also speaking to an entirely different audience).
The Daily Signal has just nine sponsored videos on the month, but collected 2.1 million views on those (averaging 230K views per upload in the first seven days). Sponsors for those videos aren’t big names at all, but for advertisers looking to get in front of a conservative audience, the outlet provides a more effective efficiency buy than trying to reach a small fraction of a costlier, larger video audience watching mainstream news.
Blaze Media had significantly more videos sponsored (26), with a variety of brands including overlapping ones with the more liberal voices above. ZocDoc, Cozy Earth, Rocket Money and Home Chef all sponsored Blaze videos, as did others. All of the outlet’s sponsored videos also outperformed platform engagement norms by 2x.
Newsmax is potentially the most interesting of the conservative voices here.
The cable news network had 78 sponsored videos in the last 90 days, with the overwhelming majority sponsored by Paramount+ or Newsmax itself. Those sponsored videos lacked the same view performance over the first seven days as these other outlets — which could’ve been impacted by a lack of variety among sponsors, volume of sponsored videos and/or a lack of greater spend put against them once sponsored.
