YouTube launches new Shopping features to help creators market products and grow their earnings

YouTube announced Tuesday the launch of new Shopping features that allow creators to select shoppable collections, better plan their shoppable videos, quickly monetize older videos and more.

The launch of the new features comes as TikTok Shop looks to take on YouTube Shopping and other competitors in the space. TikTok reportedly aims to increase the size of its TikTok Shop business in the United States tenfold, to $17.5 billion this year.

YouTube is launching “Shopping Collections” to allow creators to select products from their favorite brands for users to browse. Designers can choose a selection of products based on a theme, such as everyday makeup or a capsule wardrobe. Collections will appear in the creator’s product listing, Shop tab, and video description. At launch, creators will be able to create collections on the Studio app on their phone. YouTube plans to launch the feature on desktop soon.

Image credits: Youtube

Additionally, YouTube is launching a new Affiliate Hub in its app to make it easier for creators to find information about the latest list of Shopping partners, competitive commission rates, and promo codes. Creators will also be able to use the hub to request samples from top brands. YouTube says the idea behind the new hub is to make it easier for creators to plan their next shoppable video.

YouTube is also adding Fourthwall, a website builder that helps creators build stores, to its list of integrated platforms. By allowing users to connect their Fourthwall store, YouTube makes it easier for users to create and manage their content directly in YouTube Studio. YouTube already offers integrations with Shopify, Spreadshop and Spring.

Image credits: Youtube

Last year, YouTube launched features that allow creators to mass tag products in their video library based on products added to the video description. YouTube is now extending this feature to all Shopping creators. The company notes that this feature can help creators earn more revenue from their old content if it continues to generate high traffic.

As part of Tuesday’s announcement, YouTube revealed that users watched more than 30 billion hours of shopping-related videos in 2023. The platform saw a 25% increase in watch time for videos helping people to shop on YouTube.