AdSense Changes How It Calculates And Reports YouTube Earnings

Google AdSense announced that they have started calculating and reporting on earnings from YouTube slightly differently.

Starting April 1, 2013, AdSense will no longer calculate and report AdSense for Content Host earnings for YouTube partners. Instead, AdSense earnings from YouTube videos will only be calculated by YouTube and displayed in YouTube Analytics.

Prior to this month, there were two systems calculating earnings from the two sources of YouTube ad earnings — the AdSense system for earnings from ads sold through AdSense (auction-sold ads) and the YouTube system for earnings from ads sold through YouTube (reserve-sold ads). Now, only the YouTube system will calculate earnings from both sources, and revenue reporting will be streamlined in YouTube Analytics.

So, what does this mean for YouTube partners who have been earning revenue from AdSense? When I asked what changes a typical partner might see as a result of the changes, a Google spokesperson told me, “there really isn’t a way to estimate what the ‘typical’ partner will see, different partners will be affected differently.” The spokesperson said, “the main difference is that previously we were using two systems to calculate revenues, whereas now we’re only using one, which will mean the results are more accurate.”

The change does not affect other AdSense products, and YouTube partners can still see clicks and page views and manage ad blocking for their videos from the AdSense interface.