It is safe to say that it is in YouTube’s best interest to keep you on its website as long as possible. Presumably as you stay to watch videos, more ads can be played, and more money can be made, which is why YouTube tends of make suggestions on videos that you might be interested in.
YouTube has also given creators the ability to suggest videos mid-stream, which we suppose has potential to be useful, but unfortunately it didn’t really come off that way. So much so that according to a report from Engadget, YouTube is now removing the ability for creators to promote videos, playlists, or live streams through in-video notifications after finding out that a very, very small percentage actually clicked on them.
According to YouTube, only 1 in 20 people actually clicked on these suggestions, meaning that 95% of those watching YouTube did not. The company claims that users have given them feedback on the feature and have said that it felt a lot like spam. YouTube doesn’t think that removing the feature will cause many problems, and that they believe that cards and end screen video links are more effective tools at promoting videos rather than the ones that pop up mid stream.
If you are in the camp that felt that these suggestions were spam-like, then this should come as good news.
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