YouTube is big. Its impact is even bigger.

YouTube has long since ceased to be a secondary channel in Switzerland. The platform is a search engine, learning space, moving image stage and accompanying medium all in one. This is precisely where its power lies - and the difficulty of mastering its planning. After all, anyone who still thinks of YouTube according to the logic of linear television may be missing out on its actual impact. This is precisely where a new study by Webrepublic in collaboration with GfK comes in. It provides insights into the use of YouTube, but is ultimately aimed at something bigger: the future of the media agency itself.

From digital pioneer to integrated media provider

Webrepublic still has the web in its name. And yet today, the Zurich agency wants to be much more than a digital specialist. For Tobias Zehnder, Managing Director and co-founder, this change is not an abrupt repositioning, but the logical development of an attitude that has been there for a long time: wanting to understand how marketing works as a whole.

When it became clear around 2020 that the complete digitalization of marketing was changing not just channels but the entire system, Webrepublic felt that it was no longer enough to just master the digital part. People continue to see posters, watch television, move between screens, environments and usage situations. If you seriously want to understand advertising impact, you have to be able to read it as a whole.

This led to the move from a provider with a strong digital focus to an integrated media agency with national aspirations. Not as an end in itself, but out of the conviction that complexity for customers cannot be reduced by having more partners, but by having a better overview.

Reach alone only tells half the story

The real crux of the conversation, however, isn’t the agency’s history, but the question of what actually matters in the media industry today. Kevin Haab, Head of Media Strategy at Webrepublic and a specialist in impact research, deliberately focuses not on reach or frequency, but on ad recall. For him, ad recall isn’t just a nice-to-have metric, but a KPI with strategic relevance. After all, a campaign can, in theory, build reach very quickly and generate technically sound impressions. Whether these contacts were actually visible, triggered a cognitive response, and were genuinely associated with the brand, however, is another matter entirely.

This is precisely where the criticism of a market that likes to be dazzled by platform figures begins. Visible is not automatically effective. And a contact is far from being a memory.

The YouTube illusion

The YouTube study conducted in collaboration with GfK dispels several assumptions that have become entrenched in the market. The context of use is particularly important. YouTube is not just consumed casually. Many people use the platform in a very focused way to delve deeper into specialist topics or learn specific skills. For example, anyone looking for an Excel command, a fitness exercise or wanting to understand a problem in detail has long since ended up on YouTube.

This is highly relevant for advertising. This is because the impact of advertising depends heavily on the mental state of the user at the time. Anyone who is immersed in a topic will encounter advertising messages differently than someone who is simply watching entertainment on the side. "Context is king" is therefore not just an old industry mantra, but a tangible operational reality.

The second finding concerns the device debate. Connected TV is currently generating a lot of hype, and YouTube is also driving this trend. However, from Webrepublic’s perspective, the study clearly shows that the real drivers of reach and impact on YouTube are still mobile and desktop. Those who let themselves be too dazzled by the big screen in the living room miss out on the ad inventory where YouTube often demonstrates its decisive reach in practice. Added to this is the multiplier effect of young target audiences. Those who buy a lot of impressions on YouTube quickly end up reaching a disproportionately high share of younger audiences. This complicates traditional age-based targeting. The platform does not distribute attention neutrally, but rather according to its own usage patterns.

Why inventory is not simply inventory

Things get particularly interesting where Webrepublic combines the findings of these studies with its own impact research. From the platform’s perspective, much of this data is initially considered to be of equal value. A contact is a contact. This is precisely where the agency’s criticism comes in. Kevin Haab points to situations in which ads are technically displayed but, in reality, there is hardly any visual contact. Such «radio contacts» are often treated in the same way by large platform systems as fully visible, attentively consumed advertising moments. For Webrepublic, it is precisely this equivalence that is problematic. The agency therefore attempts to systematically categorize inventory based on its impact potential and to weight it differently using AI. The goal is not merely more elegant planning, but a more robust allocation of budgets. Money should not simply buy visibility anywhere; rather, it should be directed to places where visibility is more likely to translate into recall.

The agency as a counter-model to the black box

This brings us to the broader strategic question. What is the raison d’être of a media agency when Google, Meta, and other platforms are increasingly automating, optimizing, and shifting processes into black boxes? Tobias Zehnder puts it succinctly. An agency has a reason to exist if it outperforms the platforms’ automated AI logic. If it doesn’t simply trust the black boxes, but understands what’s happening behind the scenes. If it can identify wasted spending and direct budgets toward where advertising actually has an impact.

This view is not only an attack on platform logic, but also on the business model of many traditional networks. Zehnder makes no secret of the fact that he often sees large media agencies today less as pure service providers than as commercial platforms that earn their money through inventory, trading and their own products. Webrepublic counters this with the narrative of independence. That sounds self-confident. And it strikes a nerve at a time when many advertisers are receiving more data than ever, but do not necessarily feel better oriented.

AI speeds up the process—but does not replace human judgment

Of course, Webrepublic is also part of an industry that is currently being swept up by AI with full force. But in conversation, it quickly becomes clear that Zehnder and Haab do not view AI as an end in itself. For them, the more interesting question is not where AI is being used, but what mindset lies behind it. It’s simply not enough to just make existing processes faster and cheaper. AI becomes truly relevant where new forms of value creation emerge: at the intersection of data, modeling, consulting, and strategic judgment. Especially in a world where platforms are increasingly automating their systems, this judgment becomes the true differentiator.

This can also be seen in the new search environment. With Google's AI offensive, generative search and terms such as GEO, the logic of findability is shifting again. Clicks now only tell part of the story. Many things are becoming more indirect, more diffuse and more difficult to measure. This is precisely why, according to the implicit message, partners are needed who can not only read dashboards, but can also classify contexts.

Consistency beats the next hype

Another idea that Zehnder emphatically brings into the discussion seems almost pleasantly unagitated: Brand Consistency. While LinkedIn and TikTok produce new hypes every day and many are under pressure to innovate, he considers consistency to be massively undervalued.

Brands aren’t built on a constant stream of new claims, ever-changing visual styles, and seasonal shifts in direction. They are built on recognizability, a consistent visual and narrative language, and the ability to resonate over the years. Especially in an era of rapid change, this consistency becomes increasingly valuable. This is not a rejection of innovation. Rather, it is a reminder that even in the age of AI, brand management is not merely a game of optimization, but continues to be about memory. And patience.

The message behind the study

The YouTube study by Webrepublic and GfK is ultimately more than just a study about YouTube. It serves as a starting point for a broader debate about media, impact, and responsibility—about how much trust platform data deserves. It raises questions about how ad inventory needs to be reevaluated. And it explores what role a media agency can still play as systems become increasingly self-governing. Webrepublic offers a clear answer: through independence, its own impact research, in-depth technological expertise, and the commitment to reduce uncertainty rather than simply sell reach. Whether this approach will work as confidently in practice as it sounds in conversation is something the market will decide. But the approach certainly provides plenty of food for thought.

And perhaps that's the real point: that a study about YouTube ultimately tells us less about YouTube than about an industry that is currently having to reorganize itself.

«An agency has a reason to exist if it outperforms the platforms» automated AI algorithms."

From Insight to Impact

Building on our research into impact and usage, we have developed a data-driven approach that, for the first time, systematically evaluates YouTube inventory based on usage context and impact potential. This ensures that the budget is allocated to the channels with the greatest impact.

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«The study serves as a starting point for a broader debate on media, impact, and responsibility.»