On YouTube, Demand Gen is the campaign type that replaced Video Action: visual ads across Shorts, in-feed (Home, Watch Next, Search), Discover, and Gmail, with an optional Merchant Center product feed. It is a delivery mechanism, not a format. The files inside it are still vertical or in-feed units. TrueView, in current Google language, is skippable in-stream — a different placement with a skip button and a 30-second-or-complete view. Do not brief one and deliver the other.
On Meta the same phrase names Feed, Reels, and Stories placements bought to create demand rather than to retarget a pixel audience. The creative conventions are the UGC ad's: a face or a pair of hands, the product in frame, burned-in captions, no title sequence. Mute autoplay still starts the file with sound off. Spark Ads is TikTok's cousin for spending behind an existing post; it is not a Demand Gen placement, and a Spark authorization does not travel to YouTube or Meta.
The production implication is a 9:16 mute-safe cut first, then a 4:5 or 1:1 sibling if the in-feed unit is not full-screen. A 16:9 skippable in-stream master letterboxed into Shorts is a different composition wearing the wrong chrome. Generate at the ratio of the first placement, then re-render the others from the script.
In practice
- Ask which surfaces the campaign actually serves before you lock ratio and caption placement.
- Burn the claim into frame one. Demand-gen feeds start muted as often as organic Reels do.
- Do not reuse a skippable in-stream master as a Shorts or Reels asset without a reframe.
The mistake to avoid
Treating Demand Gen as a synonym for TrueView. One is a campaign type and a set of surfaces; the other is skippable in-stream with a skip button.
Where you will run into it
- Add a Hook to Your Video — The first second decides if anyone keeps watching.
- Add Captions to a Video — Speech in, styled subtitles out — no manual timing.
- Make a Video Vertical — Landscape in. Full-screen mobile out.
- AI Ad Generator — One offer, several openings, tested the same week.
- AI UGC Video Generator — UGC ads at the speed and price of a prompt.
Related terms
UGC ad
UGC ad meaning: an advert made to look like a peer post (handheld, to camera) so it reads as a recommendation, not a commercial.
Spark Ads
Spark Ads meaning: TikTok budget behind an existing post (yours or a creator's) so paid reach keeps the real likes, comments, and shares.
Burned-in captions
Burned-in captions meaning: subtitles rendered into pixels, so viewers cannot turn them off or lose them on re-upload. Closed captions are a separate track.
Whitelisting
Whitelisting meaning: a brand running paid ads through a creator handle (with permission) so the ad shows their name, not the brand's.
Boosted post
Boosted post meaning: paying to extend reach of something already on your page, rather than building a new ad from scratch.
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