Google watching YouTube viewership, with eye to profits

Google's (NASDAQ: GOOG) dynamite first-quarter performance is a direct result of its ability to deliver the right advertising content to the right visitor. Now, Google is in the process of compiling demographics about its YouTube audience, groundwork that will allow Google to turn the user-developed content leader into a similar cash machine.

According to an article in Advertising Age, the CMO of YouTube, Suzie Reider, equates the YouTube visitor viewing habits to "a real-time focus group that happens every day." The results of YouTube's first in-depth viewer metrics are due this fall, whetting advertisers' appetites for the Christmas season. The information could lead to more than just ancillary ad placements; it could also inform content in the production of "advertainments," along the lines of Dove's Real Beauty campaign.

Reider also shared a couple of tidbits that should please Google investors. Despite acceding to Viacom's demand to pull its content from YouTube, traffic has continued to grow. That viewership is also growing increasingly international. 70% of its 45 million users are now from outside the U.S.

Google has also tripled the staff of YouTube since its purchase, which also speaks to its intention to aggressively protect and grow marketshare.