I noticed this video about a product launch for ExactTarget/Salesforce.com. It’s hosted on YouTube.
Q: Why would one of the most sophisticated marketing tech companies put their videos on a free site like this? (I’m sure they have some super-duper video tool they can use.)
A: For the same reason that people used to advertise in the Yellow Pages — that’s where the customer are.
YouTube is where people are looking for video — so you get discoverability: People find your content. Put it on a private server, and nobody ever stumbles across it.
More important — you get sharability — because everyone knows how to share, embed, post to Facebook, etc., YouTube videos. Do it any other way, and you’ll get a worse result because people have to learn how to share before they share.