Recently, YouTube announced a series of new feature updates: visual upgrades to the Shorts shopping button, expanded channel communities, and new live reward animation gifts. These updates will greatly enhance the way creators interact with their audiences, and also provide more new ideas for monetization and fan operations.
Today we will analyze these new features step by step and see how you can make good use of them right away so that your channel can continue to attract fans, increase traffic, and improve revenue!
What new changes are there in this update?
YouTube has recently launched three core updates to further enhance the platform's monetization and engagement capabilities:
1. Shorts product stickers have been fully upgraded: the shopping button has been changed to a more conspicuous sticker form, and the click-through rate has soared by 40%.
2. Communities are open on a large scale: more channels will be given the right to post interactive posts such as pictures, texts, and voting.
3. Four new animation reward options have been added to the live-streaming gifts: enhancing the audience's sense of participation and creators' income.
1. Shorts shopping stickers are officially launched: product display is more prominent, and the click-through rate has increased by 40%.
In the past, when you marked a product in Shorts, it would only be displayed as a small banner in the lower left corner. Clicking on it would pop up the shopping list, which had a very low presence. Now, YouTube has launched a new shopping sticker (Product Stickers) feature!
Update highlights:
Freely drag the position: You can place the stickers in the area of the picture you want, such as next to the protagonist or next to the product, which is more natural and eye-catching.
Click to jump to external store: Viewers can jump to the purchase page of the product by clicking on the sticker.
Flexible display of multiple products: If you tag multiple products, viewers can expand the entire list by clicking the drop-down arrow on the right side of the sticker.
Customize sticker size and position on mobile: Want to adjust sticker size and placement? Please do so in the YouTube main app (not currently supported on desktop and Studio Mobile).
Actual results: Click-through rate increased by over 40%!
YouTube's test data in the United States in May 2025 showed that Shorts with product stickers have a 40% higher click-through rate than traditional buttons!
Practical tutorial: How to use stickers?
1. Upload Shorts videos;
2. Select the "Product Label" function in the video editing interface;
3. Add the products you want to promote (assuming you have enabled YouTube product promotion permissions);
4. Adjust the position, size, and order of stickers in the main app;
5. After release, users can directly click on the stickers to purchase!
2. Community functions are fully open: the channel not only posts videos, but also allows content interaction!
YouTube has officially opened the Communities feature to more creators. This means that you can interact with fans on a daily basis using text, pictures, voting, etc., just like running Weibo and Facebook groups.
Update highlights:
Automatic activation reminder: Eligible creators will receive activation reminders via email and on their channel page;
New sorting method: you can switch to view "most popular posts" and "latest posts";
Content quality improvement mechanism: YouTube said it has optimized its algorithm so that high-quality posts are more likely to be seen and low-quality content is demoted.
Practical tutorial: How to enable the community function?
1. Meet the qualifications (usually an active channel with more than 1,000 subscribers);
2. YouTube will remind you to turn it on via email or a notification banner on your channel homepage;
3. Go to channel settings and enable "Community";
4. Publish your first community post and start daily interactions with your fans!
3. 4 new reward animations added to the live broadcast room: increasing audience participation and revenue generation
To further stimulate the interaction of live viewers, YouTube has launched 4 new Animated Gifts, which are currently only available to US users:
New animations include:
"Victory Spin"
"Hooray"
"Seal Splash"
"Rockstar"
These animations can not only make the audience more engaged, but also increase the income of creators - the reward animation will be highlighted in the live broadcast screen to help paying users stand out.
How should creators seize this opportunity?
How should creators respond to these YouTube updates? Here are a few suggestions:
To short video e-commerce creators:
Try the sticker shopping feature now , and test the click-through rate performance first;
Carefully select products and arrange stickers reasonably to improve conversion;
Use Shorts to promote popular products and create hot-selling content.
For fan-operated creators:
Use the community function as soon as possible and activate your channel like running a community;
Post interactive posts regularly every week, including voting, asking questions, and updating status;
Try to use the community as a "warm-up + traffic generator" to increase the viewing rate of long videos/live broadcasts.
For live streaming creators:
Pay attention to the performance of live broadcast reward animations and plan ways to encourage users to give rewards;
Remind fans that they will receive "cool animation exposure" for giving tips;
Optimize live broadcast interaction strategies in the long term to increase the diversity of revenue sources.
Conclusion
YouTube is rapidly upgrading its platform from a "video platform" to an all-round creative ecosystem that integrates short videos, e-commerce, community and live broadcasting.
Have you ever used the shopping function of Shorts?
