Top 5 Branded Videos of the Week: The AI battlefield – Tubefilter

Welcome to our rundown of the most-watched branded YouTube videos of the week.

We’re publishing this snippet of a larger Gospel Stats Weekly Brand Report in order to analyze sponsorship trends in the creator economy. Any video launched in tandem with an official brand partner is eligible for the ranking.

And – as the name up above would imply – all the data comes from Gospel Stats. If you’re interested in learning more about Gospel – and which brands are sponsoring what creators on YouTube – click here.

Our latest Gospel Stats Weekly Brand Report has a couple distinct themes. First, generative artificial intelligence, with Drew Gooden talking about how it’s “ruining the internet,” only for our #2 sponsor to be customer service company Poly.AI. Then, on the lighter side, we have some truly excellent vehicles in the spotlight, from a flashy Lamborghini Gellardo to a rental undersea rover. Check ’em out right here:

#1 AI is ruining the internet
Channel: Drew Gooden
Brand: SoFi

Drew Gooden has been a brave pioneer on many topics. He took Ninja‘s masterclass so we didn’t have to (and also dyed his hair for that authentic Ninja experience). He spent hours of his life painstakingly dropping plastic balls in a basket to see if all our dreams of wealth could come true at an arcade (not likely). And he’s bought a whole lot of dumb sh*t. Now? Now he’s diving deep into the world of what rampant usage of genAI is doing to the internet, from boomers on Facebook getting teary over a Frankenstein’s monster third-world child who’s also an artist savant, to Google search being effectively useless these days. It’s all sponsored by fintech company SoFi, who only partnered with Gooden this week–and considering the 4 million views this video brought in so far, picking him for their single partnership was a good bet.

#2 GOJO MEETS SUPER SENIOR GOJO?!
Channel: sinisterbart
Brand: Poly.AI

Ironically, this week’s second most viewed branded video is sponsored by Poly.AI, a company that promises to deliver “the world’s most lifelike voice AI” for use in things like customer service calls. Founded in 2017, the business is now undoubtedly seeing a surge since genAI tools like ChatGPT and Midjourney gained mainstream popularity, and everyone from Meta to Microsoft started trying to figure out how they can ride the AI buzzword train. Its sponsored video is from animator sinisterbart, who has uploaded just 10 videos since creating their channel in 2021. This week’s video, like most of their other creations, is a loudly animated anime parody starring Satoru Gojo from the beloved anime Jujutsu Kaisen. The Poly.AI pitch is worked into the script, with Gojo and his pals calling it a way for anime fans to have conversations with their favorite characters.

#3 I BROKE the Golden RULE in Minecraft…
Channel: PewDiePie
Brand: Saily

No MrBeast on our list this week, but another T-Series warrior is here: PewDiePie has our third most watched video, and it’s set in Minecraft–which, if you’ve paid attention to gaming on YouTube

over the years, isn’t a surprise. Other games like Fortnite, Apex Legends, and Call of Duty may get more esports and pro player attention, making them seem like they’re dominating YouTube, but for years, Minecraft–which essentially built gaming’s popularity on YouTube in the first place–has been the platform’s biggest game. PewDiePie has been playing Minecraft for most of those years, and his audience showed up to drop 3 million views on this video, where he (among other things) dies to a berry bush. His adventures are sponsored by Saily, a new eSIM service from the same team that made NordVPN. Considering NordVPN sponsored more than 30 videos this week alone, we’re not surprised its new cousin is doing creator marketing. Along with sponsoring PewDiePie’s video, Saily sponsored video #65, an episode of The Phil DeFranco Show where he goes into the whole Dr Disrespect situation.

#4 REBUILDING MY WRECKED LAMBORGHINI THAT MY INSURANCE WOULDN’T
Channel: Mat Armstrong
Brand: carVertical

Car enthusiast Mat Armstrong got some bad news from his insurance company after crashing his gorgeous Lamborghini Gellardo: Yeah, they weren’t going to cover repairs. So, he decided to rebuild the car himself–with a little help from his friends. In this 40-minute upload, Armstrong buys a secondhand chassis and sets about salvaging everything he can from his Gellardo, supplementing repairs with new and used parts where needed. It’s an in-depth look at the skilled labor that goes into restoring a supercar, and, appropriately, it’s sponsored by carVertical, a service that lets you look up the crash history of cars and motorcycles before you buckle down and buy ’em. carVertical also sponsored three other videos this week: #176 from Mark McCann, #236 from Autoalex Cars, and #238 from Top Dead Center.

BONUS #80 My RC Submarine Explores a Sunken Aircraft Carrier
Channel: prestongoes
Brand: Opera

In keeping with this week’s theme of tech and vehicles, we picked a literal deep dive from prestongoes for our bonus video. This explorer and self-described “wannabe engineer” says he went down a watery rabbit hole after watching what he thought would be a clickbait YouTube video, about how the U.S. military sank an aircraft carrier on purpose. Except it turns out the U.S. military totally sank the USS Oriskany on purpose, and if you’re daring enough, you can check it out yourself. prestongoes (aka Preston Summerrow) ended up renting an RC submarine and sending it down into the depths to paddle around the Oriskany, offering a very cool look at a World War II relic that’s slowly disintegrating into the surrounding reef. Summerrow’s peek below the waves is sponsored by frequent user of creator marketing Opera, which also paid for around 20 other videos this week.

…and there’s a lot more data where that came from. If you’re interested in learning more about Gospel – and which brands are sponsoring what creators on YouTube – click here.