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G Suite for Education users: transfer ownership of YouTube Brand Accounts before July 10th

Ever since consumer Google+ shut down on April 2nd, G Suite for Education users have been unable to create a new YouTube channel on a Brand Account. Eventually many received an email from G Suite that says G Suite for Education users will not be able to be the primary owner for Brand Accounts:
  • Your G Suite for Education account can no longer be used to create a Brand Account or join an existing Brand Account.
  • On July 10, 2019, Google will delete any Brand Account for which your G Suite for Education user account is the primary owner.
  • On July 10, 2019, Google will revoke membership of your G Suite for Education user account from any remaining Brand Account you are a member of.
Update June 23, 2020: "In light of COVID-19, the planned deletion of some Brand Accounts will not occur on July 15th, as previously scheduled." Google is "working on a long term solution." More information.

Since the shutdown of consumer Google+, Brand Accounts are really only used for YouTube channels. The Brand Account lets the YouTube channel have multiple managers, and it can have a name that is different than your personal Google account name.

Many G Suite for Education users have a YouTube channel on a Brand Account for their school, classroom or educational videos.

The deadline is imminent, but don't panic! Your G Suite administrator can request a temporary extension for existing members of existing Brand Accounts who are not students and are over 18 years old. The extension lasts until July 15, 2020. Admins can make the request via https://support.google.com/a/contact/edu_brandaccount. If they haven't done so, they need to do that now.

Update July 11, 2019: If you cannot sign in to YouTube or your Brand Account and end up on this page "Your Primary/Secondary (K-12) School Brand Account is Suspended "all hope is not lost! If you are over the age of 18 and not a primary or secondary (K-12) school student, you may contact your school’s G Suite administrator to request an extension to unsuspend Brand Accounts you own. Your admin must submit this request for extension form before November 1, 2019. All suspended Brand Accounts will otherwise be deleted after November 15th.

But even with an extension, you need to make sure you don't lose your YouTube channel or other data associated with your Brand Account. All Brand Accounts that have a G Suite for Education user as the Primary Owner will be deleted after July 15, 2020, even if the account received an extension.

You have a couple of options:
  1. Transfer primary ownership of the Brand Account to a consumer Google account or non-Education G Suite account.
  2. Transfer the YouTube channel that's on the Brand Account to a user account. Download an archive of any other Brand Account data.
Read on for detailed instructions:

View and Manage your Brand Account's Primary Owner

The Primary Owner of your Brand Account needs to be a consumer Google account (for example using an @gmail.com email) or a non-Education G Suite user account. Here is how you can check that information.

1. Sign in to Google with your G Suite for Education account

2. Open your Brand Account list at https://myaccount.google.com/brandaccounts
    You will no longer be able to manage any of those Brand Accounts as of July 10th.

3. Click the Brand Account name and then click Manage Permissions 

4. That will show you all the Brand Account's Owners and Managers.  If the role for "You" is Primary Owner, then you need to transfer primary ownership to a different account.
 You can see the email username of any owner or manager by moving your mouse over their name.

5. You can promote an Owner or Manager to Primary Owner

Click the down arrow to the right of the user's current role to change their role. Select a new role from the menu. Note that you may need to wait 24 hours to promote a new Primary Owner.


You will be prompted to confirm the transfer of primary ownership.
6. You can also add a new user as new owner then promote them to Primary Owner.

Click the +person icon at the top of the Manage Permissions screen.


Enter their Google account email address and select Owner as their role.
The invited Owner needs to accept the invitation using the link in their invite email, or by viewing Pending Invitations at https://myaccount.google.com/brandaccounts

Once they have accepted the Owner invite, they can be promoted to Primary Owner as in Step 5 above.

More information: How to Manage your Google Brand Accounts

Transfer your Brand Account YouTube Channel to a User Account

If you do not want to transfer primary ownership of your Brand Account outside your organization, you can transfer the Brand Account's YouTube Channel to a G Suite user account, as long as YouTube is turned on.

My understanding is that this change will only affect Brand Accounts. G Suite for Education users will still be able to have a YouTube channel on their user account. There are two downsides to that:
  • The YouTube channel takes on the user account name. If you transfer the YouTube channel to your own G Suite for Education user account, the channel name will be your name.
  • It's not possible to have multiple managers for a YouTube channel on a user account, rather than on a Brand Account.
But if a new user with the YouTube channel name is created by your G Suite for Education administrator, you should be able to move the Brand Account's YouTube channel to that user account. Talk to your administrator to make sure that YouTube is enabled as a service for the account.

1. The user account must be an Owner of the YouTube channel's Brand Account. Add them as an owner of the Brand Account by following the instructions outlined above.

2. Sign in to YouTube on desktop, and switch to the Brand Account channel.
You can click "Switch Channels" on the menu or do so from www.youtube.com/channel_switcher.

3. Open Settings > Advanced (www.youtube.com/account_advanced)

4. Under Account Information click Move channel to your Google Account or a different Brand Account
If you do not see this option, make sure you are signed in as the owner of the Brand Account.

5. You will be prompted to sign in again, then you will see a list of options to transfer the channel, including your main G Suite user account and any other owned Brand Accounts.
Select your G Suite for Education user account. Note that when you transfer the channel, any existing channel on that Google account will be replaced.

Follow the prompts to complete the process.

A few things to note:
  • Your channel's videos, playlists and subscribers will all be transferred.
  • It may take up to 72 hours for your transferred channel to completely update.
  • The custom URL for the channel will not be transferred.
  • The comments made by the channel will not be transferred.
  • Any verification badge on the channel will not be transferred.
Learn more: Move your YouTube channel to or from a Brand Account

Download an archive of your Brand Account data

As long as you have owner access to your Brand Account, you can create and download an archive of all its data using Google Takeout. Note that this process does not delete any data, it just lets you download a copy.

1. Sign in to takeout.google.com as the Owner of the Brand Account.

2. Click your profile photo at top right, and select the Brand Account identity.

You may have to click All your Brand Accounts to see the full list.

3. Select the Google products and services you want to create an archive for.
Most Brand Accounts currently only have data for YouTube and Google Photos. Google+ Page data has been deleted.

4. At the bottom of the list click Next Step

5. Customize your Delivery Method
There are 4 options for Brand Accounts:
  • Send link to download your archive by email (this will be sent to the email notification address for the Brand Account)
  • Add to Dropbox
  • Add to OneDrive
  • Add to Box
Regular user accounts can also have the archive delivered to Google Drive. This is not an option for Brand Accounts.

6. Select the Export type, File type, and Archive size
The default settings are usually the best option, so only change those if necessary.

7. Click create archive

8. Download archive

When your archive is ready, you will be sent an email. If you chose the delivery option to download the archive, it may not work to click the download option in the email

Instead sign back in to takeout.google.com, switch to the Brand Account identity, and click the Manage Archives button at the top of the page.

That will take you to the Manage Archives page where you can download your data.
You must do this while you still have Owner access to the Brand Account!

Learn more: Download a backup of your YouTube Brand Account Channel and Google+ Page

Sj

Comments

  1. Once you've made a non g-suite account the primary owner, can the original primary owner account that is g-suite for education user still be kept as a secondary owner or manager?

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    Replies
    1. If you are a teacher or staff (or otherwise non-student) with an extension, you can temporarily keep the G Suite for Education user as a non-primary owner or manager of the Brand Account. But ultimately Brand Accounts are not supported for G Suite for Education, so the G Suite for Education account will lose access (I believe in July 2020).

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