DoubleClick Motif Does Video, Gets AOL Support

DoubleClick has added support for Flash video to its DART Motif rich media tool. The company has also gained certification from America Online for all of its formats — a significant development for DoubleClick.

Motif Streaming Video, the new feature of DART Motif, allows users to tag Flash video within banners so they can track interactions like plays, stops and rewinds. Motif is the result of a collaboration between DoubleClick and Macromedia, the developer of Flash.

Video ads seem to be gaining momentum in the marketplace, as DoubleClick, along with competitive rich media firms like Eyeblaster, PointRoll and Unicast, develop their video products. JupiterResearch, which shares a parent company with this publication, projects spending on online video to increase fivefold by 2009, from an expected $121 million in 2004 to $657 million five years later.

“Some competitors have been pushing video ahead, which is great,” said Ari Paparo, product manager for Motif. “Our offering is now allowing people to include video in Motif, which has the benefit of being integrated into DoubleClick’s ad serving system.”

One of DoubleClick’s challenges since it launched Motif has been to ensure its acceptance on publishers’ sites. Back in August, it got MSN to agree to accept expandable banners, floating ads and in-page ads. America Online had previously accepted only fixed-frame banners, but has now certified Motif for expandable banners, in-page and floating ads. A company spokesperson says it’s “in negotiations” with Yahoo, but Paparo told ClickZ News there’s “no problem” running Motif ads on the portal.

JupiterResearch analyst Nate Elliott says gaining AOL’s approval is a major milestone for Motif. “Motif has been fighting for over a year to get acceptance on the portals,” he said. “AOL was the first to give them even limited acceptance. Now that they have full acceptance on both MSN and AOL, marketers can seriously consider using the technology.”