Online Video Advertising: Not for Branding Only
Tactics and metrics for using online video as a direct advertising medium.
Tactics and metrics for using online video as a direct advertising medium.
Online video advertising’s effectiveness isn’t news to marketers. Many top advertisers have jumped into online video in a big way, causing something of an inventory shortage.
According to eMarketer, last year rich media and video advertising accounted for roughly $1.5 billion in spending, for 9 percent of total online ad spending. It’s projected to grow to $6.2 billion, or 17 percent of online advertising spending, by 2011. In other words, online video advertising will quadruple in five years.
What’s fueling this growth?
Online Video Delivers Branding Impact
Online video advertising outperforms other online formats for branding. Based on 106 campaigns, Dynamic Logic’s Q3 2006 MarketNorms data shows online video ads delivered a 6.1 percentage point improvement in aided brand awareness; a 18.1 percentage point improvement in online ad awareness; and a 9.3 percentage point improvement in message association.
Of course, not all ads are created equal. Across five branding attributes, Dynamic Logic found significant variation between the most and least memorable ads. Most-noticed ads were intrinsically linked to the brand, used online interactivity, and were synergistic with offline marketing. In contrast, least-noticed ads didn’t quickly establish relevance, weren’t clear about what was advertised, and relied on audio for message delivery.
Online Video Advertising Makes It Happen
Focusing on the interactivity associated with online video advertising, DoubleClick’s “Video Ad Benchmarks” study examines over 300 campaigns in 2006. Among the salient findings:
About 90 percent of the units in this research were in-page rather than in-stream, highlighting context’s importance. Since these ads are highly visual, interactive elements on a text page, they tend to stand out, spurring more interactions.
Not for Branding Only
Online video advertising’s high CTRs indicate these units aren’t for branding only. They point to the growth of brand response advertising, an evolving form that blends the strengths of branding and direct response disciplines in one ad. Brand marketers benefit from such driving actions as building e-mail lists and downloads to enhance customer relationships. Direct marketers benefit from enhanced brand recognition, a factor many traditional direct marketers overlooked until recently.
Recommendations for tapping into the strength of online video interactivity while increasing branding impact include:
Assessing Online Video Advertising
As with any advertising campaign, results should be measured relative to marketing goals. Metrics to track include:
Think creatively about online video advertising. Consider how you can tap into video’s engagement to get prospects to spend more time with your brand. Be it branding or direct response, think about what interactions are most relevant to your goals and how this can help build relationships with prospects, customers, and the general public. Now’s the time to jump on the online video advertising bandwagon and take advantage of this new format’s higher level of responsiveness.