Ad survey

Business

Brightroll's Video Advertising Report 2009 on Q1 is released.

Some findings:

* 87% of agency executives plan to spend more of their online advertising budgets on video in 2009
* 71% of survey participants view online video advertising as a complementary medium to television
* A majority of respondents estimates CPM prices to be at their lowest, and 20% thinks the price of pre-roll will drop to half what it is today
* Prices of pre-roll continue to fall (early Q2 data suggests this trend will continue)

BrightRoll's average CPM (cost-per-thousand impressions) numbers from the industry at large confirm the trend:

* Average pre-roll CPM: Q408 vs. Q308 – down 12.5%
* Average pre-roll CPM: Q408 vs. Q407 – down 25.0%
* % of Campaign Revenue from Pre-roll: Q109 (80.6%), Q108 (63.1%)

The drop in CPM pricing "could be a good thing," because cost may have been limiting growth, TechCrunch observed. If they come down further, say to $7-9 instead of $20, they'll give TV commercials, which range between $15 (primetime) to $50 (niche, targeted cable channels).

In addition to cost (27%), 31% of agencies cited "lack of targeting capabilities" as a factor limiting online video ad growth. Some 18% said online video has limited reach, and 12% cited ad format limitations. Just 7% thought it was held back by poor inventory quality.

Both pre-roll and in-banner ads were regarded as preferable units, with one out of two respondents saying their use of one or the other depended on the situation and advertiser goals. Reasons for their preference, according to the survey, are guaranteed impressions, overall engagement, and noticeability.

The most surprising finding of the survey was the lack of data and effort around video advertising efficacy; 87% have not performed any in-house research around their online video campaign efficacy.

Asked what they would want to know if they were to conduct research:

* 39% would explore the impact of online video advertising on offline purchase behavior
* 36% would explore changes in purchase intent / brand lift
* 25% would measure efficacy vs. television advertising

Pre-Roll Online Video Ads Work

Business

Break Media study shows that a surprising amount of people are willing to watch pre-roll advertisements. According to Beet.TV, the study claims that completion rates for 15-second pre-roll ads were 87 percent, and 77 percent viewed campaigns with overlay ads for at least 15 seconds.

Break Media used Break.com's monthly audience of 17 million 18-34-year old men as guinea pigs for the 11-week study, and advertisers Honda, T-Mobile, and truTV ran the test campaigns. The three advertisers chosen represent a cross-section of the different brands on the web, hopefully making the study results relevant to an even broader array of advertisers, Break Media CEO Keith Richman says.

The study tested the success of the four standard formats for in-stream video advertising established by the Interactive Advertising Bureau in May: pre-roll, interactive pre-roll, non-overlay ads and overlay ads.

The study demonstrated that all of the ads are effective and have different value for the advertisers, Panache president Steve Robinson says.