Category: Video

How Do You Combine TV and Digital Video?

6/24/2014

When blending the two, use TV for reach and digital video for frequency

Digital video advertising will make up nearly 12% of all digital ad spending in the US this year and is projected to grow significantly faster than search or overall display advertising for the next several years, according to a new eMarketer report, “50 Best Practices for Digital Video: Do’s and Don’ts for More Effective Advertising.”

Even though digital video advertising is in some ways well established, it is still new to many marketers and is still evolving for the experienced ones.

For this report, designed primarily for ad buyers, whether agencies or brands, eMarketer gathered insights from dozens of experts in the space—executives at brands and ad agencies, publishers, ad networks, and technology support companies. Here are the tips and suggestions from these thought leaders on integrating video ads with TV, one section of digital video advertising we focused on:

Use video to reinforce the larger TV campaign. “We know that when we’re out with a digital video buy, there’s greater recall when our [TV] spot actually airs.” (Amy Peet, Chrysler Group)

Use TV for reach and digital video for frequency. “As a cross-media planner, if you’re able to sequence these two things together, you can have them both working in unison—one for reach, one for frequency. TV advertising typically raises the profile and creates a lot of impact. Then it’s supplemented by high frequency, much cheaper inventory bought through video networks, for example, or any programmatic video buy.” (Matthew Waghorn, Huge)

Don’t expect a panacea—it doesn’t exist. There’s no simple or single formula for budgeting sight-sound-motion ads across TV and digital. “It’s going to depend by brand, by objective of what you’re trying to accomplish, by results over time and refining and tweaking those.” (Doug Knopper, FreeWheel)

Come together. Best practices are established by corporate silos—or the absence of them. “The next step will be around organizational structure. We hear a lot from agencies that the digital and linear sides are slowly coming together, and the same thing is happening with publishers. And the more these discussions happen and these groups come together, the easier it will be for the industry to start transacting on more of a converged space. So another best practice is to really think about how you merge those two sides of the house.” (Brian Dutt, FreeWheel)

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BuzzFeed: 'Video is the Biggest Shift in Our Business'

4/29/2014

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BuzzFeed Racks Up More Than a Billion YouTube Views Since 2012
By Michael Sebastian

The VIP line to BuzzFeed's first NewFront presentation Monday, 30 minutes before start time. More people queued up on the other side of the theater. Credit: Michael Sebastian BuzzFeed has often seemed ahead of the web, with strategies such as content explicitly designed to travel far in social media and "native" ads that mimic editorial. But on Monday the website was firmly part of the pack, using its first NewFronts presentation to pitch the same thing every other publisher wants to sell: video.

Founder Jonah Peretti described the site's origins, showed the evolution of its homepage and explained why its content is so shareable on the web. But his main purpose was to demonstrate that BuzzFeed is doing video in a big way.

"Video is the biggest shift in our business," Mr. Peretti told the audience, a large crowd that occupied two theaters, one of which carrying a simulcast of events in the first. BuzzFeed has produced 1,600 videos since September 2012, the company said, racking up more than 1.1 billion views on YouTube.

The presentation was the second of this year's Digital NewFronts, which mimic TV's annual upfront presentations to advertisers in an effort to lure TV ad budgets online. The New York Times pitched its digital wares Monday morning.

BuzzFeed showed off clips ranging from cat videos to a look at the average person's lifespan represented as jellybeans.

It also, central to the point, played videos it had produced for Nestle Purina, Clean and Clear and G.E. BuzzFeed never made an explicit pitch to the buyers and marketers in the audience, but let the three brands sing its praises in a question-and-answer session.

"We're working with them like we have our ad agencies over the past decades," Rick Spiekermann, director of content, community and partnerships at Nestle Purina Pet Care, told Ad Age after the event.

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TV Everywhere Clicks, Authenticated Video Views Soar 217%

12/4/2013

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by Gavin O'Malley, Tuesday, December 3, 2013

Since the inception of TV Everywhere, critics could confidently claim that the authentication of subscribers on non-TV devices was failing to materialize. Over the past year, however, authenticated video viewing grew 217% -- and now comprises 14% of all ad views on long-form content.

Clearly, the data from FreeWheel is “an indication that TV Everywhere is becoming a reality,” said Brian Dutt, manager of advisory services at FreeWheel.

“Over time, we expect that this will drive increased monetization of half-hour and hour-long TV programs (as well as live streams) across all screens,” Dutt said on Tuesday.

The data set used for its report was comprised of over 15 billion video ad views, according to the online video technology firm.

Late this year, the industry also achieved a 1:1 ratio between ad views and video views -- which, according to Dutt, indicates that monetization is finally catching up with viewing behavior. The trend is being driven by 56% year-over-year growth in long-form content with the continued movement of long-form titles into IP environments.

Digital pure-play publishers are utilizing pre-rolls on a larger percentage of short-form content -- up to 45% from 35% last year, according to FreeWheel.

According to Dutt, programmers are finally figuring out how to bring TV experiences to viewers across all devices and monetize at the same time. As such, the content mix is continuing to evolve with long-form growing most quickly (56%), led by scripted drama and sports.

The rise of mobile is also driving a massive shift in cross-channel viewing. Indeed, ad views were up 230% on mobile -- and 365% on tablets -- while the share of total ad views coming from mobile, tablet and OTT devices has tripled over the past year.

Also of note, the 30-second ad spot continues to gain traction across digital channels and now represents almost 50% of short-form ad views and 65% of long-form ad views.

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Video Streaming Beats DVR and VOD Viewing

9/9/2013

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Full-length movies are the most popular digital video content

The amount of time TV viewers in the US spend watching digital video is rising fast, especially as their choices for where and what to watch continue to expand. An Ipsos MediaCT survey of TV viewers—defined as those who watch TV during primetime at least twice per week—found that in May 2013, more than half of 18- to 34-year-old respondents watched digital video or streamed digital content at least once a week. A solid 40% did so at least once a day.

Among respondents between 35 and 49 years old, there was a lower incidence of watching digital video daily, at a still-significant 21%, while another 21% watched digital content at least once a week.

Live TV remained the most common type of content that TV viewers watched during primetime, with 67% doing so. But of the other viewing options available, streaming content and online video won out over DVR content and video-on-demand (VOD). Nearly half of viewers watched streaming or online video between 8pm and 12am vs. 36% who watched via the DVR at that time, and 28% who watched VOD.

When drilling down to how streamers watch video, a July 2013 Harris Interactive poll of US web users found that 35% of respondents often or sometimes streamed video through a subscription service, such as Netflix. Purchasing or renting individual videos was far less common, though 19% of respondents reported at least sometimes doing so.

As for what type of digital video and streamed content got the most attention among TV viewers, Ipsos’ study found that full-length movies led the way, with 62% watching this type of digital video. Cable or broadcast network content followed, at 45%, while 38% of respondents watched longer-form original content.

The findings suggest that movie viewing remains a primary function of digital video viewing, allowing viewers to watch movies in their own homes or on the go. But increasingly, digital video is also serving this function for TV, cutting into time spent in front of live TV.

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What is the Value of Made-for-Web vs. Linear TV Video?

8/26/2013

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Whirlpool’s KitchenAid brand rolled out three of its first made-for-web video spots this past July on Hulu as part of its “There’s So Much More to Make” campaign. Colleen Whitney, senior vice president and media director for Chicago and San Francisco at DigitasLBi, spoke with eMarketer’s Danielle Drolet about the KitchenAid digital effort, as well as advertisers’ increasing curiosity to align original, made-for-web ad creative with exclusive web programming.

eMarketer: When is a brand right for and ready to activate a made-for-web video ad format?

Colleen Whitney: KitchenAid, in particular, has a highly engaged audience that is very targeted. It’s an upper-income woman who has a passion for expressing herself through cooking. This, coupled with the core insight that these consumers are looking for the tools to inspire and help them achieve that passion, led us to the idea that we can create highly engaging content for this narrow audience—and deliver it in a very targeted and contextually relevant way that will increase engagement and return on investment.

eMarketer: Why are these video spots a likely next step for brands beyond linear television?

Whitney: Consumers are hungry for more online content, whether that’s premium-produced content from publishers or brand-produced content that’s relevant to a particular consumer group. There continues to be increased demand, as well as time spent with that content online. We are encouraging our brand clients to play in that space in a strong way.

We look at it in a couple of different ways, either partnering with the publishing community to create the content or, such as in the case with KitchenAid, create exclusive content for our clients. It comes in a couple of different models for us, but we certainly believe there is a huge opportunity.

eMarketer: Do you have any metrics to share for the KitchenAid campaign?

Whitney: It’s only been in the market for a couple of weeks, and we don’t have specific metrics for this effort yet. Anecdotally, we are seeing a lift in social sharing and conversation around the video, as well as the associated content that’s being put out. There is a whole series of associated custom recipes, as well.

“Across the industry, about 10% of the digital budget is going to online video. But many of our clients are already spending more than this.”

The primary role of online video for this brand is to drive brand lift. The measurement plan includes looking at both attitudinal and behavioral metrics. For attitudinal metrics, we’re looking at brand studies to check lift post-exposure. Then, from a behavioral perspective, we’re looking at the in-view experience, which includes monitoring completion rates, engagement with interactive companion banners, and so forth. We are also looking at brand site engagement metrics such as looking at attribution modeling to understand how online video is going to assist in driving conversion.

eMarketer: Are marketers looking to increase spending in made-for-web video ads?

Whitney: Without a doubt our clients are going to increase spending on online video overall. Across the industry, about 10% of the digital budget is going to online video. But many of our clients are already spending more than this. It’s at a tipping point, where dollars are going to start to follow the consumer time spent.

Within that we will increase investment in made-for-web content because the quality gets better and better. When we use it, we see positive lift in engagement metrics. The key, though, is that the online publishers have to continue to help us drive the model by investing in the discoverability of the programming. It’s important that we continue to increase the scale and reach. Online video is growing, but it’s still behind in reach compared with linear television.

eMarketer: How does an ad buy differ for a made-for-web show vs. a linear TV show?

Whitney: There is a big cost differential between the full episode players (FEPs) vs. made-for-web video content. FEPs can be as much as 50% or 60% higher from a cost-per-impression perspective. In addition, when you look at industry research, Tremor Video reported earlier this year that the results are virtually the same for made-for-web content and TV content online. It was looking at things like clickthrough and ad completion.

“Online video is growing, but it’s still behind in reach compared with linear television.”

However, we have found for some of our advertisers, and again, they’re in more vertical categories, that awareness measures are indeed equitable. Engagement metrics such as clickthrough and activity around high-value tasks are better for the short-form, midtier content than they are for the FEPs. These are based on studies via DART Logic.

eMarketer: Will the recent Emmy nod for Netflix’s “House of Cards” for best drama series present more opportunities for brand marketers?

Whitney: We are watching Netflix very closely, as is everyone else in the industry. There are two big impacts to date based on what it is doing. It is really raising the bar for the standard of quality for online original programming. There is no doubt about it. It took HBO 25 years to get its first Emmy nomination. It took Netflix six months.

Netflix also has this deal with DreamWorks Animation, which is a game changer in terms of the quality of the content that’s going to continue to come into the online ecosystem. But the other element is that it is changing the distribution model, which means we need to ensure we’re driving discoverability of this high-quality content.

Netflix’s move to release all of its episodes simultaneously is different from the linear TV model, and it changes consumer expectations. It’s only a matter of time before we figure out ways for brand marketers to partner with and capitalize on this.

eMarketer: On Hulu in particular, ad loads are getting heavier, yet these ads are more repetitive than on TV. Does this need to be discussed more?

Whitney: Yes. Clutter is a big issue. Historically, one of the benefits of advertising with online video vs. linear TV was that it offered an environment that was less cluttered, which is detrimental to key metrics like awareness as well as brand and message recall. It’s key to be mindful of frequency capping in addressing clutter on behalf of consumers.

It’s also about looking at creating more ad executions and creating truly compelling ad executions, such as the KitchenAid video, to engage consumers. It’s a numbers game, but it’s also about the quality of the content brands are putting out there that engages consumers—so you don’t drive them away.

eMarketer: Besides streaming platforms, what opportunities are there in gaming platforms? Microsoft is planning on creating its own original video programming for Xbox, which could potentially carry ads.

“Clutter is a big issue. … It’s key to be mindful of frequency capping in addressing clutter on behalf of consumers.”

Whitney: All of our clients are really interested in what Xbox is doing and how you can use the gaming platform as a marketing effort. Xbox is positioning itself as more of an entertainment destination and less of a specific gaming platform. We’re interested in the Kinect technology and the opportunity it provides to build native interactive brand experiences.

Xbox is still in the development phases in how this all comes together with original content as a pillar, but it is making a huge investment—in talent as well as in infrastructure. We’re watching it closely.

eMarketer: What are clients’ concerns when considering made-for-web video ads?

Whitney: At a high level, it still can often be a decision between linear TV dollars and online video dollars. The historical momentum behind what we know works on linear TV sometimes causes clients to pause. At the end of the day, dollars are finite, and we have to make decisions about where to invest in various channels.

We get many questions about the efficacy of online video vs. linear television. That said, within the online video environment, there are a couple of things we discuss a lot with clients. It’s a very complex marketplace with FEPs, online originals, endemic short-form [content], live streaming of events, multiple players, ad networks, and so forth. Frankly, it’s not easy to buy. A challenge we have put forth to publishers is to partner with us to make it easier to buy for our clients. We will all win in that scenario.

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Media Buyers Favor TV, But Digital, Video On Rise

8/22/2013

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Media Buyers Favor TV, But Digital, Video On Rise
by Wayne Friedman, Wednesday, August 21, 2013

TV is still the most popular advertising tool for media buyers -- but at its lowest level in three years, according to a new survey.

Chicago-based Strata, the media-buying and selling software company, says TV remains the top advertising medium with 44% of survey respondents saying “they are more interested in advertising" on it. But this is the lowest score in three years.

Digital is now at 35% -- up from 16% a year ago. Twenty-eight percent of those surveyed say advertisers will have greater spend on digital media platforms than traditional media in one to three years. Conversely, about the same number -- 27% -- say they don’t ever anticipate spending more on digital than traditional media.

Overall interest in video also remains high. There is a 61% interest in video -- TV, cable, network and digital streaming -- with 66% saying they are more interested in online video than last year. YouTube is the top online video site for media agencies at 69%. Hulu is next at 35%, and Netflix and social media video site Vine are tied for third at 14%.

Other older media continues to fall -- traditional radio advertising, for example. Eighty-six percent of media buyers say clients were interested at the same level or less than last year -- the lowest rate of interest for radio in 19 quarters.

Forty-one percent of media executives say “client attraction” remains a main goal, with 21% pointing to client spending is the second biggest challenge. Media executives say the ad economy generally looks healthy -- over half of the agencies polled experienced an increase in business compared to this time last year.

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Interpublic Strikes Deals Automating Buys With 5 Media Giants

8/20/2013

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Interpublic Strikes Deals Automating Buys With 5 Media Giants: Covers TV, Radio, Outdoor, Display, Video, Mobile
by Joe Mandese

On the heels of last week’s deal naming Adap.tv its primary automation platform for targeting and buying TV and video inventory, Interpublic this morning unveiled a spate of similar deals to automate its transactions with five big media suppliers traversing TV, radio, out-of-home, mobile and online video and display.

Details about how the deals would be structured and how they would work were not disclosed, but Interpublic said it now has agreements with TV programmer A&E Networks, cable operator Cablevision, out-of-home and radio operator Clear Channel, local broadcaster Tribune and online portal AOL, which is in the process of acquiring Adap.tv, to supply assets “not previously available through automated buying systems.”

The initiative, which was developed by Interpublic’s Mediabrands unit, is dubbed the Magna Consortium, and is part of the agency holding company’s mission to automate 50% of its media-buying by 2016.

Interpublic has said it is making the push for several reasons, including both greater operating efficiency for its agencies and its clients as media-buying becomes hyper-fragmented and hyper-complex, as well as greater precision in targeting audiences it says will result by shifting from conventional audience-buying data (ie. Nielsen ratings, GRPs, etc.) to estimates that co-mingle so-called first- and second-party sources of data in a manner similar to the way agency trading desks utilize DMPs -- or data management platforms -- to trade online audience buys.

“The good news is that our charter members were quick to sign on to develop a plan forward,” Magna Global Worldwide CEO Tim Spengler stated, adding: “Our goal is to ignite real change in the way media is transacted for the industry.”

While programmatic trading systems are growing fast in the online display marketplace (Magna estimates this is currently about 25% of all online display advertising), the growth has come largely from the emergence of an over-supply of online inventory and auction-based media-buying models like “RTB,” or real-time bidding, that many “premium” suppliers are loath to embrace for fear it will “commoditize” the value of their inventory.

However, some of the most premium online publishers now participate in programmatic exchanges, and many of those deals are not necessarily auction-based, but function more like private exchanges where sellers can set pricing “floors” and buyers can set “ceilings" to ensure that both sides are in control of the process -- even if it’s being processed by machines faster than humans can manage such deal-making.

According to Frank Addante, CEO of Rubicon Project, one of the biggest suppliers of media-buying automation technology, the speed of such transactions is accelerating and is now down to 30 milliseconds of processing time for the average online buy. That’s an improvement from 300 milliseconds a year ago, and three seconds three years ago, all thanks to improvements in data-processing technologies.

The advances of such technologies, and the shift among advertisers and agencies to use them to improve their efficiency, as well as the data-driven effectiveness of reaching their audiences, has sparked a gold rush among media and advertising technology suppliers, many of whom are now going public. One of the fastest-growing and most sophisticated of those developers -- Rocket Fuel, which utilizes artificial intelligence and robots that can assess and bid for media value faster than any human can -- is the latest to file for an initial public offering.

In its filing late last week, Rocket Fuel noted that advertisers are flocking to its technology, and that its revenues more than doubled last year -- and more than tripled during the first half of this one, thanks to a surge in the number of advertisers using its platform. The filings said Rocket Fuel currently has 784 advertisers (up from 341 last year), and that many of its existing advertisers continue to increase the volume they trade via its systems.

The greatest impediment to Interpublic’s goal of automating 50% of all its media buys by 2016 is convincing the most premium suppliers of media inventory -- especially the major television networks -- that they won’t lose control, or value, by doing so, which is why A&E Networks' direct involvement is so significant.

That said, at least a portion of all of the most premium TV suppliers inventory already is being sold through programmatic exchanges. While it’s not being sold directly by the national TV networks themselves, the trading desks of at least two agency holding companies have already begun utilizing AudienceXpress, a programmatic audience-buying exchange spun off from target TV-ad serving developer Visible World. The portion being traded by AudienceXpress comes from the two minutes per hour that networks give to local cable TV operators as part of their carriage agreements. While the cable operators are supposed to sell that commercial time to local or regional advertisers, AudienceXpress effectively pools their national reach into unwired network buys.

Since it became operational in late January, AudienceXpress Founder and CEO Walt Horstman estimates the two agency trading desks that have been beta testing it have bought 2 billion TV advertising impressions through it.

The reason why AudienceXpress has been successful where others, including Google and Microsoft, have failed, says Horstman, is that its platform is designed to give suppliers 100% control over the floors they set for selling their inventory, while giving buyers the ability to analyze more data that will enhance the value of buying those audiences from their perspective.

As with online publishing, the supply of unsold TV inventory also continues to expand due to the emergence of so-called “long-tail” networks that are not yet rated by Nielsen, as well as a torrent of free video-on-demand audience impressions

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How Do You Combine TV and Digital Video?

BuzzFeed: 'Video is the Biggest Shift in Our Business'

TV Everywhere Clicks, Authenticated Video Views Soar 217%

Video Streaming Beats DVR and VOD Viewing

More TV Viewers Tune Into Digital Video

What is the Value of Made-for-Web vs. Linear TV Video?

Media Buyers Favor TV, But Digital, Video On Rise

Interpublic Strikes Deals Automating Buys With 5 Media Giants

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