What’s the Matter with CPMs? A Lot.

I think that we can all accept and agree that online video ad spending will grow, even with the current economic state. Advertising in general has taken a hit, but rich media ads show extreme promise. For instance, eMarketer predicted that video ad spend will increase 45% in 2009 .

Online video has the ad spend, but not the model. Currently, the industry is using the same, traditional cost per thousand impressions (CPM) model that’s used for TV for online video. The problem is that CPMs don’t work because the digital space is completely different from television. Since content is consumed differently, advertisers need to measure the performance of online ads by just that – performance.

There isn’t an industry standard yet, but advertisers are starting to get the clue that the CPM metric is inefficient and that ROI depends on shifting to a performance-based pricing (PBP) model.

In an iMediaConnection article , Real Time Content CEO Naj Kidwai discusses this shift and how advertisers can take advantage of it. iMediaConnection boiled it down to 3 major take aways, which they list at the top:

* The CPM model doesn’t translate to online video
* Video ads can be developed with thousands of variations to encourage engagement
* Performance-based pricing brings more value to the advertiser and rewards the vendor

Read Naj’s entire article in iMediaConnection here .

Tags: Byline, eMarketer, iMediaConnection, Pricing, Reporting, Video
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Video: The Silver Lining in Projected Online Ad Spend

Earlier this month, Forrester released a report on “European Online Advertising Through 2013” . Although the overall outlook was a little gloomy, slowing online ad growth to just 10% in 2009, rich media and video advertising is predicted to grow tremendously, up to 59% of the online display ad space by 2013.

In an interview with ClickZ , the report’s author and principal analyst at Forrester, Nate Elliot, said that the economy’s effect on inventory costs and demand traditional display formats will actually boost spend in new and rich media advertising. “People are making assumptions based on the downturn of 2002, but display, and online as a whole are in a different position now. After the last downturn, online bounced back faster than offline, and it’s in better shape today than it was then.”

Even if 2013 isn’t for another 4 years, we still think that now is video’s moment to shine, in the European AND U.S. markets. LiveRail , an online video ad network, recently published a “State of the Industry” report on the online video ad industry that forecasts US video ad spend to go from $876 million this year to $1,226 million in 2010. While advertisers may be down with the economic climate, we have high hopes and expectations for video, this year and for many more in the future.

Tags: Advertising, Forrester, Research, Video
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Getting Personal with Web Video Campaigns

Let’s admit it, the Web video space is hot. Brands, publishers and their agencies all want a piece of the pie, but many are taking the easy way to video, using old models that were built on TV standards over 50 years ago. New approaches to creative need to be taken in order to avoid mass-targeting consumers with a one-size-fits-all video.

What if agencies could involve the consumer in the creation of the ad, showing them content that they really want to see?

Real Time Content CEO Naj Kidwai addressed the question this month in Ad Age’s Web Video Report. In his article, “Getting Personal with Web Video Campaigns“, Naj describes the personalized video campaign production process and how it can help companies better engage their audiences.

Personalization and interactivity for the individual lies at the heart of what personalized video ads are. The industry is clearly heading in this direction. A PermissionTV 2008 Digital Marketing Survey released in December showed nearly 60 percent of respondents consider interactive video experiences to be the next evolution for online video.

Tags: AdAge, Advertising, Byline, Personalization, Video
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The New Age of Personalization

When brands and agencies hear the word personalization, many still cringe with thoughts from the last technology boom that claimed to have the answers in delivering more relevant and effective marketing capabilities. No longer does personalization have to be equated to bad a memory because there are new market opportunities with the continued growth of the online video industry.

Of course, nothing is perfect and the online video industry is no exception. As an industry that’s still growing we’re still figuring out the best means of targeting and reaching online audiences. Using personalization techniques give brands the means  to intimately engage with the consumer and deliver a more relevant message. Our CEO Naj Kidwai recently published an article in Advertising Age, “The New Age of Personalization” / (copy of the article on our web-site) that offers a deeper dive into the benefits of personalization in online video today.

It’s not a novel concept to target consumers based on what they’re interested in, but through Real Time Content’s new platform which offers segmented tagging within video, brands can target audiences by changing characters, the call the action, geography, etc. We’re taking the logistics out of the equation and focusing on what will resonate with the customer best by focusing our efforts on the delivery of the message to the individual through personalization.

Tags: AdAge, Byline, Personalization, Video
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