Pre-Roll May Be Easiest Online Video Ad Option But It’s Not The Best

Those 15-30 second spots running in front of two-minute clips dominate online video advertising — and probably user frustration with the format — but that should start to shift as more advertisers see economic reasons to create just for the web. Pre-rolls and post-rolls are easy. Take the commercial being run on TV, leave as is if a 30-sec spot, and shove in front of or after a stream. ClickZ has some numbers from eMarketer that suggest creating for online is going to become more worthwhile although I’m a little surprised by the idea that online video advertising has increased only 82.2 percent from 2005, to an estimated $410 million this year. The projections have it growing at a slightly higher rate next year and hitting 11.5 percent of total spending by 2010. For a different perspective, consider that onlive video ads make up slightly more than one half of one percent of TV ad budgets this year — 0.6 percent.
So what’s next?
– Google video tests didn’t even offer pre-roll, pushing persistent branding display ads and post-roll instead. The company is looking for the video companion to paid search. Daniel Blackman, strategic partner for development at Google Video, at Ad:Tech: “”It’s clear users respond to less intrusive, more relevant, targeted ads. Can we approach video advertising with the same mentality?”
– Janet Balis, AOL SVP-sales development, is among those who see product placement and sponsorships as an alternative: “It’s possible to have a graceful integration of brand values and still make it entertaining.”
Depending on how far this goes, some of the alternatives could wind up making pre-roll seem preferable as in I’ll give you 15-30 seconds now if you promise not to bug me while I’m watching.