Top tips: 6 steps to perfect online video advertising

Online video advertising should be the most integrated marketing format. It can incorporate multiple interactive elements like social media and online gaming in one unit and enables marketers to link up their online and offline campaigns. Adrian Lacey, UK Managing Director of Tremor Media, advises marketers on making best use of the format.


Engage consumers with interactive elements
There are few effective ways to directly integrate social media platforms into other marketing activities. Online video ads do this more effectively than other marketing formats. Marketers should create online video ads that invite viewers to click through to brands’ Facebook or Twitter pages, where users can ‘Share’ or ‘Retweet’ ads, and incorporate links to interactive elements such as online games, company websites and longer form video content.
Put the viewer in control
Consumers hate pop-ups and being forced to view ads. Marketers should put the viewer in control of the ad content they watch, giving them the choice of watching more ads, further video content or the option to skip an ad. Brands can use longer form video, links to websites and social media sites to take consumers on an interactive online journey, rather than the simple linear formats that television ads offer. Online video ads enable marketers to use innovative ad formats, like vChoice, which encourage viewers to spend more time engaging with the brand through interactive elements.
Edit TV ads for online
Too many marketers simply take existing TV ads and dump them online. Online video is a very similar but different platform to TV, however it can be incorporated very efficiently with just some simple re-edits to creative. Marketers should encourage creative agencies to produce online versions of TV ads at the point of commissioning the creative. Those who do can produce ground-breaking video ads that are vastly more engaging than TV ads. Editing TV ads to create ten to twenty second ad formats is more cost- and performance-effective than creating whole new ads for online and enables companies to join up their online and offline campaigns while maintaining the integrity of brand values.
Choose when and where ads appear
Always be aware of what content ads are placed around. Don’t allow ads to appear with undesirable content of a violent or sexually graphic nature. It’s particularly important to avoid user generated content for this reason. Choosing a partner that guarantees brand safe premium content ensures ads will only appear with desirable content that enhances the brand.
Online audiences can be targeted more specifically than TV audiences as marketers can choose where and when their ads appear. A car company advertising their new car on several high-end male specific publishing sites or before a streamed James Bond film makes the brand more appealing to viewers. The content makes the brand cooler.
Create ads based on VAST
For ads to appear on different websites marketers may have to code video ad creative several times. It’s more cost- and performance-effective to create ads based on the Video Ad Serving Template (VAST), which enables marketers to create one VAST-compliant ad that can be delivered via all players. Advertisers can then place their ad on any chosen video site. Publishers are also able to choose from the widest possible range of video ads to go alongside the video content they host on their sites, giving every stream the best chance of earning them ad revenue.
Evaluate differently
Marketers need to think more intelligently about evaluation. Cost-per-click is too simplistic for online video ads. Video ads have a major role to play in brand building, so incorporate elements of the TV-favoured Gross Rating Points, where ad success is based on the number of people that watched the ad, as well as cost-per-click. Online video ads have a similar impact on a viewer as a television commercial – if not more – but can also provide a lot more insights commonly associated with the accountability of digital advertising.
The new technology available makes online video advertising the most holistic form of advertising; it has sound and video, is interactive and can incorporate social media elements to engage the viewer. Marketers need to fully grasp the benefits of online video advertising. It offers incomparable levels of engagement that encourage consumers to invest more time with products and enjoy the brand more than is possible with television advertising.
By Adrian Lacey
UK Managing Director
Tremor Media
www.tremormedia.com/
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