Online Video Ad Budgets Growing Fast
Industry leader BrightRoll has released its third annual Online Video Advertising Report with new data that shows planned spending on online video is growing faster than all other online categories.
Findings from the previous two surveys highlighted online video as a rapidly emerging category, though respondents expressed concerns over the lack of well-defined success metrics and a shortage of accepted industry standards. Previous participants were also interested in better understanding online video's ROI and more effectively leveraging the medium's targeting capabilities.
This year's survey found that the category is still seeing rapid growth and has now become a staple in the online ad buy. The rollout of mobile video inventory, increased adoption of industry standards and introduction of sophisticated targeting tools have all contributed to this growth.
Additional key findings from the report include the following:
- 28 percent of buyers revealed that they expect to see the greatest increase in ad spending in the online video category for 2011, followed by mobile video (27 percent) and social media (25 percent)
- 86 percent of respondents are shifting at least part of their display dollars over to video, while 64 percent plan to shift TV dollars to video; budgets are also migrating from search, social media and direct response, though in slightly more modest numbers at 28 percent, 27 percent and 26 percent, respectively
- Nearly two-thirds of respondents indicated that online video is equally as effective, if not more effective, than television advertising
- 41 percent of media buyers view targeting as online video advertising's greatest attribute, representing an increase of nine percentage points from 2010
- For the third year in a row, buying directly from online publishers was reported as the dominant means of purchasing inventory (52 percent), followed by ad networks (31 percent), broadcasters (10 percent), portals (6 percent) and ad exchanges (2 percent)
- 96 percent of respondents indicated that research into the efficacy of online video helps drive value for advertisers, though just 35 percent are conducting research of their own
"Looking over the results of this year's survey, it's clear that online video is fast becoming a fixture in the media buyer's toolkit," says BrightRoll CEO Tod Sacerdoti. "The industry continues to deliver improvements in campaign targeting, reporting and effectiveness. Our hope with this survey is that it will contribute to a growing body of research that helps underscore and validate the effectiveness of video's ability to reach online audiences, while highlighting those areas that need to be addressed in order to continue to propel the category forward."
