What do media, publishing, and marketing executives think about the world of online advertising in 2013? What are the biggest opportunities and challenges?
These are just a few questions answered during the Video Ad Effectiveness Summit. Will Richmond of VideNuze sat in on the day’s sessions and published an excellent summary of the key points discussed on the VideoNuze blog.
Richmond found three themes that carried through all discussions and among all executives, which he shared on VideoNuze. You can follow the link above to get all of the details, but to briefly recap, Richmond identified the following three themes from the discussions:
- It’s still difficult to measure ad effectiveness across multiple screens.
- CMOs value the security of television advertising and still want measurable proof that online video advertising is effective.
- Experimentation is critical to learning more about online video advertising.
I thought these insights were particularly interesting given the findings in the comScore study about online display advertising that I wrote about on Corporate Eye earlier in the week. That study revealed that more than half of display ads aren’t viewed at all. For increased viewability, video advertising was suggested as a viable alternative to increase viewability.
All of these studies and discussions can be summed up briefly as follows: Everyone is interested in online advertising but no method is close to perfect. Just as advertisers can’t truly measure the results of most television ads, they can’t always truly message the results of many display ads and video ads online. The tools have evolved and consumers have more screens to view branded messages, but tracking isn’t completely accurate for any medium.
What’s a marketer to do? Refrain from online advertising? Keep investing in television advertising because it’s the safer investment (i.e., everyone is familiar and accepting of its ROI limitations)?
For executives, the problem comes down to a weighing of risks versus rewards. No executive wants to be the one who makes the decision to shift advertising investments in great amounts to newer opportunities like online video. They’re excited about it but quick to cover themselves by saying it’s not proven and they’re not going to make any bold decisions related to it.
This failure to act spells opportunity for smaller companies that are more willing to take big risks and make leaps of faith to drive needed results. Online video is growing rapidly and brands that move too slowly will need to catch up eventually.
What do you think? Leave a comment below and share your thoughts about online video advertising.
Image: stock.xchng
Lucy is Editor at Corporate Eye
