Pre-roll has long been the reigning video ad format of choice, accounting for the majority of online video campaigns. While the format has numerous advantages over television, it has shortcomings as well: it’s interruptive, it’s time-limited, and it drives very little post-view engagement.
Increasingly, advertisers are turning to opt-in video as a way to deliver longer engagements, more sharing and post-view interactions, and targeted audiences.
Jun Group recently completed a survey that looked at a sample of 7.7 million incentivized video ad views from Jun Group campaigns running between May and August 2012. We compared this information to industry data on pre-roll ads. The comparison yielded the following results:
• Engagement: Users are twice as likely to interact with a brand after watching an incentivized
video ad
• Completion: Viewers are 50% more likely to complete an incentivized video ad than a pre-roll
ad (98% completion rates versus 67% completion rates)
• Sharing: Incentivized video ads are shared three times more than pre-roll ads
• Brand Awareness: Incentivized videos are better at driving brand favorability and purchase
intent whereas pre-roll video ads are more effective at driving brand awareness.
Overall, the data reinforced our belief that opt-in video ad units provide a cost-efficient and effective alliterative to pre-roll. For this reason, we expect to see more explosive growth in the sector in 2013 and beyond.