The ‘Digital TV and Video’ Category
Mark Trefgarne is Co-Founder and CEO of LiveRail, a video advertising technology company.
AdExchanger.com: Let's start with a little background on you. How did your consultancy lead to video advertising technology?
MT: We started LiveRail about four years ago, which came out of a consulting company that I was running in London. The founding team for LiveRail was all working there. As part of the consulting business, we were helping clients develop and plan their Internet strategy - from small, local businesses to publicly-traded companies. Soon after, we built out some of the applications that we recommended to our clients for their online advertising strategy which included building out their intranet or e‑commerce system.
So, four years ago, when Google bought YouTube, there was a "lightbulb" moment that video was moving online. It was a time when video podcasting became a big deal. It was clear at that point that there was a path to a future in which all TV gets consumed over the web and we thought there was a big business opportunity to help content creators and advertisers.
It seems like LiveRail found a niche that others have explored, and successfully so. Obviously, you weren't a big company initially. What allows a small player to get into the video space?
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IGN Entertainment, a media, digital distribution, and game technology company, and a division of News Corporation, recently announced that it will incorporate FreeWheel's Revenue & Payments Management (RPM) system to bring together reporting across syndication channels Read more.
Bernard Ho, VP/GM of Video at IGN Entertainment, discussed the deal and its implications.
AdExchanger.com: How does FreeWheel help IGN address advertising?
BH: FreeWheel is our video ad server and one of the things that's unique about them is they have enabled syndication partners for us, most notably YouTube, 5min and Justin.tv. The fact that we can look at our inventory across all of these different platforms where our content lives gives us a huge advantage - by delivering value for our audience and tapping into these different pools of inventory.
So, where this sets us apart from our competitors is that we have a huge owned‑and‑operated audience, but we deliver our content to other sites as well.
In addition to the ad serving, we are in the beta program for FreeWheel's RPM product and seeing some value in using this new product to integrate all of the back‑end reporting systems. We won't have to go into 15 different reporting systems and calculate each one separately anymore.
Why is it important that IGN remains nimble, in terms of reaching its audience?
We actually believe that the audiences on the Internet don't move around that much. This is something we've learned over time. I'll give you the example of YouTube. We joined YouTube and launched our channel about four years ago. From there, we slowly started syndicating out content onto YouTube, because we were afraid of cannibalization.
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Yesterday, Adobe announced that acquisition of video monetization platform Auditude as Adobe said in a release that it was looking to provide an "end-to-end video offering (...) with the goal of helping customers build long-term businesses through the delivery of quality video content and superior viewing experience across all IP-enabled devices." No terms were announced for the deal. Read more.
AdExchanger.com asked a selection of executives from the online video ad side of the ecosystem their "take" on the acquisition. Click below or scroll down for more:
Zvika Netter, CEO & Co-Founder, Innovid
"Due to the hyper-growth in the video space, followed by an influx of venture capital into the marketplace, there has been increased fragmentation within video advertising. Acquisitions will be commonplace and will most likely accelerate as more and more video specific advertising platforms and publishers adopt and accept that video and specifically, interactive video formats, will be the main driving force in advertising for years to come.
I believe we're going to keep seeing more acquisitions in the video space due to the fact: While the video space is growing extremely fast and attracting more and more advertiser's dollars it is still very fragmented and complex to work in. This is why the platform providers are becoming more and more attractive to large corporations that want to become a player in this space and cannot afford the time it takes to build a solid video advertising platform but more importantly the relationships and know-how that companies like Auditude and other partners of ours have."
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For years, the television world has pivoted on the use of a reach and frequency metric known as the Gross Rating Point, a.k.a. the GRP (Wikipedia), for the buying of advertising time. As TRAFFIQ's Eric Picard points out in a 2009 iMedia Connection article, "This currency enables immense substitutability of inventory, meaning that there is a way to value an ad across media types -- there is, essentially, an exchange rate."
So, can this system which has propelled TV forward be used online? Some companies and marketers think it should be. Ultimately, the hope among some media professionals is that not only will it ignite online video advertising, but also move TV dollars online, in general. AdExchanger.com asked a group of industry experts from the video advertising side of the ad ecosystem the following question:
"Is an online GRP system necessary in order to make online video advertising flourish and realize its potential?"
Click below or scroll down for more to read the answers:
- Suzanne Claassen, SVP, Digital Standards & Investments, SMGx (Publicis)
- Brett Wilson, CEO, TubeMogul
- Tammy Bondanza, SVP Digital Media, and Stacey Shepatin, SVP, Director of National Broadcast, Hill-Holliday (IPG)
- Amir Ashkenazi, CEO & Founder, Adap.tv
- Joseph Leon, Managing Director EMEA, Essence
- Bill Day, CEO, Tremor Video
- Jayant Kadambi, co-founder and CEO, YuMe
- Tim Avila, VP, Product Marketing, BrightRoll
- Nick Higgins, CRO, Joost
Suzanne Claassen, SVP, Digital Standards & Investments, SMGx (Publicis)
"I'm not convinced its the iGRP, but standardization of digital video measurement is essential to achieving that market's potential. The solution needs to be equatable to broadcast measurement in order for clients and agencies to embrace it quickly. Consumers have changed their video viewing habits to include new devices but media spend hasn't kept pace with that change. This is largely due to the fact that there are too many ways to measure the effectiveness of your digital video investment. It makes the market look unstable and easily manipulated."
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Anthony Risicato is GM of Platforms at Tremor Media.
He discussed Tremor Media's new Video Hub (see the release) and brand advertising with online video ads recently with AdExchanger.com.
AdExchanger.com: What was the trigger for the creation of the Video Hub for Tremor Media?
AR: We compare everything we do to television advertising, because that's really the birth of video advertising - the latest rendition of that is online.
So, [for the Video Hub], we started to work on a set of technologies that would provide a level of comfort and transparency into online video advertising that brand marketers needed. When you advertise against "Glee," you know what you're getting on television. When you advertise online, either on a website or against video content, brand advertisers need that additional level of transparency, brand safety and confidence.
Do you agree that digital is held to a higher standard by brand marketers?
Yes, it's tyranny in some cases. I gave a talk more than 10 years ago at the IAB in Europe. I said that the best thing about online advertising is that it can be measured and the worst thing about online advertising is that it can be measured.
The TV folks have created the greatest brand marketing medium ever. Digital folks look at TV as a little bit of a dinosaur and it's not the future. And I put forth that that's the wrong way to look at it.
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On Monday, Aol's video content syndication platform 5min Media and online video platform Brightcove announced that they have expanded their existing relationship to give Brightcove customers access to 5min Media’s library of video titles. Read the release.
Ran Harnevo, Co-founder and CEO of 5min Media and SVP of AOL Video, discussed the partnership and its implications.
AdExchanger.com: Can you talk a bit about the progress and evolution that 5min has made since it has been acquired by AOL?
RH: Sure. We’ve been blended into the AOL video offering in a couple of ways.
First, all of our content library is getting integrated into AOL properties including Huffington Post. On the Owned & Operated side, editors now have a much bigger video library to choose from in order to create a much deeper video experience across the AOL site, with videos that can be monetized.
Also, [awareness] of 5min has been raised in the marketplace and we integrated our salesforces and inventory with Aol. Right now, if you buy into AOL, you get both premium content in AOL properties and then premium content that is syndicated across the network. [Video ad buyers] can make a network buy and a premium buy under the same roof. AOL has a lot of users and passion towards video. We could enable a lot more content into Aol. Their salesforce increases our CPMs and distribution. And if you look at comScore numbers in the past three months, we're growing as AOL video - not only as 5min.
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Oren Harnevo is CEO of Eyeview, a personalized video ad technology company.
Can you briefly discuss your background and inspiration for Eyeview?
OH: My vision for Eyeview began while I was simultaneously working on Bachelor’s degrees in Film and Television and Computer Science at Tel-Aviv University. I became fascinated with combining these two areas by producing and measuring the quality of creative video and its effect on viewers using optimization and analytics metrics. Tal Riesenfeld, Gal Barnea and I started the company by providing a service that measures the effect of a viewer watching a video on online. We saw a lot of positive impact, especially when targeting different videos to different users. The problem advertisers were facing was that generating several variations of a video was too expensive. Gradually, we realized that the true potential in the market was creating effective personalized videos in a cost effective way. Then, once we were ready with the technology and the online video advertising market was booming, we built a product to fit that market.
What problem is Eyeview solving?
The problem we are solving is that advertisers cannot reach their target audience with an effective, personalized message through video. They can do it with text and display but not video. Today, brands can only use the one-size -fits-all TV commercial and are not able to take full advantage of the targeting and personalization potential of the digital medium.
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Scott Ferber is CEO of TidalTV, a video advertising, optimization, and yield management solutions provider.
Click below for the interview with Ferber or keep scrolling:
AdExchanger.com: How did TidalTV come about? Your Ad.com days?
SF: Yes. At Advertising.com, we were predominantly focused on measurable direct response outcome. And a direct response outcome was one we defined where the sale could occur in some trackable, measurable way. That's the basis for affiliate marketing. Those are types of activities we were involved in.
However, it appeared to us, holistically, that the vast majority of goods, products were sold not in that convenient manner so we thought sight, sound, and motion - or video - was the most powerful branding medium, and that when a consumer was given a choice or was faced with a purchase decision at the bottom of the marketing funnel, it mattered what had happened at the top of the marketing funnel.
The theory was, how can we bring more accountability to television creative where typically what it's affecting are events that happen after the fact and that aren't necessarily trackable in a closed environment like the ones on the Internet? So the whole vision became, can we build, a platform or system in the to analyze, decide, and deliver video‑based advertisements in a way that take into account all the downstream measurable repercussions in some sort of optimal way?
We defined optimal as optimal for the advertiser, optimal for the consumer, and optimal for the media owner, and in TV I would argue you have a distributor, too. It's not just Warner Brothers. It's also Time Warner Cable, Comcast, Dish and others.We are trying to provide value throughout the ecosystem. I'm trying to be a little bit simplistic, but that was the vision.
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Yesterday, Adap.tv announced a new platform it's calling "Adap.tv for Advertisers," which it describes as a buy-side management system for online video advertising. The company says Interpublic Group's Mediabrands and its agency trading desk, Cadreon, is one of the first to leverage the new platform. Read the release.
Adap.tv CEO Amir Ashkenazi discussed the announcement's implications.
AdExchanger.com: Are you moving away from your marketplace strategy?
AA: No, Adap.tv for Advertisers is an important extension of the Adap.tv Marketplace.
Similar to our offering for publishers (Adap.tv for Publishers), the idea behind Adap.tv for Advertisers is to provide buyers with the ability to manage and buy video inventory at scale. This model is similar to Google’s combination of Invite Media and AdEx.
Buying and managing video advertising is very different than display advertising in terms of technical challenges, as well as metrics and tools used to track performance. In addition to being a very powerful standalone platform for buying video across any inventory source, Adap.tv for Advertisers seamlessly integrates into display-oriented platforms, enabling display-oriented DSPs and ad networks to offer video as well.
How does pricing work for the new platform?
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Video ad marketplace SpotXchange - a portion of whose inventory is real-time biddable - announced the integration of a new optimization technology called "Otto" which it says will allow buyers to more efficiently buy video ads. In a release, the company claims that "it is the first video ad network to automatically optimize campaigns to achieve the best performance possible at scale." Read the release on SpotXchange's website.
SpotXchange CEO Mike Shehan discussed the announcement and its implications.
AdExchanger.com: Why is an auto-optimization solution necessary? Can't SpotXchange buyers optimize effectively?
MS: SpotXchange operates an auction-based marketplace connecting advertisers and publishers in real-time, which has always allowed our buyers to operate the most efficient, best-performing video ad campaigns. However, Otto, our machine learning algorithm technology, represents yet another SpotXchange advancement that allows buyers to maximize campaign performance. From our perspective, when you’re talking about a video ad marketplace of tens of thousands of sites representing over 80 million monthly unique viewers, and 30 million daily impression opportunities in 15 countries, no human would be able to evaluate each opportunity and fully optimize every single ad placement. Otto doesn’t replace humans; "he" just makes them more effective.
Does this make you a competitor to some of your buyers in that you will be working on an IO basis with your optimization engine - and some buyers will not be using the engine? How do you handle this?
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