Adconion announced the Joost Video Network today – “a complete suite of online video advertising products and services… with global in-banner and in- stream video advertising capabilities, including pre-, mid- and post- roll video advertisements.” (Read the release.) The announcement comes a little over three months since Adconion acquired Joost.
Nick Higgins, Adconion’s director of global video, discussed the company’s video ad network initiatives and Joost.
AdExchanger.com: What were the challenges involved in converting Joost into a video ad network? What parts of Joost provided infrastructure – and what didn’t?
NH: The main technical challenge was integrating the Adconion ad server in to the Joost player, which was key in order to provide our advertisers both the ability to re-target users across pre-roll and display ads as well as provide them with integrated reporting. Other than that, launching the Joost Video Network was pretty seamless, because we could leverage our existing network capabilities – after all, we are the world’s largest independent audience network.
Discuss the video formats available in the Joost network. Have you looked to the VAST standard for example as a guide? How do you seeing this playing out?
The Joost Video Network provides in-stream and in-banner video advertising. In our in-stream products, we have pre-, mid- and post-roll ads, which we supplement with overlays, and we are VAST-compliant. For in-banner video ads, we have an almost limitless number of products, based on the size of the ad and the way in which the video starts playing. We have click-to-play and autostream video ads available in IAB-compliant sizes; we also have click-to-play and autostream expandable video ads in IAB-compliant sizes.
Also, we feel it’s important to note that our network is DoubleVerified, so every video ad that runs on the Joost Video Network runs in a brand-safe environment.
From a sales standpoint, are you selling audience, placement, custom integrations?
We’re selling all three. We are certainly selling audience, and are particularly excited about our ability to target users using BlueKai data for both pre-roll and in-banner video ads. In addition, owning and operating our own video portal, Joost.com, gives us the opportunity to develop cutting-edge custom integrations, where the brand can own the video player. We also have an exclusive relationship with the branded entertainment studio RedLever, which enables us to work with clients to create custom campaigns – which we then distribute through the Joost Video Network.
A year from now, what goals would you like to see Joost to have already accomplished?
Adconion’s goal is to position Joost as a leading content aggregation, distribution and monetization video platform – so you can expect to see more announcements from us about our video products throughout the year.
By John Ebbert
