Answers the call from publishers for more mobile-first, premium video ad placements
9 years ago, Mixpo brought in-banner video to market. This gave our publisher partners a way to monetize their content by offering advertisers access to video ads outside of pre-roll. Over 30 billion in-banner video impressions later, we still hear from our publishers that demand for video ads exceeds supply.
Today we’re excited to release the first in a series of outstream units, the In-Content Video Reveal, Mixpo’s mobile-first iteration of in-banner video, that solves for many of the digital challenges publishers face today, including limited video inventory, mobile-first ad formats, and complex digital campaign execution. Here’s how the the changes in recent years have led to this new ad format, and the new opportunity it provides publishers.
The Video Boom
In 2016 advertisers will spend $10 billion on digital video ads, representing nearly 30% growth over 2015 (eMarketer 2016). Video remains so popular among advertisers because no other digital format has proven to be as impactful for brand metrics.
Mobile-First Ad Formats
Meanwhile, mobile content consumption has grown exponentially. Most of our publisher partners report that well over 50% of their page views are now on mobile. Mobile adds another layer of complexity to video ad serving. A couple factors contributing to this complexity are a growing list of browser and device combinations, differing levels of adoption of evolving IAB ad standards, Google’s deprecation of Flash support, and of course variances in how sites are built. All told, serving video ads cleanly in all the places they may appear isn’t easy.
In addition to technical complexity, the increase in mobile content consumption required rethinking video ad experiences. Smaller screen sizes mean less real estate for ads, which both means fewer ads on the screen at once and smaller ad units. Most of our publisher partners have 3-5 above the fold placements on desktop, each large enough to allow for compelling creative to drive viewers to watch a video. On mobile however, many publishers may only have a single 320x50. It is tough to use this space that many consumers have learned to ignore to compel a viewer to watch a video.
As mobile consumption has increased, vendors have developed a variety of ad formats unique to mobile in an effort to match desktop video metrics. Because what was needed was a new way to consume video ads on mobile, rather than an incremental change to the desktop experience, the market required a publisher with the scale of Facebook to define and mainstream a new experience. Facebook was also the logical player to define this experience given the pace at which video consumption was growing on their platform. They defined an experience where video ads could be consumed in a feed-based experience, set expectations around shorter ads on mobile, and standardized specs like play/pause when videos come into and go out of view.
Facebook Made the Market for Auto-Play Video Within Articles
Now the format pioneered by Facebook has been adopted as outstream across the web, an auto-play video format that appears within articles. It’s a seemingly simple ad format, with an intuitive user experience that already feels familiar. Given the complexities of mobile, executing an outstream campaign is anything but easy. It requires ad tech that can cleanly serve a unit across devices, browsers and site configurations into a player that matches up to video experiences consumers have come to expect. That includes touches like a progress bar, so viewers can see the length of an ad, player controls for scrubbing back and forth within a unit, and an intuitive way to unmute a video. An understanding of the importance of these features, and a UX sensibility around how to execute them comes only from 9 years of serving video ads and ample data about what works.
With this knowledge and experience, Mixpo is taking to market the first in a series of outstream units, the In-Content Video Reveal, Mixpo’s mobile-first iteration of in-banner video.
Learn more about Mixpo’s In-Content Video Reveal.
Erin Martin
Erin leads the marketing organization at Netsertive. She has over twenty years of experience in the marketing technology space, most recently at Mixpo, an ad tech company acquired by Netsertive in 2017, where she had leadership roles in marketing, client services, and operations. Her happy place is where marketing and operations collide, and is passionate about creating systems that put the right people, process, and technology together to do extraordinary things. She applies the same type of analytical thinking to her personal life and enjoys finding areas where work and life principles coincide. Erin has a BS in Marketing from Colorado State University where she graduated with honors. She lives in Seattle with her husband, daughter, and son, where she enjoys anything that involves the outdoors.
