Rich media and video are rapidly becoming de facto components for online campaigns of all types. In this session, agency experts will examine and illustrate with case studies what kind of campaigns benefit most from using video; how best to integrate video with other campaign elements; and discuss the creative, production, ad-serving and media challenges inherent to interactive video campaigns.
This session was moderated by Pamela Parker of ClickZ News and moderated by Maria Mandel of Digital Innovation, OgilvyOne, Scott Meyer of About/New York Times, Ian Schafer of Deep Focus and Dorian Sweet of Tribal DDB San Francisco. Since this session deals with video and multimedia ads, it's interesting to blog compared to other sessons about various optimization tactics.
First up is Maria Mandel who says adding audio and video to online ads, it increases effectiveness by 2.5%.
Case study: Ameritrade. - Client thought they could put their TV commercial online. Shows ad. - Next they tested an ad that was just for online. Shows another ad. Video created for online was 3 times more popular and generated more conversions.
How to be more engaging? - Showed example of a scenario based video for Miller Light. - Showed IBM Ad during US Open showing an ad using multiple technologies to engage the visitor including: podcast, RSS, video. This ad was very successful in terms of metrics: impressions, engagement, podcast downloads, etc.
Case Study: Seeding the Youth Environment Created an unbranded campaign that promoted "Miles Thirst" to create buzz. Created fake fan sites and ran PPC ads for popular culture items to attaract visitors. Also used online video and other interactive formats.
Next was Dorian Sweet who talked about creating viral or "remarkable" campaigns that generate buzz.
What's new? Technology is creating the ability to do more things. There's not a lot that's new other than the fact that just about anyone with the right tools can create online media.
Change is going to occur as information becomes more and more of a shared experience.
Rich content formats: Function generated - referral, affiliate Brand generated - coroporate User generated - considered consumer, hommade marketing
Examples:
User Generated - Star Wars Kid. Showed original video of a kid doing some light saber moves with a broom handle. Then showed another with addtional visual and audio creative added by someone else to illustrate how consumers are repurposing their own media to make it better.
Brand Generated - iPod. Showed a basic iPod short video ad. Then showed the George Masters hommeade iPod video that was so viral a few years ago. Brands are not the sole proprietors of the message. Consumers are creating their own versions of brand created media.
Showed example where Miller Light copied a video created by a consumer as creative for one of their commercials.
As technology gets better and better, production values will go up. That's the direction this kind of media is going.
Next up is Ian Schafer. What is necessary to engage consumers? Remember the rules of engagement.
1. Urgency - Example, CNN Pipeline. Allows consumers to create their own news 2. Utility - Example, Google and all the services that Google offers. 3. Practicality - Example, Flickr and all the different ways to use it. 4. Originality - Example, myspace has done that by allowing users to experss themselves. 5. Curiosity - Example, YouTube video sharing portal. 6. Technology and Innovation - Example, MotherLoad on Comedy Central.
Rules of Empowerment 1. Interacive - let views play with the content. Enable the media with the tools that make it easy to share or become viral. 2. Faciloitation 3. Incentivization 4. Ownership - Example, Wedding Crashers trailer that allows you to upload your photos.
Rich media and video does a great job at engaging and empowering audiences.
Rich media and video work best when information is brought directly to the consumer. When the ad is created for the medium itself and not re-purposed, it's more effective. These types of ads are also more effective when used as part of an integrated campaign.
Shows Sopranos and Google Maps mashup just launched today. http://www.hbo.com/sopranos/ Allows users to view videos based on map locations of events from the show.
Showed "Best Super Bowl Commercials" run on AOL. Within 72 hours, 4 million views.
Showed Date Movie video ad that brings visitor to your myspace profile. Then it reacts to you the real profile being displayed with humorous jabs.
Last up is Scott Meyer. Online video advertising is still in the early days. The good news is that blue chip advertisers are leading the charge.
Challenges are similar to what happened in the early days of internet advertising. Production is still expensive. Expectations are high and rich media advertising vendors are still a fragmented market.
Inventory is in short suply and not easy to manage. Video ad networks are still developing. Standards have yet to take shape.
About.com uses multimedia to increase engagement and distribution as well as advertising revenue. In the future About.com is recruiting more video experts and credible brand name experts. ALso partnering with advertisers and with brand name third party providers. Leverage user generated video content. Shows example of an user created video about accupunture.
Time ran short and there was one question that I missed.
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