Spring Into Online Video

We’re finally getting our real spring here in Atlanta. You know that time of the year that signals growth, renewal, the start of baseball (which, in my case, means driving my son around to places in Georgia you didn’t even know existed), etc.

Spring has also come to be a metaphor for the start of better times. And, after this past year, we could all use some of those. And, there’s no better time to “spring” into online video. Okay—that made me sound more than a bit dorky, but it works….read on.

IPG’s media and audience research group, MAGNA Global, forecasts a 32 percent increase in online video ad spending this year. According to the forecast, video advertising revenues will rise from $531 million in 2008 to $699 million in 2009. MAGNA believes spending will exceed $1 billion by 2011, implying a compounded annual growth rate of 36 percent each year between 2006 and 2011.

Researchers, industry pundits and marketers attribute this growth to the availability of more premium content and the continued rise of broadband penetration in the United States. And, let’s not forget, the new-found ability to target online video ads. Not to mention, it’s way more cost-effective to produce online video ads as opposed to a full-blown, 60-second TV spot.

With online video advertising, not only is targeting possible and affordable, but new technologies, such as IP Intelligence, have made optimizing the delivery of ads quite simple.

Additionally, online video content tends to be relatively highly regulated—subject to syndication rights and regional contractual and other legal issues. Using IP intelligence, you can insure that you are complying with these legal requirements (relying on users to supply accurate information is not good enough for legal compliance—obviously, if you give users an incentive to lie about their location or risk being blocked from content, they will lie!)

This all spells better times for both small businesses that want to play big and incorporate video into their marketing plans and for large, national companies that want to target audiences on a more local level. And, IP intelligence is a key to success in online video.