Viewpoint’s CEO reveals the findings from research that tested the effectiveness of the company’s “All Things Video” program.
Viewpoint recently announced the results from research conducted in conjunction with its “All Things Video” program. The phase one aggregate results measured the effectiveness of various online video ad formats, as well as the most efficient ways for advertisers to invest their media budgets in these solutions. Consumer perception of each video unit's attributes was also measured.
The online video formats tested were Viewpoint's Unicast Transitional, Unicast Pre-roll and Unicast In-page banners. Dynamic Logic conducted the research over an eight-week period, surveying more than 3,800 web consumers to measure each format's impact on Brand Awareness, Spokesperson/Message Association, Brand Favorability and Purchase Intent.
Among the key results: Viewpoint's "All Things Video" campaigns were up to three times more effective on average than Dynamic Logic's Overall MarketNorms, and annoyance rates for all online video units tested were the lowest ever released at 26 percent, compared to a 57 percent annoyance rate for television.
We talked with Viewpoint's CEO, Jay Amato, to learn more about the significance of this study.
iMedia: What was the goal of this research? What did Viewpoint and Dynamic Logic set out to do?
Amato: Viewpoint and Unicast have always been committed to understanding how our formats perform and publishing the results of our studies to help agencies/advertisers better understand how to spend their media dollars online. Unicast has brought that commitment to Viewpoint and we took it one step further, by testing multiple formats simultaneously, to help provide some insight as to the relative effectiveness of each format.
We are committed to leading the industry in finding what works best for advertisers.
iMedia: Please comment on each conclusion/result. Number one: Viewpoint’s Unicast video formats outperform all Dynamic Logic MarketNorms, including the Video MarketNorms, which are the research firm’s leading statistics.
Amato: Consumer acceptance for the Unicast video formats was the highest we’ve seen at Unicast/Viewpoint to date. The “All Things Video” study proved our video executions were over three times more effective than Dynamic Logic MarketNorms for online ad awareness and surpasses even Dynamic Logic’s highest MarketNorms, by as much as two times the Video Norm. We compared the “All Things Video” results to the published Q1, 2005 Dynamic Logic market norms data.
Bottom line: These formats work. They’re higher than even the most effective units Dynamic Logic has tested, which includes all video campaigns.
iMedia: Number two: Online advertising should be allocated strategically to align media budgets and objectives.
Amato: We found that when using various Unicast formats in tandem the advertiser had a better likelihood of improving the overall performance of the campaign. Pre-Roll is the most effective with regard to the branding metrics Brand Awareness and Message Association, and is 20 percent more effective in Message Association than the next best performing unit. Transitional video was the only format to move BOTH persuasion metrics -- it was a minimum of five times more effective than other units. In-page contributed solidly at the core of the purchase continuum (middle three metrics), but was not the most effective in any one metric.
Unicast is able to work closely with the agency/advertiser to allocate impressions across the media buy to ensure the various formats strengthen the performance of the campaign.
iMedia: Number three: Consumers are more accepting of Viewpoint’s Unicast video formats than television.
Amato: Unicast tests annoyance with all its research studies. The annoyance rates for “All Things Video” are lower than any previously tested formats. It is important to note that all these formats ran in different locations on the page and were all 30 seconds in length. What makes this so important is that while acceptance of video online is increasing, TV commercial acceptance is decreasing with 57 percent of respondents claiming television ads are annoying, according to Havas MPG, 2004.
iMedia: It’s interesting that people find TV commercials annoying, but like the online videos for their TV-like quality. Explain why this is? Does it have to do with consumer control of when the videos play?
Amato: We do not have hard data to conclude this but we believe it has to do with the guaranteed quality of the video that Unicast has provided since the release of its video product over a year ago. Additionally, because all Unicast formats give the consumer control over the video playback (play/pause, sound on/off) they feel as if they have more control and therefore reduce the annoyance. The In-page units did have the highest annoyance and we believe that is due to the placement of the video unit and that all the creatives in the study were host-initiated.
iMedia: What’s the greatest significance of this study for marketers?
Amato: What this study proves is that marketers need to be more holistic in their view of creative and how they deploy video online. This study helps marketers understand the unique benefits of each of the Unicast formats and how they can be utilized to strengthen their campaign performance.
We know marketers are going to buy video … marketers should go with someone they trust and who they know is committed to pushing the industry forward, with formats, data, and most importantly, customer service.
iMedia: How does this study relate to other research out there?
Amato: To date, there has not been a published study testing multiple formats that has been released to the market. Individual format studies have been released, but nothing comprehensive including multiple formats and most importantly, nothing from a single provider. The IAB and Marketing Evolution have tested multiple formats for their XMOS tests, but the focus of those studies are not the formats, it’s the media and relative costs.
iMedia: What’s the next step, for your study purposes as well as for video advertising?
Amato: Unicast is committed to providing advertisers the best learning possible regarding our formats and the best ways to allocate media dollars online. We will continue to push the research envelope with ongoing studies, testing the brand metrics, and as always, consumer acceptance.
Despite significant increases in video adoption online, there is still much room to grow in terms of budget allocation to online, and we believe video is what will bring those budgets to the online space. As we have always done, we will continue to meet advertiser demand with new products and/or new product features as the market dictates.