from China

Full disclosure: my company, YuMe, is one of the Google partners on this announcement. Take a look at the examples of different types of ads in our ad gallery on the YuMe site, notably the "Interactive Overlay: Click to Video" example. There's an ad for the Rambo movie, which, when clicked, takes you to a trailer for the movie.

It's not just about pre-roll anymore. Through the Google-YuMe partnership, there are number of different ways to approach an InVideo ad, including the ability to pick-and-chose which ad format works best for different types of content.

Interesting conversations over the last couple of days, fueled again by Google's announcement, are really bringing to light the differences in content and monetization. Kent Nichols' post regarding brand advertising and VideoEgg's engagement announcement raises many great points. I love Chris Albrecht's quote:

Perhaps Matt Cutler, VP of marketing and analytics at Visible Measures, put it best when he commented that the whole point of a half-day debate event is that there is nothing definitive yet, because if there was, the conference would have lasted all of 15 minutes.

I hope we begin to focus on the different types of content and how best to monetize each. Generally, UGC content is in short clips, with a single idea. Branded, episodic content is entirely different, with a consistent format and additional time in pre/post production. Instructional videos, by perhaps Make Magazine or Start Cooking, have unique challenges and monetization opportunities unto themselves.

We are still at the beginning of the video wave, and tool sets are needed to assist each type of content. That will ensure that publishers can maintain their freedom and create the best content for their audience, and not create content that fits the best advertising.

The reason Google's textual ads are so good is that they are so unobtrusive - they blend into the page. Notice that you don't see ads in the actual search results section. I hope that Google will follow this route for its AdSense for Video.

I would be more likely to remain engaged with a video that had a simple (unobtrusive) text overlay, or even a simple video overlay (reminiscent of TV stations putting in little adverts for an upcoming show at the bottom of the screen). It could be made so if the user hovers over the ad, the video stops temporarily and the ad plays out (possibly, pay-per-hover could be an ad model in which companies pay if the user hovers over it, and so allows it to run without the primary content video distracting them).

So much the better if the user is given the option of turning the ads off. The bottom line is that there's no way to force viewers to watch ads, and a smooth integration with content will, I imagine, be the most effective solution.