Outstream Video: How It Can Be The Game-changer For Publishers In 2019

Videos are great! And interactive. And not to forget, they’re effective. The world of advertising has seen a tremendous rise in revenue and audience engagement since the birth of video ads.

Sources say online videos are expected to encapsulate 80% of the internet traffic in 2019 and generate up to $15.4 billion spends. That’s huge! Publishers like BuzzFeed owe more than 50% of their ad revenue to videos ads; predicted to rise upto 75%. Again, that’s huge.

Even In July 2014, Facebook paid an estimated $400 million to acquire LiveRail, a video advertising distributor which uses real-time bidding to place over 7 billion video ads a month. The data is endless...

Clearly, the evolution of videos ads has been untamed since 2007 when YouTube introduced the video form of advertising. But today is 2019. Publishers, advertisers, and marketers can’t just keep hanging on to traditional video ads.

They’re obsessed with the innovation of new digital ad formats which bring them more and more revenue. Similarly, viewers are now smarter. And mostly, they’re AWARE. They’re obsessed with user experience and don’t appreciate hindrances. Well not anymore!

So what called for the conceptualization of outstream video? And what does it mean?

What In The World Is An Outstream Video Ad?

Straight to the point, outstream video ads are ad units that appear and autoplay in non-video environment, mostly within editorials, social feed, an article (text-centric). It’s more than just pre-roll and mid-roll video ad formats exercised by YouTube.

In the ad world, it’s considered publisher-friendly due to its independence from:

1) the need to place video ad units for advertisers.

2) the intrusiveness caused to users on the website.

3) the availability of platforms to run ads on, eg. just YouTube.

Outstream videos turn out to a game-changer in regards to viewability, one of the biggest concerns publishers live with. How? The ads happen to appear only when their placement reaches in the viewport.

Instream Vs Outstream: Who Wins?

37% brand professionals believe spending on outstream is more lucrative than spending on instream. Wait, what is in-stream first?

Instream video ads are regular pre, mid, and post-roll placements we see in YouTube videos or other video platforms. On the contrary, outstream video ads, like I said above, appear within the text-centric content when the placement is on viewer’s viewport.

Pros and cons:

The good part for instream is, viewers attentively watch those in desire to watch the actual video they have selected and launched. However, the bad part is this ad format is restricted to just a few channels supporting videos.

Outstream video ads, on the other hand, have proven to achieve 25% longer viewing than instream. They have the advantage to appear anywhere capable of achieving 100% viewability. However, careful planning as per the look and feel of the environment is a major concern.

Outstream Video Insights: Format + Compatibility

Outstream video ads prepped via AdWords give viewers the leverage to interact with them in the way they actually want. In here, the ads are not imposed. Rather, the viewers have an upper hand on how they want to deal with them.

Here’re the types and results you can expect:

In-page (native) video ads: Just like native advertising, these video ads help you garner viewer attention. The result, increased brand awareness.

Mobile only: Tailored for mobile and tablet needs, these video ads are designed to remain under user control viz. mute/unmute, scroll past, click through.

In AdWords, outstream video ads are charged basis the viewable cost which is one thousand impressions (CPM). Hence, this complies to the viewability rules wherein 50% of the ad screen is visible and is played/watched for two seconds at least.

Outstream Video: Can It Be The Game-changer In 2019?

 A survey in 2015 found out 77% agencies and 70% advertisers believe outstream video ads will be an important addition to an ad portfolio. Today in 2019, this is happening! So this is the time when outstream video may prove a turnaround for publishers. How:

Attention across the web: Outstream ads are not just YouTube dependant. These ads are capable of encapsulating user attention on any website where it makes sense for publishers; even if they don’t support video ad formats.

Higher viewability and monetization: These ads autoplay, that too then when they are exactly in the viewer’s viewport. For the reason that they play or pause as per user’s interaction with the screen, advertisers are assured their ads are seen and monetized.

Long-form nature of video ads: Unlike instream ads which are restricted to short-duration, outstream ads can be long form. These can be of long narration, storytelling nature than just plain vanilla pitching as they’re not pre/mid-roll placements.

Better engagement and recall: It’s already established that outstream video ads are capable of deriving 25% longer viewing. Furthermore, sources have found them to imbibe 300% better brand/message recall when the video is watched till completion.

Mobile-driven: 90% of the time, users use their mobile devices vertically. Thus vertical ads, a unit of outstream video ads have the bandwidth to create seamless mobile ad experience, even in the absence of vertical editorial videos.

Must-remember Pointers  

Though the stars shine nicely on outstream video ads, there are some disadvantageous attributes which exist upon the practice. Here, keep these in mind:

They are hard to find. Many times, outstream video ads come bundled with pre-roll and banner ads campaigns, instead of singular ad format to be deployed.

The performance is difficult to track. Being a relatively newer format, these lack proper analytics and performance-measuring metrics system.

Optimization is yet to be explored. Again, being a newer ad format, these are not yet exposed to practices on how to utilize them to the fullest potential.

The sound is a matter of contention. Advertisers rely on auto-sound (mute/unmute control) to get user attention, which although not all players offer.

A quick tip: Adding subtitles to the video should be a good way to combat default mute (sound off) setting on the user’s device.

Final Word

Between 2014 to 2016, marketers increased their mobile and digital video ad spending by 95%. Nearly 85% of Facebook videos are watched with the sound turned off. About 70% of marketers plan to use video marketing this year.

So, what do we infer?

Videos are far away from being limited. People love video, and it’s true. The data and these new incarnations in video advertising are indicating video as a channel of growth.

On one hand, publishers attain better viewability for enhanced ad monetization. While simultaneously, advertisers/marketers are enjoying better traction from their respective audiences. And as outstream takes off, this is a chance to harness these new formats and stimulate the performance of existing video ad efforts.

Have a compelling video creative? Contact us to find out how to make it bring more sales, higher conversions, and better impact!