State of video advertising report: what are the most tolerable ad formats?

As video content increases, it’s time for brands to understand their consumers, in order to deliver the most relevant ads to them.

Wibbitz conducted a survey in March about video consumption and consumer sentiments regarding video advertising, hoping to help publishers and consumers reach a middle ground.

Every publisher looking to expand its services to video content needs to understand its audience first, hearing their needs, in order to deliver the best video experience to them.

Here are the most interesting findings from Wibbitz’s report and what we can learn from them:

The changing state of video consumption

Video consumption has been increased during the past years and 26% of people who participated in Wibbitz’s survey responded that they are watching at least one video per day.

Mobile devices have significantly contributed to the increased video consumption, as they make videos more accessible and this can be confirmed by the fact that 55% of the frequent video viewers prefer watching them on their smartphone.

As for the most popular social platform to watch videos, Facebook is a clear winner, as 54% of them picked it as their first social destination for video consumption, and this can also be justified by Facebook’s decision to highlight video content on the users’ news feed, while the launch of Canvas made video advertising even more appealing.

However, these stats may change during the next year, as I personally predict a rise of video consumption on Snapchat.

Strong preference on silent ads

No matter how often people are watching online videos, they still don’t like ads with sound, or irrelevant messages.

45% of people answered that muted ads are more tolerable, while 39% of them considered targeted ads a crucial factor for tolerable ads.

Brands start understanding how annoying the sound in advertising may be and that’s why they are trying to send their message through the video, even with the addition of captions, to make sure they don’t lose the viewers out of annoyance.

The power of targeted ads

It is very important nowadays for brands to focus on targeted video ads, as users grow more impatient and less receptive to irrelevant advertising.

In fact, frequent video viewers care even more about the relevance of the ads, which means that it’s important for brands to keep them happy.

Facebook and linkedIn video viewers seem to be more demanding, with 41% and 47% of them respectively preferring targeted ads from any other ad type.

Short ads

The rise of the demanding video viewers, who also tend to have a short attention span, creates the need for shorter video ads to keep them engaged, as 70% of people won’t watch an ad longer than 10 seconds.

As the length of the video increases, only 51% of people will watch up to 10 seconds, but there is an increased chance they’ll watch up to 30 seconds in such cases.

Thus, the duration of the video along with its relevance, affect users’ watch time and the engagement can only be achieved with great content that will convince viewers to keep watching for more than 30 seconds.

Skipping ads

It is becoming common for consumers to seek for ways to skip an ad, especially if it’s annoying or irrelevant, with 61% of them admitting that they always skip video ads, if possible.

However, it has also been observed that not everyone takes a real action regarding ad skipping, while half of the respondents are more likely to appreciate a mute ad.

This is another reminder for brands to use the sound in advertising appropriately, only to enhance the viewing experience and not to make users skip the video faster.

Autoplay

Autoplay in video advertising can be annoying and 42% of the respondents share the same opinion, but mobile video consumption may change this soon.

It seems that mobile users are more receptive to autoplay ads and this could be related to the highly targeted content they’re exposed to. However, Snapchat users don’t seem to agree, as 55% of them find autoplay ads intrusive.

Apparently the opinions are still divided about autoplay in video advertising, which brings a great opportunity for brands to turn around the unhappy users with non-intrusive content that is highly relevant to their audience.

What brands can learn

All the above observations can help a brand understand what video consumers want,  in order to produce the right content for them.

Here are the key points to remember:

§ Relevance is key. Video consumers expect highly targeted advertising that fits their interests and their browsing habits. This increases the chances for them to keep watching a video. A personalised experience is always appreciated, so there’s no need to create video ads without knowing your audience first.

§ Silent ads can increase the engagement, as you can still send your message effectively without any disruptive sound. If there’s an indication that your audience hates the sound in your video ads, then it’s time to focus on the visual side of advertising.

§ Focus on mobile. Video consumers on mobile devices have been increased, which means that you should make sure that your content is optimised for mobile, making the viewing experience pleasant.

§ Keep it short. Even if you create a longer video, make sure that the first seconds are appealing to help users stay engaged.