With nearly all of our favorite websites now featuring video content, online video advertising is no longer a market for just YouTube and Hulu. The market for online video advertising, while young, is already enormous and it’s growing rapidly. Last year eMarketer forecasted that digital video ad spending will grow to $9.1 billion in 2017, and nearly one third of marketers are already shifting budget from online display and television advertising into online video ads, according to a 2013 study from Adap.tv and Digiday.
For publishers and advertisers there are still many challenges and questions about how to best capitalize on online video advertising. For example: What is the ideal duration for a video ad? What are some sophisticated ways to package video with traditional digital advertising to increase brand visibility?
To begin to answer these questions and gain insights into the online video advertising market, MediaRadar analyzed thousands of online video ads across more than 100 websites between November 2013 and January 2014. The study revealed some very interesting trends.
A few quick takeaways:
- While the vast majority (79%) of online video ads are either 15 or 30 seconds long, 30 second ads are about 10 times more likely to have a skip option than 15 second ads. Perhaps counter-intuitively, shorter ads can deliver more brand messaging than longer ads.
- When it comes to the high-impact packaging of online video with various forms of display and rich media ads, there are opportunities to be an early adopter within certain categories. While 52% of video ads on food websites are accompanied by display ads, just 11% of ads on tech sites also feature an accompanying display ad.
The findings are summarized in the infographic below:


Not only does Golf Digest find itself with content that effectively transitions from the page to video—such as the “Hungover Caddie” column, which will become an animated series—Baldwin says they’ve got a wealth of talent that already shine on video. Among these is Ben Crane, who Baldwin describes as “a comedic genius… in addition to being on the PGA tour,” who will host #GolfSecrets with Ben Crane. This increased emphasis on video content will also afford Golf Digest a means to further develop its editorial staff on screen.