Contextual video advertising increases attention and dwell time
A study by Video Intelligence demonstrates the impact of contextual advertising on user engagement, recall and perception of editorial and commercial content. Dwell time was increased and user engagement with pre-roll advertising was enhanced. In addition, advertising had a positive impact on the perception of publisher pages.
On behalf of Video Intelligence, a contextual video platform, Lumen Research surveyed 200 consumers about their opinions of commercial and editorial content on the entertainment site The Wrap. The focus was on engagement, dwell time and perception of video ads displayed with and without contextual content.
The study demonstrated a high positive response from users who were presented with contextual video content instead of standard or out-of-context ads. Contextual content increased dwell time on The Wrap page by 33 percent - from 33 seconds to 47. Video Intelligence's placement of contextual video content also increased user engagement with all other ad formats on the page: 71 percent of respondents engaged with displayed pre-roll ads when they were contextually aligned with the page content. If the ad was played without matching it to the page content, only 50 percent engaged. In addition, recall of the pre-roll ad also increased if it was contextually matched to the content of the page.
In general, it can be said that contextual video content in editorial environments dramatically increases both user awareness and engagement with the displayed video ad.
Advertising increases interest in the publisher's content
Eighty-five percent of respondents described the page as interesting when it included contextual video (78 percent without) and 80 percent said they had "fun browsing" when they were shown the page with contextual video (69 percent without). The results demonstrate a one-third increase in dwell time and a 9 percent increase in awareness of the corresponding publisher web pages. Overall, the content on the entire page received more attention when it contained editorially adapted videos.
The participants of the study were invited to download the software of the eye tracking institute Lumen Research onto their laptops. Subsequently, the webcam of their computer was temporarily transformed into an eye-tracking camera. By observing the eye movements, it was possible to determine exactly what the participants were looking at and what was ignored.
Kai Henniges, CEO and co-founder of Video Intelligence: "We already knew that contextual editorial content improves user interaction with advertising. However, what positively surprises us is the fact that interaction also improves for all other native advertising content located on the page." Mike Follett, Managing Director at Lumen Research adds, "Because contextual content is more relevant and interesting than typical digital video, users are also more likely to engage with the accompanying advertising."
About the methodology of the study
Participants in the study were shown an article on The Wrap about the Oscars in which half of the users saw the article with contextually relevant video content, the other half without. The same ad from M&M ran before both videos. After reading the article and watching the video, participants were asked to complete a short questionnaire about their recollection and perception of the advertisements displayed and the publisher's website. Respondents were paid for their participation. Following the survey, the software was deleted from their devices.
About the client of the study
VI is a contextual video platform and offers the VI Stories product. This allows publishers to embed a native video player on their platform that matches the look, style, and design of their app or website. A Natural Language-based machine learning algorithm (NLP) powered by IBM Watson identifies and plays editorial videos based on analysis of page content.
