Understanding the Effectiveness of Video Ads: A Measurement Study

Online video is the killer application of the Internet. Videos are expected to constitute more than 85 % of the trac on the consumer Internet within the next few years. However, a vexing problem for video providers is how to monetize their online videos. A popular monetization model pursued by many major video providers is inserting ads that play in-stream with the video that is being watched. Our work represents the first rigorous scientific study of the key fac-tors that determine the e↵ectiveness of video ads as mea-sured by their completion and abandonment rates. We col-lect and analyze a large set of anonymized traces from Aka-mai’s video delivery network consisting of about 65 million unique viewers watching 362 million videos and 257 million ads from 33 video providers around the world. Using novel quasi-experimental techniques, we show that an ad is 18.1% more likely to complete when placed as a mid-roll than as a pre-roll, and 14.3 % more likely to complete when placed as pre-roll than as a post-roll. Next, we show that completion rate of an ad decreases with increasing ad length. A 15-second ad is 2.9 % more likely to complete than a 20-second ad, which in turn is 3.9 % more likely to complete than a 30-second ad. Further, we show the ad completion rate is influenced by the video in which the ad is placed. An ad placed in long-form videos such as movies and TV episodes is 4.2 % more likely to complete than the same ad placed in short-form video such as news clips. Finally, we show that about one-third of the viewers who abandon leave in the first quarter of the ad, while about two-thirds leave at the half-way point in the ad.Our work represents a first step towards scientifically understanding video ads and viewer behavior. Such understanding is crucial for the long-term viability of online videos and the future evolution of the Internet