What Is Programmatic Video Advertising and Why It’s Worth It

Programmatic video advertising can seem like a scary new territory for beginners. However, it brings many benefits to both publishers and advertisers, and it is definitely worth the learning curve. Let’s dig deeper into what programmatic advertising is, how it works, and how your video business can thrive using programmatic ads.

What Is Programmatic Video Advertising

Programmatic advertising is a method of buying and selling ad real estate in real time using a software solution such as a programmatic ad network. The process is almost entirely automated and requires very little effort from publishers and advertisers. Programmatic video advertising, then, is programmatic advertising focused on video ad formats.

How Programmatic Advertising Works

So what does the process of programmatic advertising look like exactly? It is quite complex, and it can vary depending on the platform, ad type, and transaction type. Overall, however, it involves several steps:

This entire process happens in a very short timeframe — usually, less than a second. The most common auctioning method used in programmatic video advertising is video header bidding, which allows demand sources to place bids at the same time. 

Sometimes, however, the publisher may have a predetermined direct deal with an advertiser. This allows the advertiser to place a bid at a previously agreed upon CPM, but it doesn’t automatically guarantee a winning bid. This advertiser’s bid will still be evaluated against all the other bids placed by other demand sources.

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Most Common Types of Video Ads Used in Programmatic Advertising

Programmatic ad trading is an important element of digital video advertising. There are three common types of video ads that are served using programmatic — instream, outstream, and in-banner video ads.

Instream Video Ads

Instream video ads are what most people think of when they hear the phrase video advertising. These are ads that show up within the player before, during, or after a video stream. They are thus divided into pre-roll, mid-roll, and post-roll video ads respectively. They can be skippable or unskippable and can vary in length. 

Outstream Video Ads

Outstream video ads show up in different places on a website, for example, between two blocks of text or on the side of the page. They usually appear in a video player and can start playing automatically as the user scrolls. 

Outstream ads can be divided into two main categories — in-content outstream ads, which appear between paragraphs, and in-slide ads, which appear in a player that pops up in the corner of the screen and remains there even as the user scrolls.

In-Banner Video Ads

In-banner video ads, as the name suggests, are embedded into display ad slots. They are usually GIFs or shorter videos and contain a thumbnail image, as well as some text. They are more engaging than traditional, static banners but less intrusive than instream and outstream video ads. A great advantage for publishers when it comes to in-banner ads is that they don’t require a video player.

Why Are Publishers Turning to Programmatic Video Advertising?

The global programmatic ad spend amounted to just under $188 billion in 2017. In 2022, it is expected to exceed $490 billion. That is, roughly, 75% of the total ad spend for this year. And this upward trend doesn’t seem to be slowing down. According to Statista, in 2026, global advertisers will have spent over $720 billion on programmatic ads. 

So why are advertisers and publishers turning to programmatic video advertising at such a high rate? The answer is quite simple — it makes the process of ad trading faster, easier, and more profitable for all parties involved.

Benefits of Programmatic Video Advertising

There are multiple benefits both publishers and advertisers get to enjoy upon switching to programmatic video advertising. Some of the main ones are:

• Saving Time — Both advertisers and publishers can save time by switching to programmatic advertising. Since the process is automated, they won’t have to manually strike deals and spend time looking for the right match for their needs.
• Saving Resources — Saving time is closely related to saving resources. Brands that don’t use programmatic advertising usually have to have whole teams of ad experts tasked with striking deals. An automated ad buying process reduces the necessary resources exponentially.
• Better Audience Targeting — Programmatic advertising uses precise, real-time data to target the right audience for each ad. Whether it is behavioral or contextual targeting, with programmatic ads, you can be sure the message reaches the right people.
• Higher Ad Fill Rates — Letting a software solution deal with the process of ad trading, rather than doing it manually, also results in higher ad fill rates for publishers. By extension, this also brings more ad revenue.
• Real-Time Actionable Data — Another great thing about relying on ad tech is the fact that both publishers and advertisers have access to actionable, real-time data and analytics. With these, they can optimize creatives for better performance and higher revenue.

The Problems With Programmatic Video Advertising

As with any other piece of technology, programmatic advertising comes with its set of pitfalls. Here are some of the biggest concerns publishers have when considering switching over:

• Lack of Control — Letting technology take over invariably means giving up control over the process of buying and selling ad inventory. In other words, advertisers don’t really have a say in where their ads appear. On their end, publishers don’t have control over which ads show up on their websites or players. While there are some parameters advertisers and publishers have control over, they are limited by the policy of the video ad network they’re using.
• Ad Fraud — Lack of control also means a higher risk of ad fraud. Advertisers are at risk of spending funds on bot traffic, rather than real impressions. On the other hand, publishers are at risk of giving away audience data to advertisers who don’t place bets on the auction and pocket the data instead. Luckily, both of these issues are easy to bypass with a reliable ad network that thoroughly vets its demand- and supply-side clients and has the right ad fraud protection tech in place.
• Lower CPMs — Programmatic advertising focuses on quantity. It will bring higher ad fill rates to publishers, but these ads will come at lower CPMs. With enough volume, however, this loss in revenue can be easily offset.

How to Start With Programmatic Video Advertising

Are you a publisher looking to get started with programmatic video advertising? If so, the first thing you need is ad real estate. In other words, you should either have a library of videos that you want to monetize or a platform where you want to serve outstream or in-banner video ads.

If you don’t already have one, you will need an online video platform where you can host, manage, and distribute video content. The best OVPs have reliable, lightweight, low-latency HTML5 players that allow you to distribute content globally. Ideally, this platform should support AVOD or offer easy integration with a programmatic ad platform. 

A reliable ad platform will provide you with access to high-quality ad demand. In other words, it will allow you to connect with a long list of advertisers and DSPs interested in serving video ads on your platform or in your player. 

Lastly, there will be some manual setting-up to do. You need to configure the player to be able to serve ads and implement ad tags. You should also set the floor price (the lowest CPM you are willing to accept per impression). The last step is to embed the video player on your website, track ad performance, and enjoy the ad yield.

Get Into Programmatic Video Advertising the Easy Way

Getting started with programmatic video advertising can seem like a daunting task to beginners. But with Brid.TV, it doesn’t have to be. Brid.TV is an all-in-one video hosting, management, and monetization solution that gives publishers full control over their content from a single video CMS. The platform also comes with its own Marketplace, which provides publishers with high-quality ad demand from sources such as Google ADX.

How to Serve Video Ads Programmatically on Your Website with Brid.TV

Monetizing your video content using ads with Brid.TV is a simple and straightforward process. 

First, log into your account and access the CMS. In the drop-down menu at the top of the screen, choose the site you want to monetize.

Then, navigate to Players and click on the Add Player button. From here, you can customize the player according to your preferences. 

Scroll down to Monetization. There, you will be able to set up your monetization preferences. On the right side of the screen, you will be able to choose among the available ad types. Pick the ad format you want to implement (for example, mid-rolls), and insert the ad tags you received from your ad network. 

The last step is to embed the video player on your website using the embed code or the Brid.TV WordPress plugin.

Ready to Start Monetizing With Brid.TV?

Are you ready to get into programmatic video advertising to boost your monetization efforts? Try Brid.TV for free and see what makes our platform the best choice for publishers.

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