FreeWheel's Video Marketplace Report Highlights Growing Opportunity in Digital Video

By Comcast Advertising InSites Archives
Cover image for  article: FreeWheel's Video Marketplace Report Highlights Growing Opportunity in Digital Video

As the digital video industry continues to mature, advertisers and content owners should be exploring new ways to maximize reach and monetize premium digital video content. That’s the prevailing message in FreeWheel’s recently released 2nd Half 2022 Video Marketplace Report (VMR). FreeWheel’s insights stem from its aggregated data collected through its platform, representing the usage and monetization of professional, rights-managed ad-supported video content across the globe.

The report explores video advertising and audience adoption trends in the United States and Europe, highlighting the continued growth of digital advertising, projected to reach $150B+ in 2024. FAST (Free Ad-Supported Streaming TV) channels are on the rise with viewers (50% of all OTT ad views), offering marketers an opportunity to connect with audiences who are more comfortable with linear-like viewing experiences. Expect programmatic to make linear transactions more akin to digital in 2023, a lure to include more programmatic deals in Upfront buying strategies.

FreeWheel highlights the following key takeaways:

  1. Connected TV (CTV) represents the largest portion of ad views by device in the U.S.
  2. OTT accounts for nearly two-thirds of ad views by distribution platform in the U.S., yet only 20% in Europe.
  3. In the U.S., Free Ad-Supported Streaming TV (FAST) channels account for 50% of OTT views and 30% of total ad views.
  4. In Europe, access to premium content largely occurs through some kind of authentication.
  5. The majority of targeted campaigns in the U.S. are behavior-based at 72%. Meanwhile, the same percentage of campaigns in Europe are demo-based.
  6. Advertisers are buying programmatic through guaranteed deals in both the U.S. and Europe.

One prevailing observation in the report is that viewers are finding content wherever and whenever they want it, as evidenced by +7% YOY ad view growth despite several CTV players (Snap, Roku, YouTube) citing depressed ad revenue expectations and quarterly declines. In Europe, the last few years have seen unprecedented changes in content delivery and consumption as European audiences embraced the new viewing choices offered to them (+13% increase in ad views, continuing its multi-year, double-digit growth). Although audiences are sampling content across distribution options, the large screen experience is still preferred, accounting for 82% of all ad views in the CTV and STB VOD worlds.

Sports Still Driving Live Viewing

Live viewing in the best viewing environments continues to be driven by sports programming. On digital platforms, sports represents a fraction of total ad views but highlights the urgency to deliver the highest quality user experience. European audiences have not quite warmed up to live content (simulcast) on digital devices yet, preferring VOD to access long-form video. FreeWheel points to a new glut in ad-supported content offerings on more streaming channels as a potential pain point for European audiences who are seeking to quickly locate and discover content.

Whether Behavioral or Contextual, Audience Targeting is Advancing

FreeWheel’s report points to a differentiation in targeting techniques on either side of the pond with behavior-based approaches accounting for the lion’s share (72%) of U.S. campaigns, while only 28% in Europe where data compliance rules eschew heavy reliance on cookies and prefer traditional demographic (age/gender) approaches. Contextual targeting is on the rise in both geographies, however, as third-party cookie deprecation is on the horizon.

Programmatic Growth Follows Rapid CTV/FAST Channel Adoption

Nearly a third of U.S. transactions are now happening programmatically (less so in Europe (14%), with guaranteed programmatic deals accounting for slightly more than half of all programmatic deals. The report cites increasing privacy measures as a potential incentive toward a greater share of guaranteed programmatic deals in the near future.

Whether you are a publisher, marketer or viewer, the video marketplace appears to be poised for an abundance of choice. FreeWheel’s distillation of its global transactional database makes it easy to observe the rapid changes as they are occurring across distribution channels, viewing contexts and targeting approaches. For a more in-depth analysis of the newly released FreeWheel Video Marketplace Report for the second half of 2022, visit their website here.

Source: FreeWheel Video Marketplace Report 2H 2022. FAST Channels Redefine Distribution.

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