The death of the third-party cookie is drawing nearer by the day, and many advertisers are losing sleep over it. Behavioral targeting has been the bread and butter in digital video advertising for over a decade now, as it allowed advertisers to serve highly relevant ads based on users’ browsing histories. But now that the third-party cookie is on its deathbed, advertisers are looking for alternate solutions for reaching their ideal audiences.
IAB believes that the future of video advertising lies in contextual advertising solutions. Although contextual targeting isn’t new in the advertising world, now might be the perfect time for its comeback. From ad exchanges and SSPs to online video platforms like TargetVideo, many businesses in the video advertising landscape are exploring various contextual video solutions to help publishers and advertisers adapt to these changes.
But what do these solutions entail, and how do they work? In this article, we’ll do a deep dive into contextual advertising with videos, why you should be on the lookout for it, and why we believe it’s the future of the industry.
What Is Contextual Video Advertising
Contextual video advertising is an ad targeting method that relies on video or on-page context to deliver relevant ads to end users. In other words, advertisers using this method can ensure that their ads appear on web pages or videos that are contextually relevant to the ads themselves.
The best way to illustrate this targeting technique is with an example. Let’s say you are an e-commerce store selling kitchen utensils. Using contextual targeting would allow you to serve your video ads on various cooking blogs or recipe tutorial videos. Having your ads show up only on topically relevant websites or content maximizes the odds of them leaving a positive impression.
However, contextual ad targeting is not only beneficial to advertisers. Publishers who implement contextual video solutions on their websites will become more attractive to advertisers. That gives them an edge in the already competitive video advertising market.
How Contextual Video Targeting Solutions Work
There are two primary ways contextual video targeting methods work. The first serves ads based on the context of the video the ad will appear in, while the other serves ads relevant to the context of a web page. Here’s how each of these methods works:
Targeting Based on Video Content
Contextual video solutions that target ads based on video content will analyze the context of a particular video to serve relevant ads. This method is excellent for video-rich websites as it allows publishers to serve ads tailored to the content the users are watching.
However, this method may not be optimal if videos are only a supporting medium for your website. In those cases, targeting ads based on the context of a web page may prove a better option.
But how do publishers analyze the context of a given video? There are two methods most contextual ad targeting solutions use:
1. Using Metadata to Understand Video Context
The easiest and the most intuitive way to understand the context of a video is by relying on its metadata. There are several reasons this method is so commonly used:
- It’s Straightforward to Implement — Implementing this solution is much simpler than trying to incorporate complex AI and algorithms when trying to deduce the basic context of a given video.
- Publishers Have Full Control Over a Video’s Metadata — Unlike with AI algorithms, publishers are the ones who fill in each video’s metadata, giving them full control over this contextual targeting method.
However, using metadata to understand video context does have a few downsides too. One of the most notable ones is that video metadata isn’t always reliable, especially for user-generated content.
Another thing worth mentioning is that, although this technique lets publishers exercise more control, using metadata to analyze video context is less reliable than relying on AI. The reason is that video metadata cannot capture all the contextual nuances that machine learning algorithms can.
2. Using AI to Understand Video Context
Some advanced contextual video advertising solutions rely on AI to interpret a video’s context. There are two primary approaches to this method:
- An algorithm can transform audio into text, analyze it, and infer context from the most prominent keywords in the transcript.
- AI can rely on analyzing images and individual video frames to understand a video’s context.
Although these methods are more consistent and reliable, they are challenging to implement and can be quite costly. However, they’re undoubtedly the best fit for larger publishers with higher budgets.
Targeting Based on Web Page Content
Another popular contextual video targeting method is using the surrounding content on a web page to infer context. This method usually uses various keywords or metadata found on a page to identify its context. The system then matches the overall context to an appropriate advertising vertical to serve relevant ads.
For instance, TargetVideo uses this same technology for its contextual video advertising solution. We use AI to help our system identify a page’s context and match it to the most suitable IAB ad category. Doing that allows our HTML5 player to only serve ads with those specific IAB tags on those specific videos, giving publishers better-targeted ad experiences.
Why Publishers and Advertisers Should Care About Contextual Video Ads Targeting
As we briefly mentioned before, there are many benefits to using a contextual ad targeting solution. Here are just some of the most notable benefits of contextual video for publishers and advertisers:
- Better Ad Relevancy — Contextual video ad targeting allows publishers to serve ads relevant to the content the users’ willingly decided to consume. That means the odds of them interacting and engaging with the ad will be much higher and will provide a better advertising experience overall.
- Better Advertising Experience — Users are less likely to find these ads annoying or intrusive since they are relevant to the content they’re consuming.
- More Control Over Ad Placements — Advertisers have better control over where their ads will show up since they can choose specific verticals to meet various goals.
- Staying on Top of the Competition — With third-party cookies out of the way, publishers and advertisers are left with few options. That is why getting on board with contextual video advertising sooner rather than later can give them the edge over their competitors.
- Higher Ad Revenue — Serving more relevant ads will result in better ad engagement and help publishers increase video ad revenue.
Whether you’re a publisher or advertiser, preparing yourself for the death of the third-party cookie is essential to your business success. That is why you should look to switch to contextual ad targeting as soon as possible.
How Publishers Can Start With Contextual Video Advertising
The easiest way to start with contextual video advertising is to find an online video platform with built-in contextual advertising support. If you’re unsure where to start, TargetVideo can help you.
Our video platform has built-in contextual ad targeting that works by analyzing the context of on-page content surrounding the video and then matching it with the appropriate IAB ad category. This system allows publishers to serve only ads belonging to that specific advertising vertical, resulting in better-targeted ad experiences.
If you’re looking for a reliable contextual video targeting solution with an intuitive video CMS, a lightweight HTML5 player, and various video monetization options (e.g., instream and outstream video ads, ad podding, video header bidding), you’re in the right place.
