Gasta Video News:

Online TV viewing doubles in past year

The number of Britons viewing TV online has more than doubled in the last 12 months, according to Ofcom.
The regulator’s annual UK Communications Market Report found the number of people watching TV programmes online grew from 8% to 17%, and nearly a third of internet
The number of UK internet users who watched YouTube hit 9m in April, nearly 50% more than a year ago, while the BBC iPlayer delivered more than 700,000 daily video streams in May 2008.

The number of households with digital video recorders grew 53% in 2007 to nearly 6m (23%) and the majority (88%) use them to fast-forward through ads.
The findings were in line with increased online ad spend, which, according to Ofcom, grew to £2.8bn in 2007, attracting more money than the combined ad spend on ITV1, Channel 4, Five and S4C. Take-up of broadband through a landline grew from 52% of households to 58% in 12 months.

This was mainly driven by consumers upgrading from dial-up to broadband.
More than one in ten mobile phone users have accessed the internet on their phone and 3G mobile connections increased by 4.7m (60%) in 2007 to reach 12.5m subscribers.

According to the Ofcom report, the average UK adult spent seven hours nine minutes a day using various communications services, six minutes more than in 2002. This includes radio listening, TV viewing, time spent online, texting or talking on the telephone.

Gasta Advetising set to grow

Find the online opportunities in your own backyard: Gasta.com

Billions of local ad dollars will be moving online in coming years. Find out which outlets offer the best potential returns.

These days, the advertising community is focusing its attention on how to create ads for online media -- including video, rich media, Flash, etc. -- and the revenue potential associated with these channels. However, a less-often-asked but vitally important question in terms of industry shift, as well as dollars and cents, is this: Where will these ads be placed?

Industry estimates suggest that mobile advertising will reach nearly $10 billion in the next few years, with online video reaching nearly $3 billion. However, advertising at the local market level -- although not as frequently discussed -- has the potential for even bigger numbers and greater growth. What's more, local advertising isn't at odds with mobile and online video, as many assume. Rather, rich media and geotargeted place-based mobile advertising are likely to be big components of that local online ad spend. Within the context of the changing media landscape, local online advertising represents a massive opportunity that is coming into its own -- and bears more attention from the advertising community.

Tip O'Neill once said, "All politics is local." And while that's not quite true of advertising, it does resonate when assessing this new shift into hyper-local marketing and advertising. According to eMarketer, $97 billion of the $157 billion -- more than 60 percent -- of the advertising market in the U.S. is focused on local. The online portion of that has thus far lagged behind the other advertising channels, with only about $2.1 billion -- 2 percent -- of local advertising being online at the end of 2007. However, that number is expected to more than triple over the next four years to more than $7.8 billion. That's a huge movement of dollars shifting toward reaching local audiences online.

But where are these dollars going to end up?

Although traditional local media -- Yellow Pages, newspapers, radio and broadcast television -- all have an online presence, none of them enjoys the dominance on the web that they do in their "home markets." Yet their audiences are moving online at faster and faster rates, resulting in major drop-offs in print subscriptions to newspapers, broadcast TV audiences, terrestrial radio listenership and Yellow Pages customers.

For example, the Kelsey Group recently found the erosion of print Yellow Pages is going to increase from 2-3 percent to more than 10 percent this year. That's a pretty massive decrease year over year. And even the Yellow Pages Marketing Association concedes that although online usage of Yellow Pages is growing, a 10 percent drop in print usage dwarfs the increase in online searches. Newspapers are in a similar boat with their advertising; online ad sales are climbing, but offline usage declines are taking a larger chunk of ad sales away from the industry as a whole.

And yet, projections show online ad sales more than tripling -- and there has to be a place for all that advertising to land, outside of the traditional media's online presences mentioned above.

With Google, Yahoo and online Yellow Pages growing their audiences, there is certainly going to be growth in local business searches. But what about brand advertising and trying to reach people who are migrating away from traditional television, radio and newspaper outlets for their news?

The numbers are a little grim. There are about 1,400 daily newspapers and 7,000 television and radio stations in the U.S., and back-of-the-envelope math shows that they each produce about three to six stories per day, or about 22,000 local stories for the entire U.S. This for an audience of roughly 20,000 individual cities and towns. All these players used to be able to back up their locally produced content with national stories, thereby providing a full news experience for their viewers or readers. But, the internet has changed all that; people get their national news from national sources. Instead of competing with other local newspapers, papers are competing with every news site that has a web page. Given this fragmentation, local news sites are not maintaining their market share.

So what's going to take up the slack?

Well, nature abhors a vacuum. Thus, amateur, user-generated content and commentaries are taking off in local markets. The internet's solution to the dearth of local news coverage is the same as it has been with other problems of scale: let the people build it themselves. Similar to Wikipedia, the Open Directory and Usenet, truly local content is going to be provided by the people who live there.

In looking at sites like MetroBlogs, Gothamist publications, Outside.in, NowPublic, Baristanet and Topix (the site that I run), it becomes apparent that a massive amount of attention and investment has been paid to giving people a platform for engagement with the places they live. And while social networks (based on who you know) like Facebook, LinkedIn and MySpace have generated a lot of usage, and even more buzz, none of them has really provided a locally contextual venue. You are unlikely to meet the neighbors who live two blocks away via Facebook or LinkedIn. However, when that same family starts blogging about your neighborhood or commenting on something another neighbor wrote, it's a compelling discussion -- one that you're likely to read and possibly even join.

Given the aforementioned advertising growth and the decline of the traditional places for it to go, user-generated content is where the action is going to be. The local online outlets that make the most sense for a given campaign will vary greatly depending on where you live and who you're trying to reach with your advertising. But the potential audience size available through these channels is impressive. Speaking for Topix, we've seen comment rates go from around 30,000 comments a day in the middle of 2007 to more than 140,000 comments a day -- or more than 3.5 million comments a month -- across more than 20,000 cities and towns within the U.S.

Media consumption and local audiences' preferences are shifting. Advertising is going to shift as well. So along with that cool viral video and mobile campaign, consider how you can make the most of region-specific opportunities as the $97 billion gorilla of locally targeted ad dollars spent in the U.S. starts to move online.

Chris Tolles is CEO of Topix

Gasta Ad Network

Does your ad network make the grade?

With an explosion in the number of ad networks over the last 18 months, it has become increasingly difficult for agencies and clients to identify which network is their best long-term marketing partner -- the network that can deliver a brand's objectives year in, year out.

It will come as no surprise that I believe in the value that a strong network can provide a brand, but the operative word in that sentence is "strong." Ad networks are emphatically not interchangeable, and the business relationships you create in this sector can make a big difference in how well you exceed your business objectives.

As one of the pioneers in this space, I have seen a lot of brands and networks work together over the years. That experience has led me to conclude that there are nine key considerations that should be used to determine what ad networks a planner should choose to have as part of their marketing plans. In my experience, these factors are relevant to both the "vertical" ad network sector, as well as the "horizontal" or general market sector:

Take a look at your ad networks checklist.

Site quality and transparency

• Site quality: Some ad networks truly represent the best sites online. Some mostly sell junk. In my view, the quality of content has both qualitative and quantitative benefits for a brand. On the quant side, sites with better content hold viewer eyes longer on each page, and that enduring exposure makes it far more likely that a user will notice an ad, interact with it and process its message. Qualitatively, there is evidence that the strength of content surrounding an ad can have an impact on brand perceptions. Quality content gives a brand increased credibility; in the vertical sector, having ads placed in quality content can also demonstrate brand support of a user's interest areas.

• Transparent site lists: There appear to be three kinds of site lists out there now: 100 percent transparent, ersatz transparent and "black box." The first and third categories are self-explanatory, while the second refers to networks that are willing to provide some "example" sites, but not the entire list. Although our network does share its entire site list, I don't believe that is an essential consideration for an advertiser. This is because the sites not on your plan have no bearing on your brand, but the sites on your plan do have a profound bearing on your brand. You deserve to know where your ads are running -- all of your ads.

Reach and targeting

• Reach: You don't need to go with the biggest network, but focus your major network spending on players with large numbers of your users/prospects, for practical reasons. Digital planning, buying and reporting are complex enough without having to deal with 25 networks for every buy. By choosing a mix of larger vertical networks and a leading horizontal or two, you can simplify your efforts considerably.

Targeting options: Whether or not you are currently using advanced targeting approaches, having access to some of the methodologies can be a boon for a planner. Behavioural, retargeting and audience segmentation will likely be a part of your future plans, and creating working relationships with highly capable networks can make capitalizing on these technologies easier and more productive in the future.

Cross-platform and growth

Cross-platform opportunities: Just when most marketers are becoming reasonably comfortable with online ads, the media environment has begun to diversify across digital media platforms in a big way. While vehicles like mobile, gaming, social media and widgets aren't new, they are all rapidly reaching a critical mass state that makes ignoring them shortsighted. Some networks have already recognized this glacial change and can offer you entrée into such platforms as part of your standard buys. You would do well to consider these networks more carefully, as they can help guide your efforts through our dramatically changing media environment.

Growth trends: Networks and sites that are growing make under-delivery less likely and ensure that your ads appear in highly involving content. Additionally, when more and more sites are joining a network, you can be assured that they are offering a quality marketing environment.

Exclusive sites and reporting

Exclusive site representation agreements: The polar extremes of the network business are "leftover" networks that sell remnant inventory versus "exclusive" networks that are the outsourced sales arms of publishers. Naturally, most networks fall somewhere in between. But particularly in the "vertical" side of the business, working with networks that are the exclusive sales agents of at least some of their sites provides assurance that they have unique understanding of that vertical, and can provide value-add insights that help make your efforts more efficacious.

Reporting capabilities: If you think about how much time your team spends futzing with spreadsheets, it'll be immediately apparent why working with partners that offer strong reporting should be high on your list of considerations. Depending on your reporting approach, they should either offer strong standalone systems or a way to easily integrate data into existing reporting platforms like DFP. Good reporting also makes real optimization possible -- and to actually optimize, you need to free up hours that would otherwise be spent cursing at Microsoft Excel files.

The people: Before you sign with a network, think about the person who will be serving your account? Is he/she responsive? Proactive? Smart? Do they answer your call promptly? Do they really listen to what you want and need? Great networks can be murder to deal with if your salesperson is lousy. Do yourself a favour and skip the networks that have teams that create problems instead of solutions.

Nine simple considerations -- none of them rocket science -- but each of them an important way to filter the 300 or so networks out there down to a manageable short list. If you choose correctly, you will benefit from long-term relationships that really help build your success.

I hope this brief list of considerations helps you find exactly the right ad network for your future efforts

Robert Tas Sportgenic.