March 4, 2008

Hulu Keeping Video Ads Short

Filed under: Advertising, TV — Jose Alvear @ 1:54 am

The CEO of Hulu said that Internet video ads should be short, in order to be effective. Hulu is that new online video venture by NBC and News Corp. that’s trying to take on iTunes and YouTube by bringing TV content to the web.

Speaking at a keynote presentation at the Interactive Advertising Bureau’s last week, Jason Kilar, CEO of Hulu said that advertisers shouldn’t re-purpose the same 30-second TV spots on the Internet.

This isn’t new. I think most new media advertisers know that online video ads should be kept short. I mean, most Internet video content is short (about 2.6 minutes) so it makes sense to have even shorter video ads.

Hulu, of course is going for longer content–30 minute sitcoms and hour-long dramas, for example. So it’s a different universe than what YouTube is working with.

Plus Hulu is still trying to get their advertising and revenue opportunities nailed down while still in beta. Currently, Hulu is testing overlay advertising and short video ads running one ad during a natural commercial break. That’s in line with what other content providers, like ABC.com and NBC.com are already doing with their TV shows online.intreatment.JPG

Interestingly, Kilar said that Hulu isn’t competing with YouTube, since they’re not doing user-generated content. However, YouTube isnt’ all user-generated content. Just last week HBO announced it was putting up entire episodes of its new series, In Treatment, on YouTube for free. Anyone can go on and watch the first five or so episodes of the show or catch up to missed episodes, even if they aren’t HBO subscribers.

It seems like Hollywood is finally getting it. Put your content on the web or people will get it illegally via BitTorrent. They are fully experimenting with this new delivery model: put your content on the Internet, get audiences however you can and see what happens.

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