Adotube is a new video advertising network that offers publishers a way to monetize their videos by using opt-in, lead generation ads that overlay on top of the video in a (mostly) non-instrusive manner. Similar to LiveRail (which we profiled earlier this month), Adotube ads are opt-in, meaning viewers must click on them before they play. But unlike LiveRail, Adotube does not serve video ads, but instead displays interactive banner ads that are focused on lead generation.
“Our opt-in advertising technology was created for those seeking a simple and effective way to make money online,” said Adotube President Leo Grzhonko in a press release. “We refer to it as the in-stream interactive online video monetizing solution.”
In addition to pre-roll and post-roll banners, Adotube’s main product are their overlayed “roll-over” advertisements. When a video starts, Adotube loads a flash graphic in the lower corner of the video player — either a static button or an animated character. When the viewer rolls his mouse over the graphic, the video pauses and an interactive banner opens over the clip. The banner ad collects information from the user and returns him to the video where it was paused. These ads are aimed at lead generation.
The ad animation will keep playing, even if the user pauses the video, and Adotube ads will continue to cycle until the user views it. Some of these ads could get annoying because of that, but Adotube’s overlay tech could easily be used in conjunction with non-intrusive ad designs.
Adotube says they offer demographic targeting for their ads, but the examples on their page were a bit odd, with targeting options like “first name” — honestly, who can (or wants to) target an ad to a single person? Perhaps I am missing something, but rather than true demographic targeting, their example appeared really to show a way to choose which form fields would be shown on the banner. Certainly helpful, but not actual targeting.
The New York-based company is building a publisher network of sites with at least 200,000 uniques per month, and their software can be plugged into any flash player or load ads on videos pulled from any source (including YouTube, Daily Motion, etc.). A sample Adotube advertisement is embedded below.
