Pre-Roll Online Video Ads Work, Break Media Study Shows

The vast majority of online video viewers are watching pre-roll and overlay ads, a study released today by Break Media and Panache shows. Completion rates for 15-second pre-roll ads were 87 percent, and 77 percent viewed campaigns with overlay ads for at least 15 seconds.

Break Media used Break.com's monthly audience of 17 million 18-34-year old men as guinea pigs for the 11-week study, and advertisers Honda, T-Mobile, and truTV ran the test campaigns. The three advertisers chosen represent a cross-section of the different brands on the web, hopefully making the study results relevant to an even broader array of advertisers, Break Media CEO Keith Richman says.

Panache, a video advertising delivery platform, placed the ads and supplied the technology to measure engagement.

The study tested the success of the four standard formats for in-stream video advertising established by the Interactive Advertising Bureau in May: pre-roll, interactive pre-roll, non-overlay ads and overlay ads.

The study demonstrated that all of the ads are effective and have different value for the advertisers, Panache president Steve Robinson says.

--Kelsey Blodget, Associate Producer

Update: Tremor Media announced today that 80 percent of its viewers are completing 15 and 30 second pre-roll ads. Michael Learmonth at SAI just published a post analyzing the numbers from both studies.