YouTube users can pick their poison with ads

YouTube said Monday users can choose whether to watch an advertisement at the beginning of a video or to watch a few ads as their video plays.

The Web's largest video site will give users a chance to choose when to watch their ads as part of a test. Those who choose to watch an ad at the outset, what YouTube calls the "promoted video," will get to choose between ads.

Hand it to Google, the company continues to try to find the kind of Web video ads that please advertisers but don't alienate viewers. It's tricky. The process can sometimes be painful for both company and users. For instance, some of the ads that have appeared lately at the bottom of YouTube videos obscure much of the lower half of the frame.

What's the use of clicking on the video if I can't see it? YouTube's got to pay the bills somehow, but I'm glad they're looking for less annoying ways to advertise to viewers.

"We are constantly testing a wide range of options to find the right advertising format for the right content on YouTube," the company said on its blog. "We think giving users a say in the process helps our efforts."

(Credit: YouTube)

[karpenterskids]

Hulu has offered users (from time to time anyways) the option to choose between watching a long ad at the beginning, or shorter ones as the video plays, for quite some time.


Just thought it's worth mentioning.

[Michichael]

Wow. Touting a feature that it's competitors have had for months as innovation and new? This isn't very Google-like.

<Sarcasm>They're taking a page out of Apple's playbook. </sarcasm>

[Belinus]

Time to stop using YouTube if they're gonna be forcing ads on us. I don't blame them for wanting to monetize it in some way, but did they ever stop to think one of the reasons YouTube is so popular is because it is ad-free?

[Michichael]

*was

[Brian]

The only YouTube videos that are ad-free are from the users that have not been promoted to partnership.

[pjscullion]

Hulu seemed to do this for certain advertisers. For example, the XO-laptop commercial with the adorable little African boy never offered this option, but the Honda Odyssey commercial did.

IMHO, I find the longer ads before the video to be the way to go. I am a has-been pirate (yarrrr, let's go plunder Sweden for booty!) and TiVo addict, yet I'm still willing to sit through a minute-long ad so that I can watch my Family Guy episodes hassle-free. And by "willing to sit through a minute-long ad", I (of course) mean "Get food/beer/check Facebook/read e-mail while the ad passes."

[Michichael]

Pretty much. Advertising, at least to me, is a dying industry in a society that doesn't even retain them. It really needs to rethink the way it works - instead of forcing itself on the consumer. That usually just makes it discarded in memory all the faster.

[Brian]

Ads have always meant 'bathroom break' for me.

Advertisers simply don't understand.

[jessiethe3rd]

This is going to open the market up to other options. I had ads in youtube videos. This is your life with Google... one... long... ad. This is how Google makes its money - being force more advertisement into your life... No place to hide... to place to run.

[Burnsie001]

Don't watch Youtube anyway since it requires Flash player to be installed and that is such a horrible product from the consumers view tha tI just won't install it..

[donyazyd]

I thak you for this fantyfabeluos site

[TheMarketingIntern]

At least YouTube is trying, but this concept STILL delays my access to video content. Someone has to come up with a better solution. I want my content 1) free, 2) uninterrupted, and 3) immediate. What about that is so difficult to understand? Why can't we monetize web video without violating any of these?