HACKENSACK, N.J., March 18 /PRNewswire/ -- An inside look at online
advertising from Slingo.com, a top casual game site, reveals some important
lessons for online video advertisers.
If you thought there was a lot of video content online now, you haven't
seen anything yet. More than 154 million Americans will watch online videos
this year. According to eMarketer, that's a 12.1% increase from last year.
But are these online video ads really engaging consumers?
Most advertisers are still experimenting with video advertising and
rightfully so, according to a recent study by Burst Media, which surveyed
more than 2,600 online users in December 2007. Half of the respondents
(50.7%) stop watching an online video once they encounter an in-stream
advertisement. The benefits for watching online video advertising need to
be greater in order to engage viewers and be more successful.
The type of content an online consumer is viewing has a lot to do with
the success of a video campaign, according to Steve Silberberg, head of ad
sales development for the digital interactive entertainment company,
Slingo, Inc. "When video ads are served in front of non-video content, like
an engaging casual game from http://www.slingo.com, the online viewer has a
much bigger stake in the overall experience, because the payoff to the
end-user after the video ad has played is higher."
Online video ads generally do not offer a big enough reward in exchange
for the user's time; most online pre-roll ads are followed by similar
content, video content following video content, that often does have a
strong payoff. For a two-minute video, a thirty-second pre-roll
advertisement is one-fourth of the total experience, which is too much for
most viewers, especially online where everything is so fast-paced. The
potential payoff to the online user needs to be bigger for them to put up
with that level of intrusion. The online medium is very different from
television where viewers are watching half-hour or hour-long shows with an
average advertising pod of four to five minutes on prime time television.
If the payoff is big enough for the user, with more engaging content,
the effectiveness of the ad goes through the roof. Each and every
Slingo.com free game begins after a pre-roll video ad, and more people are
willing to watch it because they know that the free casual game they will
play as soon as the ad is over will truly engage them. The average
Slingo.com game player spends over 10 hours playing free games on
http://www.slingo.com per month. That equates to an average of 100 video
ads every month delivered to a highly targeted engaged audience.
Merry Poppings, the latest free game from http://www.slingo.com that is
preceded by a video ad, is a great example of maximizing the combination of
video ad content with casual game content. This Slingo.com casual game
consists of two play modes, the midway mode and the sideshow mode. In the
midway mode, the casual gamer can play up to 10 levels, where each level of
the popular online game is separated by a pre-roll ad intermission. In the
sideshow mode, a pre-roll ad intermission is broken up into seven-minute
game play intervals. Anyway you play it, from an advertiser's or a casual
gamers' perspective, there's a reward -- to an advertiser, it's engagement;
to a gamer, it's a free game.
The key demographic for online casual gaming is a virtually untapped
market -- women aged 35 to 65. Frank N. Magid Associates, a world leader in
research-based consulting, published findings on the favorite leisure
activities of women in a recent article in Advertising Age. The study
reveals what Slingo.com has known for over 10 years -- that playing free
games online is one of the top leisure activities of women aged 35 to 65,
which is the core demographic of http://www.slingo.com.
According to the Magid study, casual games are the third-favorite
activity of all women. The results are especially revealing when the study
looks at women 55 to 64, in which casual gaming is second only to watching
TV. (Source: National Online Magid Media Futures Survey, March 2007). With
Slingo's ad model of only one video ad at a time, online viewers are
willing to wait and, more importantly, to watch online video ads, as
opposed to watching a TV show where they usually change channels and surf
during a pod of six or seven commercials before their program returns.
Online video advertisers can learn from the casual online gaming
experience with the video ad-engagement-reward model. For more information
about Slingo.com's experience with highly engaging video advertising,
contact Steve Silberberg at steve@slingo.com.
About Slingo, Inc.
Slingo, Inc. is a U.S.-based company that has developed and licensed
the intellectual property for the Slingo(R) brand of games for over 11
years. As a digital interactive entertainment company and thought-leader in
the casual games industry, Slingo, Inc. has successfully licensed to
partners worldwide for use with: free online game sites, downloadable
games, lottery tickets, casino slot machines and table games, a television
game show, interactive television, mobile phone games, and most digital
interactive mediums. The original Slingo game boasts that over three
billion games have been played to date. Slingo is also the first in many
areas, including First cyber lottery ticket and First casual game to be
made into a television game show. Slingo, Inc.'s long list of partners have
included America Online, AC Coin and Slot, IGT, United States Playing Card
Company, Funkitron, Scientific Games Corporation, PixelPlay, Hasbro, Tiger
Electronics, I-play and Oberon-Media. People can play Slingo and more than
30 original games as well as join the social networking community by going
to http://www.slingo.com -- For press inquiries contact bizdev@slingo.com.
This release was issued through eReleases(TM). For more information,
visit http://www.ereleases.com.
SOURCE Slingo, Inc.
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Related links:
http://www.slingo.com
CONTACT:
Steve Silberberg of Slingo, Inc.,
steve@slingo.com or bizdev@slingo.com
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