While Web video is growing on a daily basis, much of this content is devoid of any monetization, meaning content producers and video sites alike aren’t making any revenue for their efforts. Is this a situation likely to change any time soon?
Over the last few months here on Web TV Wire, we’ve looked at the seemingly never-ending debate as to whether online video can be a profitable business by way of monetization in some depth.
Google and YouTube
Most of this has been regarding YouTube, and Google’s attempts at making some of the $1.65 billion it invested in the video sharing site back by use of advertising.
Google has considered the use of pre-roll and post-roll advertising on videos, but that’s only possible on videos that have been checked for copyright violations – about 4% of the total video content uploaded to YouTube.
We then asked if pre-vetting all videos would help Google’s monetization cause, but argued that bringing this measure in would do more harm than good in terms of user satisfaction and viewer numbers.
TubeMogul – Web Analytics
The question as to how Web video will become profitable rumbles on, but TubeMogul, a Web analytics company that helps video content producers track their videos performance over a number of sites may have the answer.
According to Alley Insider, TubeMogul conducted a survey amongst 12,000 of its members. The respondents gave answers concerning monetization, CPM, and the use of particular advertising methods.
Surprising Results
51% are monetizing their videos, and those that are succeeding report that the average CPM (cost per 1000 video views) paid by an advertiser is a not too shabby at $12.39.
Overlay adverts proved to be the most popular form of advertising used, while 23.4% of respondents claimed to be monetizing on their own rather than with a partner program such as Revver.
Hope For A Viable Business Model
While the data is hardly conclusive, with only 1,114 people responding, the fact that the majority of this number are monetizing is a sign that many certainly see it as a viable business option.
The CPM rate of $12 also shows that those who are doing it are doing it well, which should give hope to those who haven’t yet tried to monetize their video content but are looking to do so in the future.
The question over monetization won’t be answered quickly but by research such as this survey, we can at least start to get a picture of the possibilities for serious money to be made in the future. Whether Google can turn this in to a viable model for YouTube is another matter.
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