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December 18, 2005
Monetizing Video Podcasts, Washington Post style
I see that the recent video podcasts at Washingtonpost.com want to be monetized with video advertising. For the next month, they signed up EarthLink as a sponsor.
Here is how it will work. Viewers see a video slide telling them the Washingtonpost.com video will play after a commercial message. Then a 15-second ad plays, followed by the content. People can see the video podcasts either on their Video iPods, or on the Web.
I will classify this as another ‘build it and [hopefully] they will come’ exercise. Here are the problems that will keep this monetization experiment small.
So far, there's no way to dynamically insert ads into video podcasts, so ads are actually part of the overall video file. This means the ads will still be associated with the video even if someone views the content years from now.
It's also technically impossible to measure actual viewership, though publishers can determine how many people downloaded the video file. Washingtonpost.com wouldn't reveal the size of the audience for its video podcasting service, but it's presumably quite small.
Dynamic ad insersion and verification are two vital components of a healthy, large-scale ad model. Both television and online advertising could not exist without them.
The companies didn't provide details of the financial aspects of the deal, but said it was priced on a flat fee basis. MediaVest negotiated the buy on behalf of EarthLink.
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