“Sociable” is the newest commentary on essential social media developments and trends from industry expert Andrew Hutchinson of Social Media Today.
Well, that’s one method to sidestep controversy.
Back in June, ad intelligence provider Adalytics published a report which suggested that around 75% of the ads purchased through Google’s TrueView video campaign offering have been displayed on surfaces that don’t meet the stated standards for TrueView ad placement. Most notably, Adalytics claimed that nearly all of in-stream ads purchased through the choice were eventually served muted and auto-playing “as out-stream video or as obscured video players on independent sites”.
So reasonably than premium in-stream placement, Google, in response to the report, had been serving these ads on lesser display surfaces, increasing overall impressions, but likely producing lesser results.
Google refuted the evaluation, but interestingly, Google has now seemingly taken an unusual step to deal with this, by changing the name of its “in-stream” ad offering to “skippable ads” as a substitute.
As explained by YouTube:
“To more accurately describe the ad format, the YouTube ad format ‘in-stream ads’ is now named ‘skippable ads’ throughout Display & Video 360. There are not any campaign creation or management workflow changes consequently of this naming update, but we recommend ensuring your teams are aware of the brand new names.”
So it’s not even called “in-stream” anymore, so you may’t complain about alternative placement.
Google has further clarified that the name change pertains to all awareness and consideration campaigns in Display and Video 360, with the update being made “to simplify naming conventions between awareness formats”.
Which stands out as the true motivation, nevertheless it does seem interesting that it’s renaming the precise format that was brought into query, in a way that will mean future concerns around the identical can be less valid, provided that it’s not specifically titled “in-stream”
Of course, that doesn’t change the substance of the Adalytics report, which continues to be the topic of a pending class motion lawsuit, and will find yourself costing Google billions in refunds consequently. But it’s an interesting side note, which may even be of relevance to those running TrueView campaigns moving forward.
The updated name also higher aligns with the IAB’s standards on in-stream video formats, which could ensure Google avoids further complications as questions are raised around ad impressions and performance.
So there are reasons beyond the Adalytics report back to update the naming conventions. But still, it could also have an effect in that case, which can have given Google a powerful nudge to make the shift.
Either way, value noting for Google marketers.
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