A Video ad server solely serves Video advertising formats. Videos have seen exponential growth in online advertising over the last few years, thanks to the rise in popularity of social media video platforms such as TikTok and YouTube. As a result, and according to Statista, in 2021, digital video advertising spending in the US was estimated at 55.34 billion U.S. dollars and it is projected to increase to 78.5 billion by 2023. If you want to be a part of this growing market, you need to choose the best video ad platform, that is built for performance.

If you are an advertiser focusing on video ads, or if you are a publisher looking to monetize your site with video content, you will find a host of excellent benefits in using EXADS as your video ad serving platform.

How do Video Ads Work?

Video advertising campaigns tend to have a very high conversion rate compared to traditional banners. The main 3 video formats, aside from Video Banners, are Video Sliders, In-Stream, and Outstream formats. The end user journey starts when the target consumer triggers the ad by interacting with a website page, they watch the ad, and are taken to its landing page once they have clicked on the video ad. All EXADS video formats are fully responsive and work across all channels and devices. EXADS video ad formats are fully compliant with the IAB Standards, the Coalition for Better Ads, and Google regulations.

The 3 main video formats:

In-Stream Video (VAST): Pre-roll in-stream ads will show on a publisher’s site inside a video player which the user will most likely watch in full screen mode, because it plays before the video they have chosen to see. Once the video ad starts playing, a ‘skip ad in 5 seconds’ button is shown to end users on the bottom right of the screen, just like Youtube ads. This format has the highest CTR and a very high conversion rate. This format is available with the CPM, CPC and CPV* pricing models.

Outstream Video: This ad is shown to end users while scrolling a website. The publisher can set the timing when the video ad will be displayed on the website. As the user scrolls down the page the ad zone pushes the website content down and the Outstream ad starts being visible to the user. Once 50% of the ad zone is viewable, the video ad plays automatically on mute giving the option to the end user to unmute it. Available on CPC, CPV* and CPM.

Video Slider: Once a website has loaded, the end user will see the ad slide in from the bottom right of the page, which makes this format very eye-catching. Available on CPC, CPV* and CPM.

*What is CPV? The term CPV stands for cost per view, which means that advertisers only pay if the video is watched by an end user after a certain amount of seconds. This model is suitable for campaigns that have a very high CTR but a low View Rate.

The Benefits of Video Advertising

• Highly eye-catching formats: The growth in short video content due to platforms like Instagram, TikTok and sites like Youtube, indicates clearly that consumers prefer video ads. Video formats stand out amongst other site content and they can easily capture the attention of the audience. 
• Extremely engaging: Video ads are highly engaging and great for brand awareness. They allow brands to connect with their audiences through curated content that tells a compelling story about them.
• Metrics booster: Because of their visibility and enhanced engagement, video ad formats offer high CTRs and conversion rates for advertisers and, in turn, high eCPMs for publishers, making ad zones highly profitable. 
• Extra Video features available: EXADS’ video formats come with a range of extra features such as live stream video ads, which have proven to achieve a higher and more positive response from target audiences, and the CTA and Friendly URL Feature, which allows advertisers to add a predetermined CTA on their video ads (In-Stream, Slider and Outstream).
• Fluid Player: You can use Fluid Player to showcase your video content through the EXADS platform. Fluid Player is a free open source HTML 5 video player, highly customizable, compatible with all video formats including streaming files.

Using EXADS as your Video Ad Serving Platform

The EXADS video ad server allows ad networks and publishers to set up any combination of video ad formats. As mentioned above, video ads come in several formats, including video banners (MP4 files, max weight 150KB) and in-video banners (JPG, PNG and GIF files, max weight 150KB), Outstream and Slider (both accepting MP4 files, max weight 50MB), and In-Stream (MPEG-4 files, max weight 51MB). Each format has different technical and creative requirements - Find out about each ad format’s specifications here. 

Here is why you will benefit from setting up your own video ad server using the EXADS platform: 

Fully customizable Video ad server: EXADS ad serving solutions can be branded and fully customized to meet the requirements of your business. Our Video Ad Server is completely scalable to grow alongside your business and it allows you to create unlimited role-based self-serve accounts for your advertisers and publishers. 

VAST & VPAID Support: Our video ad server allows you to integrate seamlessly with all industry standard video players, meaning that you can serve your ads flawlessly on all video ad zones. EXADS offers a deeper industry standard video protocol feature: Video Player Ad Interface Definition (VPAID.) Video Ad-Serving Template (VAST) provides a common ad response format for video players that enables video ads to be served across all compliant video players and it only supports relatively simple in-stream video ad formats that are not executable. These simple ad formats do not provide an interactive user experience, and do not allow the Advertiser to collect detailed information on user interaction.

The ability to layer VPAID onto VAST offers an enhanced solution. VPAID establishes a common communication protocol between video players and ad units that allows a single “executable ad” (one that requires software logic to be executed as part of ad playback) to be displayed in-stream with the Publisher’s video content, in any compliant video player. It enables the executable ad unit to expect and rely upon a common set of functionalities from the video player. VPAID enables the video player to expect and rely upon a common set of functionality from the executable ad unit. Furthermore, the significance is that Advertisers using VPAID ads can provide rich ad experiences for viewers and collect ad playback and interaction details that are just as rich as the ad experience. With the adoption of VPAID, Advertisers have more control over the display experience in their video campaigns. Also, as VPAID compliant video players enable a more diverse and interactive set of video advertising, VPAID compliant Publishers should expect to sell more in-stream video inventory.

24/7 technical support: Our team of technical experts will offer you support and guidance as required. We also provide advanced documentation that is updated regularly and that can be shared with your publishers or advertisers.

Comprehensive financial management: Manage all your video ad server’s invoices and do mass payouts all in one place with EXADS financial management tools - we offer one of the most comprehensive lists of payment options for your clients, with options including SecurionPay, SafeCharge, and Paypal for Advertisers, and Paxum, Webmoney and WireTransfer for Publishers. 

EXADS Video Ad Serving Platform for Publishers

With EXADS, Publishers can set up a Video ad zones quickly and easily. Our self-service platform allows Publishers to set up and enable various video optimization features on their site. Here are some key benefits for Publishers:

Enhanced website content: EXADS self-service video advertising platform allows publishers to easily insert tags or keywords within video ad zones. This attracts advertisers targeting video ad zones for specific verticals. For example if a publisher has a video article about cars, using keywords and tags such as “cars”, “automobiles”, “car dealer”, “second hand cars”, etc., will attract specific ads from advertisers pushing car related offers and it creates a great contextual way for advertisers to bid for the video ad format placed within the publisher site car content. This enhances the end user experience, because the end user has clicked on the car content and is not shown irrelevant ads. This strategy brings extra value to the end user and attracts relevant advertising for the video ad zone which in turn makes the ad zone more valuable to advertisers with car related offers and increases CTRs and eCPMs.

Performance monitoring: EXADS analytics and real-time reporting capabilities allow publishers to monitor the performance of their video ad zones. Our customizable dashboards, filter sets and intelligent data analysis reporting makes it easy for publishers to access and assess their performance KPIs. 

Easy to use: The EXADS self-service interface is extremely user friendly for both beginners and experienced publishers. This is made possible through extensive research performed by our team of User Experience experts who have helped create an intuitive interface.

Brand protection: EXADS offers an automated ad compliance and quality solution for your video ad server that allows you to scan all of your campaigns and ad zones to make sure that there is no malvertising or malicious code hidden within the ad supply chain. This is possible through an integration with AdSecure’s 360-degree monitoring and protection for your ad supply chain, which helps you automate your ad verification process before ad campaigns go live and while they are running. Protecting your network and publishers from malvertising.

EXADS Video Ad Serving Platform for Advertisers

There’s a real opportunity to get creative with video ads, which combined with the automation and management tools of the EXADS platform, allows advertisers to optimize campaigns and drive more conversions:

Tell a compelling story: Video ads offer the possibility for advertisers to further engage with  audiences with creative content with video ads between 15 to 30 seconds long. The video ad formats are great for product demos, reaction videos, testimonials, interviews, step-by-step guides or product/brand stories. Advertisers can create separate campaigns for each video ad format and device promoting different aspects of their service in different styles to test out which one performs best. 

Automation tools available: EXADS platform provides a range of automation and optimization tools to help advertisers save time and generate a higher ROI. For example, The Bidder, which is an automatic bidding optimization tool that works by adjusting the bids for Video ad zones according to how many conversions are received, and blocks those ad zones that don’t convert. Additionally there are a large range of dimensions that can be added to specific rules that advertisers can create to further optimize their bids. EXADS also offers variations and landing page algorithms so that advertisers can funnel traffic to the best performing ad creatives and landing pages, allowing for A/B testing and enhanced campaign performance optimization. 

Analytics features: EXADS customizable dashboards show real-time and historical data for each Video ad campaign enabling a quick analysis of how each campaign is performing, thus allowing immediate optimization decisions.

Testing options: Performance key metrics between In-Stream, Slider and Outstream formats can provide very different results, such as View Ratio, CTR and bidding strategies between Mobile and Desktop devices. This means that there are many possibilities to test, track and adjust as campaigns. 

Conclusion

Whether you are an ad network, an advertiser or a publisher, EXADS white-label ad serving solution has a large range of industry leading features to get your video ad server set up quickly and customized to your needs. Want more information? Get in touch with us to discuss how you can take your video advertising monetization to the next level!