Real-time bidding in online video set for massive growth

March 29th, 2012

Real-time bidding (RTB) in online video advertising is seeing a growth explosion and could account for nearly a quarter of the US market within a year, new figures have shown.

RTB for online video has emerged as a major component of online video buys, with bid-based buying and private exchange driven deals serving as the two main buying methods, according to Forrester Consulting, which carried out its research for RTB and online video ad solutions provider SpotXchange.

The study, Online Video RTB Primed for Dramatic Growth, found that RTB in online video advertising is on track to grow from $190 million (£119.5 million) in 2011 to $387 million (£243.5 million) this year. By 2013 the market should expand again to $667 million (£419.8 million), with RTB in online video advertising accounting for 21.8 per cent of all US online video spending.

Central to this dramatic growth is the success of RTB in online display advertising, which has laid the groundwork for RTB in online video, Forrester Consulting said. Buyers familiar with RTB in online display advertising have gone on to adopt RTB for online video as they understand the technology and audience-based buying. Plus, the auction format is helping to bring together buyers and sellers who want to reach the same audience.

"We believe this study provides validation to what we already knew: that RTB will be an extremely strong force of online video spends in the coming years," commented Michael Shehan, president and CEO of SpotXchange. "We are seeing very similar percentage growth in our RTB marketplace."

RTB is the process by which advertisers assign individual value to a particular ad impression by bidding on those impressions in real time in an auction environment.