Aug 25th 2020
Immersive Video: A Compelling Innovation for In-App Advertising
In the last 5 years, several studies have shown that today, attention span is no more than 6 to 8 seconds. This is especially true with ad creative so making a compelling first impression is key (MediaPost, CNBC, Microsoft Attention Span Study).
No doubt, how to make that initial impression is where the opportunity lies. At Vungle Creative Labs (VCL), we’re powered by creativity, driven by performance — and we’re dedicated to researching and testing various ad creatives to discover how to make in-app creative standout.
Since 2011, we’ve studied the efficacy of video and found it to be one of the most impactful and engaging ad units. We’ve learned that for a video ad to perform well, the time a user spends on the ad and the amount of interactivity is vital to further driving engagement, conversion, uplift, and ultimately scaling.
Immersive video: an introduction
As a result of these learnings, VCL has created a new ad unit called Immersive Video, which allows users to interact and explore within the mobile ad. It makes an immediate impact, captures users’ attention, and can differentiate a Publishers’ game or brand.
Immersive video allows the user to interact with a 10-second looping video and explore deeper inside the environment through gyroscope or directional prompts. This captures the users’ attention in a novel way — all within the crucial 6 to 8-second window ― with a richer experience of the game or product and increasing chances of them engaging with the brand or app.
Imagine that after playing your favorite game, an ad for Call of Duty Mobile —a game that simulates the infantry and combined arms of warfare — appears and it catches your attention. You feel like you’re floating alongside an apache helicopter, just outside the window watching as a lone, sweaty pilot is hunched over the flight controls, his eyes intensely focused on avoiding the oncoming ammunition of his enemy. The helicopter swerves left and right and then you see the earth below you approaching much too quickly.
This is the innovation of immersive video and with the expertise of Vungle Creative Labs, it allows advertisers to showcase their 360-degree video games.
Immersive video also capitalizes on Vungle’s adaptive creative technology that allows the video to be responsive to the user’s device orientation — whether in portrait or landscape — so the experience is optimized automatically for the best visual and audio experience.
Success stories
Over the past year, Vungle Creative Labs has conducted A/B testing of a variety of video features and creatives across our network. Our team has also beta-tested immersive video for a wide range of clients, including brands, gaming, and non-gaming advertisers. This has allowed us to rapidly learn, iterate, and refine the unit along with our ad targeting, ultimately resulting in a final product that greatly performs at scale, adapting to whatever device it is served.
Advertisers are seeing tremendous success with immersive video across a variety of game genres from Match3 games to high-end triple A titles such as Call Of Duty Mobile. Advertisers were able to increase scale by 5x in non-gaming publisher apps when introducing Immersive Video. Another large mobile game publisher, Seriously, had a 30% IPM increase, reaching a record 10 IPM with the introduction of Immersive Video. With Vungle’s immersive video format, regardless of orientation or game mechanic, immersive video allows advertisers to extend an existing experience into new dimensions with strong performance.
Beyond gaming
Gaming clients are a big part of our business and we have seen a huge success to date making beautiful creatives for this sector of the market. Our data, however, has revealed that our immersive video creatives for gaming have also achieved great uplift and success in non-gaming inventory. Mobile developers are increasingly advertising their game’s IP outside of core game mechanics with characters and universes coming together with unique visual storytelling — similar to their PC or console game counterparts. Mobile games are international brands that fit right in with the traditional marquee names found advertising in non-gaming mobile apps.
We see huge potential as we look to extend beyond gaming and we have workflows that can satisfy all of our clients. Vungle Creative Labs produces its own internal asset packs for our clients, allowing us to remix our creatives quickly. Whether we are producing creative for a casual advertiser that needs a high volume of creative to test the finer creative variables, or for a highly-polished brand piece that requires extra care and attention, we have it covered.
Vungle’s vision for an immersive future
We’re already experimenting with our next iteration of immersion that will allow the user to engage in a non-linear, 3D experience, providing even richer interactions and allowing us to create even more immersive experiences, even allowing the user to opt-in to an AR or VR experience. Imagine being able to navigate a 3D helicopter or even being able to place the helicopter in your living room. The possibilities and the boundaries of our imagination are limitless.
