Joost: Big Advertisers Love It. But Will Users?

ClickZ reports that Joost has signed three-month contracts with a group of 31 big brand advertisers, including Procter & Gamble, Coca-Cola, Nike, General Motors and Visa. It will offer these marketers traditional units such as :30 mid-roll spots as well as unique formats, including a small digital overlay ad. "The foundation is the traditional :30 spot, which we believe is far from dead, served on a mid-roll basis," said David Clark, Joost's EVP of global advertising. "We're inspired by others who seem to be able to make this work, like ABC for example."

JJ:  This is pretty cool.  We are witnessing an Interactive TV medium built from the ground up.  It all sounds good but I  haven't heard how they will get Joost into the living room.

HB:  The bigger question, I think, is whether Joost viewers will be willing to watch 30-second ads.  The Joost environment is already startlingly TV-like (see "Test-Driving Joost"), which is great for traditional TV programmers, but not so great for many Internet users, who don't like to be programmed (and who often watch online videos at work, where transforming the PC into a TV won't go over so well).  The reason "traditional TV spots" aren't common online is not that they don't work--it's that Internet users hate them.  So I think it's premature for Joost fans to commence an end-zone dance.

Comments

[lokiman72]

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