The future of online advertising revolves around video, the mobile platform and how it’s shared, according to Ben Kiblinger.
But videos are difficult to monetize and expensive. British video advertising firm Coull claims to have a solution, and a small online marketing company in Lompoc was part of the answer.
Coull acquired RevUpNet, a performance-based online marketing company, in April for $2 million. A six-person operation founded by Kiblinger and John Greathouse is now the United Kingdom-based company’s gateway into the U.S. market, Webb Capital CEO Peter Webb said.
“As a result of this acquisition, we are well positioned to build on recent client wins, including Sears, Puma and Under Armour and expect 50 percent of our business to come from the U.S. within the next 12 months,” Webb said in a statement.
“Video is the fastest growing sector within online advertising and Coull is positioned to take a market lead in Europe and the U.S.’’
RevUpNet specializes in affiliate marketing and generated $60 million in online sales for advertisers over the past three years, Kiblinger said.
The company is now advertising Coull’s marketing tools, which allow advertisers to include links to products seen in the video after it’s published.
For instance, when a video blogger uploads a Yosemite trail review, Coull can add product links to the backpack or tent seen in the review, Kiblinger said.
“Coull gives the consumer a more relevant video experience because the ad becomes integrated with the content and it’s offered more as a resource and less of an interruption,” he said.
But Coull was losing money prior to the RevUpNet acquisition and expects to turn a profit in the third quarter of this year, according to its website. It estimates that video advertising will grow 36 percent from 2010 to 2015, resulting in $7.1 billion in revenue. The video-watching demographic has grown 321 percent from 2008 to 2011, according to Coull’s site.
“Video is the fastest growing space and this is the solution for people interested in making video work,” Kiblinger said.
Greathouse said that effective video advertising opens up opportunities for advertisers and publishers.
“We agreed to join forces with Coull because we believe that the company’s ability to provision and publish performance-based video ads unlocks significant latent value for both advertisers and publishers, while enhancing the typical Internet user’s online experience,” he wrote in a Forbes column.
The video marketing company also provides a network of 50,000 affiliates, which allows advertisers to offer affiliate publishers performance-based offers such as pay-per-click sales, Greathouse added.
“It’s one thing to develop the technology and another to bring it to market, and Coull can deliver a lot of value on the technology,” Kiblinger said.
Rob Duva of RingRevenue pointed to Pandora’s video advertising. Pandora’s advertisements are the new 30-second spots that captivate listeners and can be easily monetized, he said.
“The performance marketing space has a huge potential especially now that more folks are moving to the small screen and consuming a lot of content,” Duva said. “But it’s not easy for publishers to create their own video content that advertisers can leverage and RevUpNet and Coull can drive a broader adoption of that technology.”
While Kiblinger initially grew RevUpNet out of his home, the Lompoc firm now has a global platform from which to work. The scalability of Coull’s technology will change the world of online advertising, he said.
“Online advertisers as a group were up an average of 15 percent per year during the recession,” Kiblinger said. “Now we’re looking at a new opportunity and growing at a much faster pace.”
— Noozhawk staff writer Alex Kacik can be reached at akacik@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @NoozhawkBiz, @noozhawk and @NoozhawkNews. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.