Over the past year or so a number of merchants have launched video creative. Prezzybox, Firebox, I Want One of Those, Buyagift and Red Letter Days spring to mind. Not all have maintained their enthusiasm for video, whilst elsewhere in affiliate marketing video creative seems to have set up residence with the legend that is “mobile internet will be big next year”.

About a year ago Buy.at set up video ads which incorporated affiliate links for Littlewoods. This was a bit of a false dawn but it looks like they’ve reopened the video case. They’ve partnered with Coull, a service which allows you to make any video interactive!

They’ve already launched creative for Haven Holidays…

… and also for Littlewoods

The result is pretty good!

They’re taking TV adverts and applying interactivity to it so the viewer can click on items and then click through to the merchant and make a purchase. They’re an ideal accompaniment to content or as a standalone advert.

The only thing missing is an option to click on the logos for Haven or Littlewoods at the top of the adverts and therefore visit the merchant without viewing the advert. Hopefully this can be added in the future?

I’d love to see this technology rolled out for other merchants. For example Next have a brand new advert (which is very M&S by the way) featuring their new range and a Gwen Stefani soundtrack. This would be a great bit of creative for a fashion blog!

The key issues with video (creative or otherwise) are time and cost coupled with do they convert?

Taking current TV advertising and converting it to this format removes the need for developing specific video, so that should save on costs so what about conversion rates? Although not specifically affiliate related Coull Case Studies are encouraging. Renault “saw a very high view-to-interaction rate” and Agent Provocateur had “engagement rates greater than 50%.”

If affiliates take this creative on board and it proves successful then it may well encourage more networks and merchants to look at video and rescue it from being left on the same shelf as “mobile will be big next year”.

What do you think? Is this the kind of creative you’d use on your blogs and websites?

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