The Internet Advertising Bureau just released their 2006 report. Here are a couple of interesting findings from the report:

• Online advertising revenue is up 35% over 2005.

• For the third consecutive year, online advertising revenue has posted record results.

Read the full report here.

In a previous post, I talked about engaging consumers with your ad versus trying to drive click-throughs. While it’s been proven that people like to explore and interact with ads much more than they like to click-through, sometimes it just helps to see things for yourself. The examples below are proof of how enticing rich media can be.

This one is pretty amazing; it has six different videos in an expanding banner. Imagine six of your videos in creative like this?

It’s got to be difficult to convince people to click-through to a toothbrush site. This ad brings the product alive when users rollover “Product Features.” The same thing could be done with your product.

The conventional way to get a video ad in front of online users is through video pre-roll. Video within a banner allows you to use video throughout an entire site. This Mac ad is a great example of video in a banner.

The real beauty of rich media is the ability to have users interact with your creative. It’s a powerful concept and one that has been proven to be very effective with online users. Let us know if you have any questions on how you can get rich media ads build for your brand.

Journalists love to break stories before their competition, so we’re proud of being the first to cover the Leatt neck brace. Getting a scoop about a big sponsor change is great, but it doesn’t compare with helping to put a truly life-saving product on the map.

Vital MX’s Content Director, Steve Giberson, has always had an interest in advancing motocross safety (maybe because he crashes so much?), so he was intrigued when he first came across the Leatt brace. With a handful of former pros now confined to wheelchairs due to riding accidents, Steve was hopeful about what the Leatt brace could mean for current riders. His review back in November, 2006, was the first time most people heard about it. Then in February, Steve filmed and posted to Vital MX a video with motocross legend David Bailey in which Bailey implored other riders to try out the Leatt brace. For those who don’t know Bailey’s background, he has spent the last twenty years in a wheelchair after suffering a career-ending riding accident.

That video set off a landslide. In an editorial he wrote about the video, Racer X Editor Davey Coombs said that it “pretty much stopped the busy supercross world in its tracks.” Motocross Action transcribed the video and printed the text in their magazine. Message boards were on fire with discussion about the video and the Leatt brace. Less than one week after we posted the video, top pros and amateurs who had never before worn neck braces were using the Leatt brace in competition.

The effect on Leatt, a small South African startup, was huge. On February 8, the day before we posted the Bailey video, their stock price was at $.14 per share. By February 20, their stock had more than quadrupled to $.60. Their stock has since settled in around $.45, giving the company a market value of around $50 million (US). Show this stock chart to your CFO if you need more budget for online marketing!

Perhaps most significant is how quickly and effectively consumers were able to learn about this groundbreaking product, and the positive impact this has had. Consider the post I saw on a regional motocross message board. It’s from a father writing about his son who crashed while using the Leatt brace:

“This video is the reason #475 and his brother #473 started wearing the Leatt Neck Brace.”¦ Due to the severe fracture on Garet’s L7, his neurologist could not believe he did not have neck injuries, knowing that he had to land on the top of his head to sustain the fractures that he did. I took the brace to the hospital last night and Georgeann showed it to the doctor and he confirmed the fact AGAIN that if Garet had not had the Leatt Neck Brace on he would have definitely broken his neck, no question.”

Being able to hear and see Bailey’s plea on video the day it was filmed gave it an urgency and impact that would not have been possible with traditional print media. We’re proud to have broken this story and put the spotlight on a product that makes motocross a safer sport.

Mike posted a Jeremy Reeves interview and photo gallery on Vital Skate today.

When asked about skateboarding web sites, Jeremy had a great quote: “It’s great, it keeps skating alive. It gets people hooked because of the constant updates and news. It’s way more efficient than magazines in that department.”

Take a look at the interview and the photo gallery.

Since the dawn of Internet advertising, click-throughs have been the standard metric by which marketers gauge their ads’ effectiveness. Driving people to their website was often the goal of their ad campaign, so click-throughs were the logical measure. Now, as high-speed Internet connections have become mainstream, rich media ads are emerging as the standard and the objective is often not click-throughs.

“Rich media” is a broad term, but it typically refers to ads that allow for user interaction and have advanced features, such as video, sound, the ability to expand in size, games, etc. Rich media ads allow you to bring a small part of your site directly to the consumer. The idea is to engage users within your ad, rather than just using the ad as a hook to get them to your site.

This makes perfect sense if you think about how people surf the Internet. There is a certain commitment level — however small — to clicking an ad and being taken to a new site. Even if an ad looks interesting, many people will not want to get sidetracked by clicking on it. Ads that can expand or play video are very effective because they allow interaction with minimal commitment or delay. Not surprisingly, the user interaction rates on rich media ads blow away click-through rates on conventional ads — 5% compared to 1%. That’s a whopping 500% difference in measurable response!

Whether it’s because it’s fun for users to interact, or because it’s less of a commitment than clicking, it’s undeniable that rich media ads are more effective at engaging consumers and driving higher response rates.

Check out these great examples of rich media ads:

As soon as you rollover this Sin City video ad, the sounds comes on. This ad is simple and hugely effective.

Movie studios know more people will see a trailer if they’re played within a banner, rather than expect users to click-through to a different web site.