US Digital Video Viewers Aren't Fond of Pre-Roll Ads
52% of respondents would skip a pre-roll ad if presented with one
September 21, 2016
Advertising may be key to the existence of much digital video content, but that doesn’t mean digital video viewers are keen on it. In fact, when presented with a 15- and 30-second pre-roll ad, one in five US digital video viewers will simply close the video and stop watching it, July 2016 research revealed.

Others—roughly a quarter or respondents—will do something either offline or online until the ad is over.
Nielsen and Newlio, a survey optimization platform, commissioned by video analytics company Limbik and video ad tech company, Logobar, surveyed 1,115 US internet users who watch digital video content for more than an hour per week.
A majority of respondents (52%) said they simply skip a pre-roll ad when presented with it. Some said that they let the ad play out, but don’t pay attention to it. They’ll do something else, or mute the ad, until it finishes.

A survey from Limelight Networks also found that most internet users don’t really like video ads. In fact, 26.7% of internet users in the US, the UK, Australia and Canada said that if there was an ad before the video and they couldn’t skip it, they would abandon the video. And, interestingly, another 16.4% said they would abandon any videos with ads running first.
Too many ads in a video can also be a problem. Indeed, roughly two-thirds of respondents said they would abandon digital videos if this was the case.
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