Bigger Isn’t Always Better

Bigger is better is the zeitgeist when it comes to display advertising. Efforts by large Web publishers to experiment with larger display formats are in full swing as they strive to grab more brand advertising dollars from TV and traditional media.

But does size really matter? In an attempt to answer that question, Web measurement firm Compete recently conducted a study that compared Kohl’s ads of different standard sizes that ran April 24 on the home pages of MSN and AOL. MSN ran the familiar 250 x 300 medium rectangle, and AOL ran a 300 x 600 half-page skyscraper.

Both ran on the right side of the page and featured the same creative showing a reduced-price blender and storewide touting of savings and free shipping. As might be expected, the more attention-grabbing skyscraper ad drew 30% more click-throughs per session (1.5% vs. 1.2%).

But the smaller unit was more effective in driving people toward sales—with 8.3% of those who clicked through to Kohls.com filling up a shopping cart, compared to 6.6% for the larger ad—a 26% better conversion rate. Consumers who clicked on the smaller ad also averaged more time on the landing page (8.9 minutes versus 7.5 minutes).

Middle-Agers Help Hulu Grow 490%

Though YouTube continues to rank as the #1 video web brand in the US, with 5.5 billion total streams in April, Hulu ranks #2 as it continues on a steep growth trajectory, increasing 490% in total streams year-over-year (YoY), from 63.2 million in April 2008 to 373.3 million in April 2009, according to data from Nielsen Online (PDF link).

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The Nielsen analysis also found that the time spent viewing per viewer in April 2009 has grown 29% in the past six months among people ages 35-49, making it the fastest growing group in terms of time spent viewing per viewer. This growth is 13 percentage points higher than the growth of time spent viewing per viewer for the overall market, which increased 16% over the same 6-month period, Nielsen said.

Google Still #1; MSN Shopping Search Grows 615%

The total number of US searches in April 2009 increased 4.4% year-over-year, with Google Search firmly holding the #1 search-provider spot when ranked by total searches, according to Nielsen Online (PDF link), which said Google captured 5.5 billion total searches, or 64% of all search queries conducted during the month.

Yahoo Search ranked #2, but declined 2.8% YoY. MSN/Windows Live was #3.

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Searches on shopping-specific engines only comprise between one and two percent of total search activity, but MSN/Windows Live Search saw a 615% increase in total visitors and was the fastest growing shopping search provider in April. This increase is, in part, because of the popular and well-received Live Search Cashback program, in which the Microsoft promises to pay consumers back for purchasing products their search engine helped find.

The IAB Sets Some Standards For Social Ads

Before the advent of ad standards from the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), the online advertising world was fragmented between any number of display formats. When the IAB launched IAB standards in 1996, an agency could buy media across numerous properties without adjusting the creative.

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Today, the IAB has once again stepped in to help bring clear standards to online advertising with a new set of best practices for social media advertising. It’s a welcome change because advertising has been far behind the consumer space with respect to implementing the kinds of social functionality that has made social media properties like Twitter, MySpace and Facebook so popular.

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The standards were developed as part of a 151-company committee with 218 members (yup, that was fun) including MySpace, Microsoft, Google, Facebook, SocialMedia.com, CBS, Accenture, PriceWaterhouseCoopers LLC, Condé Nast Digital, IDG Entertainment, and Nielsen Online. You can see one of the many example ads above, and the entire document embedded below.