Advertising network
buy.at and online video solutions developer
Coull have joined forces to implement Europe?s first ever combined use of interactive video advertising and affiliate marketing.
Launched today, the new application is available to affiliates on the buy.at network, supported by AOL?s digital advertising business,
Platform-A. It is deployed in the context of an advertising campaign commissioned by
Shop Direct Group, one of the UK?s major online and home shopping retailers, to promote the latest big-brand fashion collections distributed through its LittlewoodDirect.com site.
The video shows models wearing the hottest new designs sold by
LittlewoodDirect. It is interactive in that each product on display is assigned its own tag. This means that customers are never more than one click away from the page specifically dedicated to whatever item of clothing or accessory catches their attention, from where they can immediately access the relevant product page on LittlewoodsDirect.com. The result should be an increased level of consumer engagement - not to mention a higher rate of impulse-buys.
This technology is exploited for maximum effect by its integration with the buy.at marketing network, a platform that runs a combination of SEO and PPC, content, comparison and loyalty site affiliates, and onto which Shop Direct Group consolidated all of its affiliate marketing accounts in January 2008. Affiliate sites earn commission on the basis of the sales they generate by hosting promotional content circulated through the network.
Coull technology takes the system one step further. Full integration of video tags with buy.at?s tracking and campaign analytics ensures that if the LittlewoodsDirect.com promotional video is copied from an affiliate?s site and pasted into another website or a customer?s social network profile, then tracking and reporting functionalities remain embedded. Affiliates can therefore be certain that they will be rewarded for all the activity they generate, even when it is indirect.
Coull chief executive officer Irfon Watkins underlines the new venture?s potential, saying that, ?Interactive video is a powerful tool for enhancing product placement and driving sales online and buy.at is innovating in the affiliate sector by offering it to its network of 9,000 affiliates. Major brands are getting excited about the impact interactive video advertising will make to their online campaigns.?
Research commissioned by buy.at and conducted by e-consultancy.com confirms this prediction, finding that retailers currently spend 19 per cent of their online marketing budget on affiliate marketing, and that 71 per cent of them expect to increase investment in affiliate marketing over next two years.
Disclaimer: Coull are a client of SMP creators Elemental.