• by Daisy Whitney , Op-Ed Contributor, November 26, 2012

All is right with the online video ad world again. After a few months of declining ad views, the number of video ads watched in October hit nearly 11 billion , according to comScore’s recently-released monthly figures.

That 10.9 billion video ad view count is a 16% boost from the 9.4 billion video ads served in September , and up about 45% from the 7.5 billion video ads a year ago. Also, the number of ads viewed has returned to previous highs reached  in the late spring when June delivered 11 billion video ads. Since then, the number of ads viewed had slipped, due in part to the slowdown in online TV viewing in the summer months.  Even so, it took longer than expected into the fall TV season for the ads viewed to catch up.

In a promising note for the industry, the ads are spread widely across a range of properties, with ad network BrightRoll claiming the top spot in October with more than 1.8 billion video ads, followed by Google sites with more than 1.7 billion, and Hulu with 1.5 billion. This was the first time in several months when Google-owned sites didn’t command the top notch for most ads served.

But the slip in ranking shouldn’t be construed that YouTube is losing ground. Rather, it’s evidence that online video advertising is broadening and reaching deeper into more sites, due to the growth of ad networks. ComScore said BrightRoll’s video ads reached nearly half the total U.S. population.

ComScore also reported in October that 86 percent of the U.S. Internet audience viewed online video, the length of the average video watched was 6.1 minutes, while the average ad length was less than 30 seconds. Video ads comprised 22.6% of all videos viewed, but only 1.6% of minutes spend viewing online video ads. Hulu still claims the most impressive ad load with a frequency of 59 videos ads per viewer, compared to Google-owned sites with 19.