• Reuters, Wednesday, August 23, 2006 12:45 PM

Marketers have a new venue to place video ads, one that attracts millions of viewers daily:YouTube. The online video-sharing company says it will offer video brand advertising on its site to complement the minimalist text and small graphical online banner ads, promotions and sponsorships. In addition to video ads, YouTube is offering advertisers two other advertising options. One is called Brand Channels, in which advertisers will be allowed to customize the channels and create subscriptions so viewers are alerted whenever a new video is added. Another option is the Participatory Video Ad, in which a user-initiated video advertisement allows consumers to rate, share, comment and embed advertising content they find interesting on their own pages. The company says the new business models were the first of a new range of ad types which will be rolled out over the coming year. Industry watchers say the moves are part of YouTube's efforts to find ways to convert its soaring popularity into revenue.The site currently serves an average of more than 100 million video showings daily and has nearly one-third of the U.S. Web video audience, twice that of rival MySpace and three times that of Google Inc.

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