• by Gavin O'Malley  @mp_gavin, June 21, 2012

Facing stiff competition, online video ad networks are introducing new products and services faster than marketers can make sense of them.

Adap.tv is expected to debut a new tool on Thursday, designed to give buyers greater visibility into campaign results -- before running a single impression.

Called the Campaign Optimizer, the predictive technology uses historical data to analyze billions of impressions. Once buyers set their desired performance goals, the system returns the real-time price and inventory availability needed to achieve them. It is set to hit the market next month.

Toby Gabriner, president of Adap.tv, said the service takes the mystery out of planning online video ad campaigns. “Buyers need to see and understand the outcome of their campaigns in order to make intelligent decisions,” he said.

According to internal data, the new product works. Indeed, in a recent study, Adap.tv analyzed campaigns over a three-month period and found that on average, optimized campaigns delivered 30% higher completion rates, and 21% lower cost-per-completed-view (CPCV) than those not using the Campaign Optimizer.

But don’t take his word for it, said Gabriner. He is encouraging dubious buyers to adjust their performance goals for specific ads -- such as completion rate and level of distribution on preferred sites -- and see the impact on their campaigns.

By 2016, domestic digital video ad spending will explode by over 250%, from $2 billion in 2011 to $5.4 billion, Forrester predicts. The potential sums explain why Adap.tv -- along with Tremor Video, YuMe, and other video ad networks -- are so concerned with buyers’ needs.

On the back end, Adap.tv technology is automatically allocating inventory, which it believes will efficiently achieve buyers’ pre-set goals.