• by Daisy Whitney , Op-Ed Contributor, July 6, 2012

Ah, can you smell it in the air? It’s summer partnerships, which can lead to fall mergers!

The online video industry has been all cozy with each other lately (dare I say, there’s some serious dating going on!), and the newest set of partners to cuddle up are real-time ad buying platform TubeMogul and interactive video technology firm Innovid. The just-inked partnership brings Innovid’s interactive ad formats into TubeMogul’s platform, so that TubeMogul clients can include the Innovid ads in their buys, and can also do all the measuring and analyzing of results from one dashboard too. Essentially, the integration lets users compare metrics like engagement and brand lift for their interactive units and other type of video ads in one spot, the companies said.

And that’s a good thing. We’re all trying to do that in our lives in one way or another, whether it’s finding one fabulous over-the-top box that has YouTube, Netflix and Amazon on it, or even moving all our apps onto the home screen of our smartphone. Whatever it is, we want our lives to be easier and our technology to be consolidated.

The consolidation is particularly vital in this deal, TubeMogul said, because comparing formats has been a big headache for marketers. “Now they can look at it in the same place they are looking at brand survey, engagement and Nielsen GRP data, comparing specific audiences and sites across mobile, connected TV, YouTube pre-roll,” said David Burch, TubeMogul’s communications director. “That also means they can buy transparently, knowing exactly where an ad is running and being able to log in at anytime to turn off a specific site that is not performing.”

In addition, Innovid’s ad format is pretty cool and offers marketers a number of innovative ways to add an interactive element, be it a recipe or more info, to an ad.

The deal also speaks to a growing trend in online video – that of partnerships among various online video companies. Earlier this spring, Adap.tv launched its App Center that brings tools from a range of vendors into a one-stop marketplace as well.

Often, these looser deals precede larger ones. You know, the M&A kind. So perhaps this summer of dating will lead to a fall of weddings.