For an ad tech industry used to talking so much about “data” these days, it may seem counterintuitive to suggest that there is insufficient data around. But that’s the reality when it comes to video, says one video ad tech exec.
“There’s a paucity of data,” says Irfon Watkins, CEO and co-founder of Coull, a Bristol, UK-based company whose technology mines the content of videos, indexing them for ad targetability.
“(We need) metadata about what the content is… (for instance), is it sport or entertainment? As an industry, we slap ourselves on the back – but we could be doing a lot better.”
In January 2014, Coull helped serve 150m monthly video impressions. This past December, it clocked 15bn and is on track to serve around a billion each day, Watkins says.
The company is currently on a hiring spree, believing technology layered over content always improves the brand safety of online environments.
He was interviewed at Beet.TV’s annual executive retreat by Furious Corp founder Ashley J. Swartz.
The Beet Retreat ’15 was sponsored by AOL and Videology. Please find additional videos from the event here.
