Events

• Dr. Zhenhui (Jack) Jiang
  Associate Professor
  Department of Information Systems and Analytics
  National University of Singapore

Although video advertising is a popular form of online product marketing, its effectiveness is at times questioned. This is because online users tend to avoid video advertising despite video being an engaging medium. This study investigates how digital platforms can effectively deliver video advertising to engage users in watching online video advertising. In particular, we assess the effects of advertising choice on users’ attention to online video advertising. Through one field experiment and two laboratory experiments, this study finds that compared to normal direct-exposure advertising, choice-based advertising, which prompts users to choose one ad from several advertising options to watch, can significantly increase users’ attention to online video advertising. However, the positive impact of advertising choice on users’ attention disappears when users cannot perceive a meaningful information gap about the content of video advertising. Moreover, our results also show that the superiority of choice-based advertising is more prominent when more information about the content of video advertising is presented in choice options.