online advertising Online advertising, also known as online marketing, Internet advertising, digital advertising or web advertising, is a form of marketing and advertising which uses the Internet to promote products and services to audiences and platform users. ...

, a companion ad is a display ad shown alongside a

video Video is an electronic medium for the recording, copying, playback, broadcasting, and display of moving visual media. Video was first developed for mechanical television systems, which were quickly replaced by cathode-ray tube (CRT) syst ...

or audio ad, usually displayed on top of the

player Player may refer to: Role or adjective * Player (game), a participant in a game or sport ** Gamer, a player in video and tabletop games ** Athlete, a player in sports ** Player character, a character in a video game or role playing game who ...

and/or on its side. It is displayed at the same time than the master ad and offers the user a spot to click. It can continue to be displayed after the master ad has finished playing. They are called companion ads because they are thought of as a companion to the main video or audio ad Companion ads are seen as giving an advantage to brands because customers will have access to the brand after the video ad ends in the event they gain interest Services like

YouTube YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...

(video ad) or

Spotify Spotify (; ) is a proprietary Swedish audio streaming and media services provider founded on 23 April 2006 by Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon. It is one of the largest music streaming service providers, with over 456 million monthly active us ...

(audio ad) allow advertisers to add companion ads to their master ads. For video ads, as standardized by the

Interactive Advertising Bureau The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) is an American advertising business organization that develops industry standards, conducts research, and provides legal support for the online advertising industry. The organization represents many of th ...

, the companion ad is defined alongside its master ad inside the

VAST Vast or VAST may refer to: * ''Vast'' (novel), a 1998 science fiction novel by Linda Nagata * ''Vast'' (2011 film), a Dutch film, winner of the 2011 Golden Calf for Best Television Drama * Vast Broadband, an American cable and internet compan ...

response. It is characterized by the creative's resolution and type, the file URL and a click-through URL. Companion ads are also used on connected TVs as a new way for brands and advertisers to engage deeper with the TV viewers. In that context, the companion ad is clicked with the remote controller instead of the mouse ( PC) or finger (

mobile Mobile may refer to: Places * Mobile, Alabama, a U.S. port city * Mobile County, Alabama * Mobile, Arizona, a small town near Phoenix, U.S. * Mobile, Newfoundland and Labrador Arts, entertainment, and media Music Groups and labels * Mobile ( ...

). Services like

Roku Roku ( ) is a brand of hardware digital media players manufactured by American company Roku, Inc. They offer access to streaming media content from online services. The first Roku model, developed in collaboration with Netflix, was introduced ...

also support inserting companion ads on TVs through

set-top box A set-top box (STB), also colloquially known as a cable box and historically television decoder, is an information appliance device that generally contains a TV-tuner input and displays output to a television set and an external source of sign ...

es."Roku Advertising Framework overview"
''Roku.com''

References

{{reflist Online advertising methods