WebProNews

Poor Yahoo.  The company's facing falling stock prices, potential shareholder lawsuits, and all sorts of criticism.  But one unit's doing all right, as Yahoo's video people expect to sell half of its ad inventory in advance.

 Yahoo Video Ad Inventory Moving Fast

Michael Learmonth reports that only 30 percent of the inventory was sold in advance last year, so 50 percent represents a marked improvement.  Although stats don't correspond well to emotions, a PR person could suggest that advertisers are now almost twice as enthusiastic about online video, and they're creating a slight ad shortage as a result.

Even Yahoo's video unit is facing a few open-ended issues, however.  Learmonth notes, "That scarcity doesn't mean that online video revenue is skyrocketing.  In part it means that there aren't that many viewers watching ad-supported video . . . .  And in part it means that advertisers aren't loading up video with ads, [because] they're afraid the ads will drive viewers away."

ABC is testing the limits of this second problem, and Yahoo is surely watching with interest.  Otherwise, they're somewhat stuck with a guess-and-check approach.

We, too, are somewhat stuck; this looks to be another "tune in next year and check the statistics" matter.