Google ropes in Sony, Warner for advertising initiative

Google ropes in Sony, Warner for advertising initiative

MUMBAI: Google ropes in two major music labels Sony BMG Music Entertainment and Warner Music Group to expand testing video advertising system.

Google's AdSense online ad system plans to distribute advertising alongside videos by working with two major music labels to embed video ads on web sites in a four week test which is already underway.

"Over the past few months, we have run tests to figure out how we work with our partners and advertisers to combine high quality video content with ads and then distribute them (over) the Google AdSense network," Google said in statement.

Earlier Google had explored a similar trial of Google's video advertising system with Viacom's MTV Networks, which provided music videos to run on a select number of web sites running Google ads.

As part of the test, advertisements would be billed on a cost per thousand impressions (CPM) model, the traditional billing method for mass market advertising as opposed to the pay-per-click billing model Google popularized with text ads.

Google has been pushing ahead in recent months to expand beyond its hugely successful text-advertising system into new advertising formats including video, radio and mobile phones.

The Google advertising system splits the resulting revenue three ways to the video content owner, the web site publisher and Google. However, the exact revenue splits were not disclosed by Google.

"It's the same model that was used for the CD and DVD, universal compatibility, and we think it's the principal thing holding back the growth of digital today," he told Reuters.
EMI Music head of digital Barney Wragg talking to Reuters said that digital was revolutionizing the way they work.