Google Inc., the Internet search engine that made its fortune from selling small text ads beside search results, is branching out into video to attract larger clients.
Video ads will appear on websites that subscribe to Google’s AdSense advertising program. Advertisers can pay based on how many people see the ad, or how many users actually click through to the target website, said Gokul Rajaram, a Google product manager.
With video ads, Google is targeting clients that have traditionally turned to Yahoo Inc. and Microsoft Corp. to promote their brands on the Web. The market for online video ads in the U.S. will almost triple to $640 million in 2007, according to researcher EMarketer Inc. Yahoo, the most visited U.S. website, and Microsoft’s MSN already sell video ads on their sites.
