Cars.com was founded in 1998 as a simple car listing service and has since become the most recognized automotive marketplace and a comprehensive buying resource. From expert reviews to maintenance guides, it empowers automotive buyers and sellers with the information they need to make confident decisions.
“We pride ourselves in having so much content,” said Melissa Klauda, Executive Producer. “Video has always been a huge part of that, but it’s grown over the years as more advertisers and visitors expect it.”
In 2009, Cars.com started using Brightcove to power their video library, and they’ve continued to use our product ever since. Not only did they find a video solution that met their immediate needs, they found one that scaled with them as their business grew.
MANAGING AND MONETIZING A MASSIVE VIDEO LIBRARY
Like the vehicles they listed, the content on Cars.com’s website depreciated slowly. Not everyone shops for brand new vehicles, so older content about older cars tends to retain its value. This meant their video library had the potential to grow exponentially, and with it, the need to manage it properly.
They needed a video management system that allowed them to organize their expanding library and publish assets anywhere they wanted—from articles to vehicle detail pages. Once they could manage those assets, then they needed a way to easily monetize them.
As a well-known car listing service, Cars.com’s audience was very valuable to larger automakers. As Melissa recalled, “We wanted to run pre-roll video ads to ensure that we’re providing value to our advertising partners on an OEM level.”
While a number of video platforms offer monetization capabilities, they needed one that included ad placement controls and ad networks with direct selling options.
W
MELISSA KLAUDA
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER, CARS.COM
AUTOMATING VIDEO PUBLISHING AND INTEGRATING WITH AD NETWORKS
Using Brightcove’s IMA plugin, Cars.com is able to sell pre-roll ads directly to their clients through their GAM account. The team can enable ads on a player as easily as they can change the color of the play button.
“We’ve explored other video players,” noted Melissa. “But because of the ad integration and its ease-of-use, we stick with Brightcove.” Furthermore, with access to detailed analytics, they can provide their clients with accurate CPMs and reinforce their value.
To manage their video library, Melissa described how her team leverages Brightcove. “It was as simple as creating our tagging structure, tagging all the videos, and they would go everywhere we wanted them to go within seconds.”
Using Smart Playlists, Melissa’s team assigns tags to playlists so that when they tag new videos, the assets automatically populate in those playlists. Then, they use Brightcove Gallery to publish those playlists in different viewing experiences, like grids or carousels. Thus, with the playlists assigned to the proper sections on the website, videos will literally publish to multiple destinations in seconds by simply adding tags.
DRIVING CUSTOMER ENGAGEMENT AND AD REVENUE
Since partnering with Brightcove, Cars.com has published over 3,000 videos on its website, increasing organic views each month. Better still, the pre-rolls on those videos contribute to their annual digital ad revenue.
In addition to the simplicity of Brightcove’s monetization and video management tools, Melissa appreciates how the analytics help her monitor performance. “The insights and my dashboard are simple. When I’m on other platforms, I have to jump through hoops. With Brightcove, it’s super easy to access and the quality of analytics has continued to improve.”
Besides ease-of-use, nothing is more important in the tech world than reliability, and businesses like Cars.com stay with us for that one simple reason. “W
