Ad Specifications CONTENTS

Transcription

1 CONTENTS Key Specifications 2 Available Placements and Approved Third Party Ad Servers 3 Rich Media 4 Polite Download / In-Unit Video 4 Expandable 4 Floating to Ad Unit 5 Homepage 6 Infopane 6 Textlinks 6 In-Stream Video (Pre-Roll) 7 Innovid Video Overlay 9 Content Integration 10 Data Reported 11 Creative SLA and Late Creative Policy 11 Flash Guidelines / clicktag Format 11 Third Party Ad Servers 12 Rich Media Submission Guidelines 13 1

2 KEY SPECIFICATIONS Available Ad Units File Weight Animation Flash Version Audio 300x250, 728x90, 160x600, 234x60, 180x150 40K Max (SWF/GIF/JPG) 30 seconds Max 7-10, ActionScript 3 accepted User-initiated on click Creative Creative with a white background must have a solid 1-pixel border (black recommended). SWF files must be accompanied by a backup GIF/JPG. All Rich Media (In-Unit Video, Expandable, Floating) must be Third Party served (see page 3 for approved vendors). Audio Audio must be user-initiated on click. Creative must include a prominent ON/OFF or mute button. A volume control is optional though recommended. Audio must not exceed 30 seconds. In-Stream Video ads (i.e. pre-roll video) that are served within a video player environment such as Sympatico Video, should have audio that plays automatically. Target Window When an ad is clicked it must launch the advertiser s landing page in a new browser window. 2

3 AVAILABLE PLACEMENTS AND APPROVED THIRD PARTY AD SERVERS Products Homepage Available Ad Units 300x x90 160x x60 180x150 In-Unit All Expandable All Approved Third Party Ad Servers AdCentric, AdGear, Atlas, DART, Eyeblaster, eyereturn, EyeWonder, Mediaplex, PointRoll Expandable 300x600 All, expands to 500x600 Floating to Ad Unit All except AdGear Communications Hotmail - In-Unit All Hotmail - Expandable All except AdCentric and Mediaplex All except AdCentric, AdGear and Hotmail - Floating to Ad Unit Mediaplex Messenger - In-Unit All DoubleClick, Eyeblaster, PointRoll, Messenger - Expandable eyereturn only WL Today - In-Unit All WL Today - Pre-Expanded PointRoll only Channels Autos All Careers (In-Unit only) All Entertainment All Finance All Health All Horoscopes All Lifestyle All Music All News All Search (In-Unit only) All Sports All Tech All Travel All 3

4 RICH MEDIA Polite Download / In-Unit Video The user visits a Sympatico.ca page with a 728x90, 300x250 or 160x600 ad unit. The 40K ad loads. Once the page has fully loaded, the Polite Download begins, up to a maximum file size of 2.2 MB. Once the Polite Download has completed, the initial creative is replaced with the heavier ad. Within 30 seconds, the flash animation or video ends. The video may be replayed, or a longer video may play if it is initiated by the user (on click). All audio must be user-initiated on click. If audio is used, creative must include a mute button or an ON/OFF toggler. Expandable The user visits a Sympatico.ca page with a 728x90, 300x250 or 160x 600 ad unit. The 40K ad loads. The expanded ad can be initiated by either: mouse over/mouse off, or click to expand/click to retract. The expanded panel is part of a Polite Download which occurs after page load so as to not affect the overall load time of the page. The Polite Download can be up to 2.2 MB in size. Creative must indicate that it will expand on mouse over, using text such as roll over to expand or similar. The expanded ad must include a prominent close button with the word CLOSE. Ad Unit Initial Dimensions Maximum Dimensions (expanded state) Leaderboard 728x90 728x360 Down Big Box 300x x250 Left Skyscraper 160x x600 Left Expansion Direction Homepage 300x x x600 Left 4

5 RICH MEDIA (CONT D) Floating to Ad Unit The user visits a Sympatico.ca page with a 300x250 or 728x90 ad unit. A small, non-intrusive floating component appears over the page. The floating component appears to float adjacent to the ad unit. Maximum stage size of floating component: 500x500 pixels. Floating component: o Must not take the shape of an exact square or rectangle. o Must not pause over content for longer than 2 seconds. o Must not obstruct page navigation. o Must be frequency capped to 1 per user per 24 hours. o Must have a prominent close button with the word CLOSE. Within 10 seconds, or when the user opts to close the experience, the floating component resolves into the ad unit. The floating component must be designed to draw the user s attention back to the ad unit, rather than as a standalone, unconnected floating section. The ad unit (300x250 or 728x90) can be standard (Flash, GIF/JPG) or Rich Media (Expandable, Polite Download). It can also be designed to permit the user to replay the floating component. The floating component is automatic, with a max time limit of 10 seconds. Audio is not permitted within the floating component; calls to action for audio are not permitted in the floating component. If the ad unit (300x250 or 728x90) is an Expandable or Polite Download, user-initiated audio is permitted (on click). Video is not permitted within the floating component; calls to action for video are not permitted in the floating component. If the ad unit (300x250 or 728x90) is an Expandable or Polite Download, video is permitted. 5

6 HOMEPAGE Homepage Infopane Image: Title: Body: 90x50 static GIF/JPG (10K Max) 25 characters Max 70 characters Max Cannot be same advertiser on sequential days creative must change daily. Text submission is pure text only. Image cannot contain branding / logo. No product shots containing visible branding (eg. promoting Tide detergent image of a laundry machine is accepted, image of a box of Tide is not accepted). Highlighting or use of colour is not permitted. Excessive punctuation is prohibited (only a single period, question mark or exclamation point permitted). Animation not permitted. Audio not permitted. Homepage Textlinks Text: 35 characters Max All text on a single line. Submission is pure text only. Highlighting or use of colour is not permitted. Excessive punctuation is prohibited (only a single period, question mark or exclamation point permitted). No background color should be specified. Animation not permitted. Audio not permitted. 6

7 IN-STREAM VIDEO (PRE-ROLL) The In-Stream Video ad delivers within the Sympatico Video player. There are two required elements for submission: Video: Companion: 15-second to 30-second video (16:9 or 4:3 aspect ratio) 300x250 (SWF, GIF or JPG) The user selects video content to play. The video ad plays and a 300x250 companion ad displays in close proximity to the player. The player will not allow the user to skip the advertisement - the only way the user may close out of the advertisement is by closing the player completely. The ad is loaded when the user selects a sponsored stream to watch, or when such content is loaded automatically, e.g. via a playlist. The companion ad remains present after the streaming ad has ended. Digital File Submission The Sympatico Video platform requires video ad creative in FLV format. The FLV may be submitted according to spec, or Sympatico.ca can transcode non-flv source files instead. 1. FLV Specification (for use in Sympatico Video as is, without changes) Video Codec: On2 VP6 Encoding: 2-Pass VBR Resolution: 640x360 pixels (16:9) or 640x480 pixels (4:3) Data Rate: Video: 536 Kbps Audio: 48 Kbps Mono Total Data Rate: 600 Kbps Keyframes: 2 seconds ou auto 2. Non-FLV Specification (to be transcoded for use in Sympatico Video) Video Codec: 2-Pass H.264 or WMV or MPEG 2 Resolution: 640x360 pixels (16:9) or 640x480 pixels (4:3) Total Data Rate: ~2 Mbps and up Keyframes: 2 seconds or auto 7

8 IN-STREAM VIDEO (CONT D) Send digital video file or link to your Sympatico.ca Account Manager. If the file must be sent, and is too large to , it may be uploaded to the following FTP account: Host: msnmedia.sympatico.ca Login: adcreative Password: z0vbgk1t (You may need to change your FTP client s mode from Passive to Active) Companion Ad 300x250 (SWF, GIF or JPG) Max file size: 40K Max animation time: 30 seconds No Third Party tags accepted 8

9 Innovid No Third Party tags accepted 9

10 CONTENT INTEGRATION Advertorial Image: Title: Body: 70x70 static GIF/JPG (4K Max) 10 words Max 45 words Max (25 words Max for French) Images must be approved by your Account Manager. GIF files must have a transparent background. Excessive punctuation is prohibited (only a single period, question mark or exclamation point permitted). Animation not permitted. Audio not permitted. Sponsorship Logo Preferred format:.eps Animation not permitted. Audio not permitted. Articles Text: Image: words 40K Max Animation not permitted. Audio not permitted. 10

11 DATA REPORTED Ad requests (impressions) and clicks are reported. For some Third Party tags clicks are not reported by Sympatico.ca but are available from the Third Party vendor. CREATIVE SLA AND LATE CREATIVE POLICY Standard Creative Third Party Rich Media Creative and In-Stream Video 3 business days 5 business days In the event we do not receive creative built using our IAB certified specifications within 3 business days before the start date, an IAB approved "public service announcement" creative will be assigned to the line item(s) in question. Details on this IAB initiative can be found at FLASH GUIDELINES The clicktag is case-sensitive in Flash version 7 and above and should be "clicktag". In other versions of Flash, it is not case-sensitive, but it is recommended to be "clicktag". Select geturl in the button from where you want the URL navigation to trigger. Type clicktag in the URL field. clicktag is case sensitive. Below is an example of what the finished button script will look like: on (release) { geturl(clicktag, "_blank"); } NEW: Sympatico.ca accepts IAB Canada s Universal ClickTAG. Details on this IAB initiative can be found at 11

12 THIRD PARTY AD SERVERS In order to monitor the quality of advertising content on our network, Sympatico.ca reserves the right to the following at anytime: Monitor Third Party servers for performance and response times. A list and/or sample page of all creative currently live. The ability to require express approval of any creative additions or deletions. Advertising creative be Sympatico.ca hosted given any problems with the client s Third Party server. Clickthrough tracking is not available on Third Party served campaigns. Different Sympatico.ca channels have different Rich Media acceptance requirements. Please consult with your Sympatico.ca contact to confirm acceptance. Cache-Busting Cache-busting is required for all Third Party served campaigns. Placement of cache-busting parameters must be clearly indicated in the ad tag code. Third Party served click URLs for hard-coded placements (textlinks, etc.) do not make use of cache-busting. Rich Media not accepted by Sympatico.ca We do not support JAVA (not to be confused with JavaScript) due to security issues, in addition to performance issues and initial load times. Ad code using ILAYER, LAYER or NOLAYER tags due to compatibility and stability issues. Mailto fields, as we cannot ensure the user will have a consistently good experience using ads with this functionality. If you have any questions regarding creative submissions, please contact your Sympatico.ca Account Representative. PLEASE NOTE: ANY ELEMENT NOT MEETING SPEC WILL BE RETURNED FOR REVISION, WHICH MAY DELAY THE EXPECTED LIVE DATE AND RESULT IN LOST IMPRESSIONS. 12

13 RICH MEDIA SUBMISSION GUIDELINES Please consult with your Account Executive or Account Manager to confirm acceptance of Rich Media ad servers. Sympatico.ca reserves the right to display a static down level ad to browsers that do not render a rich media experience correctly. Sympatico.ca requires 5 business days from the date tags are received from the Third Party vendor for testing, scheduling and publishing. The Sympatico.ca 5 day turnaround time will commence once a complete creative submission is received and a corresponding Sympatico.ca insertion order is signed. Sympatico.ca reserves the right to refuse any advertising/advertisers, make exceptions to this policy on a case-by-case basis, as well as to make changes and add to this policy at any time. Please refer to the Sympatico.ca Creative Acceptance Policy (CAP) for more detailed guidelines regarding user experience. 13