A recent report from IAB and video advertising company BrightRoll shows that online video viewing in Canada is at an all-time high and continues to grow at a momentous pace. Numbers from the 2012 report show that total viewership is up 58% over last year, across all age groups.

Further, 45% (up 10% over the past year) of marketers report that half or more than half of their RFPs include a digital video component.

The reason behind the embrace of video is because 68% of advertisers perceive it to be more effective – in recall, branding, messaging and likeability – than television, according to the Canada Video Advertising Report. What’s more, 82% believe video is more effective than online display ads and 73% feel that there is more efficiency in using video over social media.

Advertisers express their appreciation for video’s targeting capabilities (around 42%), its ability to re-use creative (22%), reach (18%), lower price relative to TV (9%) and the variety of available ad units (8%). The respondants say that the use of video ads can increase even further if there is (in order) more GRP research, research on ROI, lower media costs, campaign measurement, rights agreements, case studies education and campaign planning.

Hands down, pre-roll tops all other forms of video advertising, with 96% of respondents saying that they use the format in online campaigns, 26% use it in mobile campaigns and 30% in tablet campaigns. Companion ads are second to video pre-roll and in-banner video ads are the third most preferred unit, according to the report.

Measurement of the format remains a concern for advertisers, according to the report. Being able to show the translation of GRP to online video buying is reported to be a top area of interest for additional research, and second is the impact it has on offline purchase behaviour. Not far behind, measurement tools that show a change in purchase intent or brand lift is believed to be another important area of research, as is performance metrics between video and television advertising.

When comparing the U.S. and Canada, the latter is more inclined to purchase video advertising from a broadcaster (40.6%) than south of the border (6.7%). Close to 28% of Canadian advertisers are likely to purchase from an ad network, as opposed to 41% in the US. Ad exchanges are also being used more in the States (7.6%) than in Canada (3.8%).