According to YouTube, only 30 per cent of TrueView adverts on its site are skipped on average, meaning that well over two in three of them are watched by visitors. The company also claims that users who choose not to skip the adverts are 75 per cent more engaged than with standard pre-roll advertising that doesn't give them the choice.

The figures were revealed by Bruce Daisley, sales director of YouTube and display at Google, during the Media360 event in Manchester. He also claimed that clients can use the TrueView advertising model to get real time results on how well a specific advert is doing:

"TrueView challenges the old models and for the first time advertisers can see how often their ad is being skipped and it gives the media agencies the chance to challenge the creative execution, by simply pointing out that a certain ad is less effective than the previous one, simply because the user hasn’t viewed it as much," he said.

The TrueView advertising platform was launched by YouTube/Google at the beginning of December 2010, and allows viewers to skip the advert after 5 seconds have been played. It is commonly played before video clips (pre-roll), but can also appear mid-roll in longer streams. Advertisers only have to pay if their adverts are watched in their entirety or for 30 seconds, whichever comes first.

Do you skip the ads on YouTube? Or are you happy to let them play out? Let us know in the comments below...