Video Marketing is soaring towards becoming the strongest marketing trend of 2019. Video Content is getting the attention of all the major social and tech media giants because of media consumption trends by the general population, because creating video content has gotten cheaper and offers a greater ROI and because new video format allows for many different placements for ads. If your business or brand has not bought into video marketing yet, maybe these reasons will convince you to start recording and sharing!
More People are on Mobile and Streaming Than Ever Before
The rise of mobile data consumption is the overarching media trend of the past decade. Mobile traffic has now surpassed that of desktop computers, with 48.2% of all Internet traffic coming from mobile users. The display format of mobile devices naturally trends towards playing videos horizontally, matching up very closely to film and video’s preferred 1.85:1 or 2.39:1 aspect ratios. US consumers are watching videos more than ever before, and streaming accounts for 15% of their 40 hours a week spent watching videos digitally. More people are cutting the cord with cable providers, preferring the content online in skinny bundling packages like Spotify Hulu. Audiences are no longer watching commercial rotations on cable and broadcast en masse like they were just 5 or 10 years ago.
More and More Social and Tech Brands are Concentrating on Video
The giants, Google, Amazon, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, have been closely monitoring how their users have been consuming data in this new digital age and have appropriately implemented changes in their platforms to reflect data consumption habits. Mark Zuckerberg explicitly stated the futures of Facebook and Instagram is in video, and that he will spend as much as he needs to accelerate the move. His plans focus on initiatives like Facebook Watch, and native ads playing before, during and after video streams. Facebook encourages brands to post videos around three minutes in length based on their studies on audience viewing habits, for example. Instagram is following its parent company, naturally, expanding beyond its original still image format with minute-long video posts and the longer IGTV video format. Twitter even relented and now allows videos to be posted along with tweet captions. Amazon is barreling along with its streaming services for Amazon Prime members. And, most impressively, Google has announced that it will have its AI programs search for video snippets relevant to search queries and will autoplay them on that query’s results page.
Video is Cheaper to Create Now, Ad Spend is Performing Better Than Expected
For a long time, it was hard to make interesting videos quickly, cheaply and efficiently. Creating videos took too long, the tools were hard to learn and everything and everyone involved were too expensive. Nowadays, everyone can record videos and edit them with ease if they have a smartphone. So we now have a situation where across the field, online video is getting better at an amazing rate. And going hand-in-hand with this information is the return on investment now enjoyed by marketers on digital video. Digital video is costing less to produce, generates more interest in a brand, product or service and is more effective at conversions than non-video advertising. People watching video are more likely to act. Viewers retain the information from videos much better than receiving it via text. For example, marketers using digital video had their revenue grow 49% faster than those who didn’t.
Video Changes with the Times, and Often Reflects Progress Easiest
It seems like the days of your typical 15-second and 30-second pre-roll spots are a thing of the past. Marketers have gotten extremely creative in where video can be placed, creating more opportunities for brands and services than ever before. Video can be put wherever there are eyes on screens. Now it’s no strange thing to see an ad play natively before a video stream, mid-stream or after. Instagram has video ads between users’ Stories, YouTube offers its TrueView streaming ads and Twitter plays videos between every couple of tweets.
Video is Able to Tell and Show a Story in Vastly Different Formats
As mentioned earlier, people retain information much easier via video than any other format. Makes you wonder why I’m writing this all down then, huh? While blogs definitely have their purpose and benefits, video is easier and quicker to consume. Your message is more likely to be heard and understood the way you meant it to. Your message can now be told via 10-second stories on Facebook and Instagram. You can host live video sessions like a Q&A or an Ask Me Anything. 360-Degree and VR videos allow you to transport audiences into immersive settings and scenes. And people are wanting to learn more about products and brands in paid video classes and tutorial videos. The way you want your video to share your message is now only limited to your imagination!
