Digital Marketing & The Growth of Video

As brand influence continues to grow in the online space, so does the importance of maintaining high quality, engaging content in strategic digital marketing plans. In the recent past, brands could get away with simply posting still imagery on their social accounts. Today, a strategic mix of content, including tactical video, is imperative to a brand’s digital marketing strategy.

One of the most beneficial tools we have at our disposal as marketers is a wide range of analytic tools. We can use those tools to figure out exactly what content performs the best with each respective audience, and which content isn’t up to par. Each year, video continues to perform better and better, outperforming other types of content exponentially. 

Today’s audiences crave video more than ever. In 2021, it’s projected that on average, a person will spend 100 minutes per day viewing online video content, up 19% from 84 minutes in 2019. With the arrival of the COVID — 19 pandemic, people are restricted in their activities, as a result, they are spending much more time online, specifically, making purchases. According to Adobe Analytics, online spending increased significantly from September 2019 to September 2020 by 43% or a massive $60.4 billion.

Today’s consumer is financially savvy, craves information and has the luxury of a world of products and services right at their fingertips at all times. Video content is the easiest way to convey a lot of information in a small amount of time. However, brands are in constant competition for consumer attention and those with the best digital marketing practices will be the ones to reap the rewards. Facebook alone has over four billion video views with approximately 500 million viewers watching over 100 million hours of video content per day. 

Over the past two years, according to Google’s 2019 Research Review, time spent viewing product/shopping related videos grew by 500%. Length of videos is also important, depending on the type of video,  the target audience and the platform the video is being launched on. For example, shorter videos that are 30 seconds or less tend to perform better on Instagram, while slightly longer videos perform best on Facebook. 

When it comes to content, we have just seconds, 1.3 to be exact, to capture audience attention before scrolling commences. It’s imperative that the first frames of any video content capture attention, utilizing things like quick movement, engaging music and quality thumbnails, while incorporating brand stories and messaging. 

Businesses that use video in their digital marketing strategy have a distinct edge, 72% of consumers say they would rather learn about a product or service via video. Additionally, 95% of a message is retained when the information is conveyed through video versus just 10% retained from text.

Websites and landing pages that contain video content perform better when compared to those without video content. Conversion rates are significantly increased, traffic is greatly increased and a website is 53 times more likely to appear on Google’s first page of search results if video is utilized.

Retargeting via paid advertising is easier with video as well. Facebook’s Ads Manager boasts a built in tool which tracks paid video views. Digital marketers can take that information and use it to retarget audiences based on how long they viewed each piece of video and which videos were viewed. For example, if someone viewed the first video in a marketing series, it’s then possible to target them specifically with the second, and so on, greatly increasing the chances of conversion.

Video can be used in a multitude of different ways to engage target audiences. Some of the more popular formats include; 

• Anchor/Brand 
• Product/Service demonstrations
• Informational
• How to/DIY
• Behind the scenes/inside peak
• Event
• FAQ/Q&A
• Reviews/Testimonials
• Presentations
• Webinars
• Vlogs
• Live 
• User generated content

Video creation takes time and expertise but it’s imperative to digital marketing success. Approximately 88% of marketers report positive ROI on their video investments, making it one of the best ways to promote business as 2021 approaches.