'Net Features : online video

10 Tips for Overnight Web Video Superstardom

Allison Howen — Fri, 12 Apr 2013 19:30:00 GMT

If you want to spice up your Web presence, it may be time to consider implementing a video strategy.

If you aren't convinced, consider this: A recent comScore study reveals that Americans watched 33 billion online content videos in February alone. Moreover, Invodo research shows that consumers watch video 60 percent of the time when it is available, and that 52 percent of consumers who watch product videos claim the videos make them more confident about their purchases, which helps to reduce return rates.

In addition to those stats, implementing a video strategy can help your enterprise drive site traffic, improve time-on-site and engagement metrics, increase conversion rates and grow its social fan base. That said, producing videos can be a complex and even an intimidating process if you’re just starting out, which is why Website Magazine has compiled 10 tips that will help you become an overnight Web video superstar, just check them out below:

1. Get Good Equipment

While a simple Webcam along with a free online editor is suitable for composing basic videos, you should consider purchasing higher-end equipment if you intend on producing videos on a regular basis. For example, if you are creating product videos that include a lot of detail, you should invest in an HD camera. Also, there is nothing worse than trying to edit a shaky video, and since shooting a steady video with a handheld camcorder is harder than one would think, a sturdy tripod is also a good investment. In addition to those pieces of equipment, some of the Web’s free video editors, such as YouTube or WeVideo, don’t include as many features as you might want, in which case you should purchase a more robust video editing platform, such as Apple’s Final Cut Pro or Adobe’s Premiere Pro. Lastly, if you’re struggling with capturing sound, a microphone will certainly help with this problem.

2. Make a Plan

Before your jump into the production stages, you must first create a plan for your video. For example, what is the goal of your video? It could be to drive more traffic to your website, to inform your audience about a new product or to foster a better relationship with your customers. Once the goal has been identified, you must decide what type of video will allow you to reach this goal, such as a demonstration, an advertisement, a comedy or just a straightforward informative piece. You might still need some inspiration for your content, in which case you should check out TubeRank. This platform enables users to set three conversational triggers in order to view similar videos that have been successful on the Web as inspiration.

3. Write a Script

You may be good at giving off-the-cuff speeches, but that is not the best strategy for video content. This is because online videos have the ability to be seen by millions of people, and you don’t want any flubs to take center-stage over your content. By writing out a script, you can make sure that you include every important piece of information into the video and that your thoughts are organized so that the video isn’t too long and turns your viewers away. Additionally, you might even be able to find a way to fit some quirky or entertaining tidbits into the script that would be harder to implement when improvising. That said, don’t rely so much on your script that you come off as stuffy in your video, because it is important to show your personality in order to be more relatable to your viewers. This is where practice comes into play…

4. Practice Makes Perfect

Before you start shooting, make sure to practice because you need to be confident in the content that you’re selling. While you should practice in front of an audience at least once so that they can give you some tips for improvement, the best way to self-identify areas of improvement is by simply reading the script aloud and recording yourself with a Webcam. This will not only get you familiar with being on camera, but it will also give you an opportunity to analyze your voice (did you pronounce every word correctly?), as well as an opportunity to identify any nervous ticks you might have. Furthermore, by reading the script aloud, you will feel more comfortable with its content and be able to edit areas that don’t sound quite right.

5. Just Do It.

This step is pretty self-explanatory: Just do it. While your first video will most likely end up not being your best in the long run, it will help to give you confidence, which will go a long way in future productions.

6. Put On Your Editing Pants

After your video is shot, it’s editing time. It is important to note, however, that the amount of editing you will have to do depends on your video’s quality, content and purpose. For example, if you’re a skincare line that is shooting a product demonstration, you may want to splice in some close-ups of a model’s skin during a step-by-step demonstration. Conversely, if you’re a pet store that is putting together a video of your customers with their pets, it might be appropriate to use some unique effects, such as custom graphics, or attention-grabbing transitions when switching between photos and videos.

7. Don’t Forget About Audio

While you should certainly make sure your audio is consistent throughout your video during both the shooting and editing processes, you might also want to consider adding background music or sound effects to specific parts of your video. If this is the case, make sure you have permission for any audio you add to the video. YouTube, for example, allows users to access select audio from Creative Commons for their videos.

8. Ask for Feedback

After the video is edited, it is a good idea to show it to colleagues before publishing it to the ’Net. This is because an extra set of eyes and ears might see or hear something that you didn’t, such as a black spot between transitions. Furthermore, outsiders might suggest adding an element that you had previously overlooked, like captions or additional images or video footage.

9. Distribute

Once you are mentally prepared to become an overnight Web video superstar, it is time to start distributing your video across the ’Net. If you are not hosting the video on YouTube, then you will need to use another hosting platform like Vzaar or Brightcove. Once the video is up, it should definitely be featured on your website, but you should also create social and email campaigns around it too. By sending the video to your subscribers and sharing it with your Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Pinterest fans, you are increasing its audience reach and its chances of going viral.

10. Measure

After your video is published, it is time to start measuring results. While you should definitely evaluate metrics like views, time watched and completion rates, you should also analyze traffic spikes on your site because of the video. It is also important to monitor the devices and channels customers are using to view the videos, as this can help you tailor future video content and promotion strategies based on the audiences who respond best to this type of visual content. Additionally, to measure the popularity of your video across the social Web, you should analyze popular engagement metrics, such as shares, likes, comments, retweets and replies.

Video Usage Soars for Vzaar

Allison Howen — Fri, 11 Jan 2013 17:30:00 GMT

While 2012 might have been the year of mobile, Web workers should note that online video’s popularity was steadily rising as well.

In fact, video hosting platform vzaar saw record growth last year, with sales increasing 48 percent from January to December 2012. According to vzaar chairman Gareth Cadwallader, the monetization of video content was one of the strong drivers for 2012’s growth.

“We have seen a surge in the amount of companies using video subscription services to generate profits and enable commerce,” said Cadwallader. “One of the key developments within vzaar's platform has been the move to integrate VAST 2.0 compliant pre- mid- and post- roll linear commercials.”

Security concerns also drove companies to make the move to paid-for-hosting platforms, according to vzaar CTO Adrian Sevitz.

“By developing enhanced security features such as Signed Keys to prevent videos from being embedded anywhere that the user does not want them to be, vzaar are ideally placed to serve this growing market,” said Sevitz. “Security is not just about access but also about control of the Brand. Branding control is essential to any business using video as a way to market their brand. In 2012 vzaar introduced branded video pages that allow subscribers to customize video pages to their own specification.”

Other business features available through the vzaar platform include Multi User Accounts for managing multiple subscriber profiles, Bulk Uploading for up to ten videos at once, Multi Language Player-Support and Video Watermarking.

"2012 represented an important achievement not only in terms of the numbers but also because they reflected a healthy split between new accounts and existing customers who signed on for larger and longer term contracts," said Jim Henry, vzaar vice president of sales. "With the continued rise of online video, global demand for our platform will continue to drive significant growth for us going forward."

The Rich Get Richer: A Guide to Interactive Visual Content

Linc Wonham — Fri, 04 May 2012 19:00:00 GMT

Over the past couple of years, there have been major shifts in consumer purchasing patterns. New technology has made the buying experience more interactive more often.

With more touch-points come more opportunities to create an engaging experience with the consumer, but it also means there are more pieces to take into account. Consumers expect to be able to engage with a brand consistently through every channel, all the time. They want to be able to shop online via computer, smartphone, tablet, as well as in-store, and have a universal experience.

How do you create engaging content?
With all of these moving pieces, how do you keep your brand consistent across all channels while keeping up with the continuously evolving consumer? By keeping them engaged no matter what channel they’re using.

Utilizing rich media content such as photography, 360-degree views of the product, and online video are ideal ways to achieve consumer interaction. On average, consumers spend 48 seconds on a website with only text. But add video to the mix and the consumer spends up to five minutes and 50 seconds – making video more than five times more effective than text.

Having a consumer spend more time on your site is fantastic, but the ultimate goal is conversion. When selling products online, it’s important that the consumer feels comfortable and confident the product is what they are looking for.

Providing images, more views, demo videos, and different color options is one way to increase the consumer’s confidence and decrease the number of returns. Take Zappos, for instance: By using video demos of items on product pages, the online retailer was able to increase sales by 6 to 30 percent.

Why is consistency important?
Since consumers aren’t just making online purchases from a computer anymore, it’s important to ensure that creative content is compatible and consistent from mobile devices, tablets and laptops. Over the last three years, mobile video traffic has increased 5,000 percent, providing great opportunity for online retailers to remain competitive with compelling visual content.

One best practice for creating engaging visual content is to shoot the products once and use that content across several platforms. For that reason, online retailers should consider creative agencies that have the capability to shoot high-quality content and repurpose it for multiple deliverables including still images, 360-degree product views, interactive catalogs and online video.

This strategy helps to create a consistent brand message while also reducing the cost of production, as online retailers aren’t required to pay a separate fee for each set of visual content they have created. This approach also provides a one-stop solution for online retailers who are then able to use the same imagery and content for direct mailing campaigns, email blasts, marketing collateral and even social media campaigns.

Another approach is solving the issue of device compatibility. Some devices aren’t compatible with certain software such as Adobe Flash, so it’s important to find a creative agency that also understands the technical concerns that go into offering rich media content. In this instance, HTML5 is often the best solution for cross-device compatibility.

How do I know if my strategy was successful?
The final component of a successful e-commerce strategy is measurement. The digital content is brand-consistent and the video and imagery is compatible on all devices, but are the customers making the purchase?

Conversion is measurable by comparing visits per product before visual content was added with those after. For the products that included 360-degree photographs, were fewer products returned? If so, it’s safe to assume that the ability to view the product from multiple angles allowed the consumer to better decide that the product fit their needs.

Or, did demo videos better explain a product, leading to an increase in the number of purchases? All of these factors help online retailers create an emotional connection between their products and the consumer, as well as increase confidence in their purchases.

Whether you’re working in luxury brands, women’s clothing, consumer electronics, home goods or food products, interactive visual content is necessary to drive the website user to purchase your products. By creating consistent and compatible multimedia content, online retailers gain the interest of the consumer as well as increase their confidence in the product and brand.

About the author: Jason Arena is the vice president of brand strategy and marketing at KSC Kreate.

Video Crowdfunding Put to the Test

Linc Wonham — Wed, 02 May 2012 17:00:00 GMT

Dailymotion, the second largest video portal on the Web, has partnered with social micropayments platform Flattr to create the first global-scale, socially funded video network.

The partnership allows online video creators to be paid for their content directly by individual viewers, presenting new opportunities for bloggers and others to monetize their videos.

“By empowering video creators to take control and earn money from their work, no longer will online video be limited to an unpaid pursuit,” says Dailymotion managing director Roland Hamilton.

This is the largest-scale implementation of crowdfunding for online video, with traffic numbers and user volume substantial enough to determine if social funding has a future as a viable revenue model for video on the Web.

Video creators on Dailymotion can import a Flattr button directly onto their channels and each individual video. Flattr users, who make a monthly donation ranging from a few dollars to several hundred, click to donate funds directly to the creator.

Each month, the number of total donations from each Flattr user is calculated, and payment is divided evenly among all recipients the user has chosen. Recipients also register for Flattr accounts to receive funds, which they can then donate to others as they see fit or withdraw to a bank account.

Customize Business Videos with Branded Pages

Linc Wonham — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 16:00:00 GMT

Web video hosting service vzaar has launched a new video page design feature that enables businesses to maintain brand consistency across all of its online channels.

The design patterns, colors, text, titles, logos, links, special offers, etc., around the vzaar video player are all totally customizable. In addition to building upon any of the three customizable templates, designers and other creatives can also import a color scheme, background and logo straight from a Twitter account.

“Branded Video Pages serve as a home base for your video content,” says Dan Rees-Jones, head of customer support at vzaar. “Every video receives a totally customizable webpage available immediately upon upload that is designed with one purpose: to showcase your work. This is extremely valuable to any business with video to share – they do not need to build an entirely new page on their own site to deliver cuts to clients for approval, share content on Twitter and Facebook, or circulate company training videos internally.”

In addition to customizing the portfolio page, vzaar gives businesses control over how the video player itself looks – its quality, colors, borders, dimensions, etc. Online businesses can also add and superimpose subtitles, embed calls to action, logos, images, and social network sharing tools, as well as control how their customers interact with the video.

“It’s great to have an instant video page up and ready to share the second a video upload completes,” says Shaun Sinnott, director of online marketing at TopGolf. “It took no time to reskin the pages to be perfectly in line with the TopGolf brand, and we expect to get a lot use from them, particularly when sharing videos on social media.”

Click here to see more details on how Branded Pages work and how to implement the new feature.

Use Video to Drive Brand Interest (Not Direct Sales)

Pete Prestipino — Mon, 09 Apr 2012 15:30:00 GMT

A new survey from Harris Interactive and brand agency Digitas reveals an increased urgency for brand investment in video, showing that 46 percent of online video viewers in the U.S. say that if they are watching a video online that mentions a new product or brand, they would be at least somewhat likely to look up that brand afterwards.

Additional highlights from the study include the following:

- 49 percent of those who follow brands on social networks say that if a brand that they follow posts a video online, they are at least somewhat likely to click on the link to watch it and learn more.

- 51 percent of online video viewers, ages 18-44, say that if they watch a video online and it mentions a new product or brand, they would look up that brand.

- 62 percent of online video viewers who have a favorite celebrity, ages 18-34, would check out an online video starring that person.

"Brand content has become an integral part of any successful marketing strategy," says Stephanie Sarofian, managing director of The Third Act, the brand content unit of Digitas. "Whether you're thinking about mobile, social, b2b, or any facet of marketing, content is now at the heart of everything we do. There is immense opportunity right now for brands to engage consumers through content-marketing across all channels."

Tremor Video Certified for Ad Buyer Transparency

Linc Wonham — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 15:00:00 GMT

Online video technology company Tremor Video has been certified under the Interactive Advertising Bureau’s (IAB) Networks & Exchanges Quality Assurance Guidelines (QAG) for video and mobile advertising.

The IAB’s guidelines create common terminology and standards, allowing for advertisers and agencies to evaluate campaign value with greater control and consistency.

Launched in April 2011 for online display advertising, the revised QAG for digital video and mobile Web and in-application media went into effect on April 1, 2012. Tremor Video was a member of the working group that developed the IAB framework for video.

In October 2011, Tremor Video became the first company to serve the AdChoices consumer privacy notification icon within the video player. The company is currently working on video classification standards as part of the IAB’s Making Measurement Make Sense initiative.

“We salute Tremor Video for adopting the IAB Quality Assurance Guidelines, especially at a time when the digital video sector gathers increasing momentum and brand marketers find it vitally important to count on a set of consistent standards when they make a video ad buy,” says Randall Rothenberg, President and CEO, IAB. “This show of support by such an industry leader and influencer as Tremor Video will encourage others to apply for certification as well as to take part in this critical initiative for the entire ecosystem.”

Tremor Video provides in-stream video advertising solutions to Fortune 1000 brand advertisers and top-tier publishers. The company leverages its award-winning decisioning engine, innovative video ad formats and publisher technology to deliver the campaign results and scale advertisers should expect from digital video.

Play Video in Email Directly with StreamSend Widget

Pete Prestipino — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 18:30:00 GMT

Email marketing service and social marketing tool suite StreamSend has released its Email+Video offering that promises at least a little more control of video as it relates to user experience in the email channel.

What StreamSend is essentially offering up here is a widget (and a smart one at that) that enables marketers to insert a video still into their email template. While the video will not actually play in the email message itself, it at least won’t take the user to a third-party destination (like YouTube) that is outside of the marketer's control.

“Video adds a personal, powerful dimension to your emails that engages viewers and builds relationships with them,” says Dan Forootan, president of StreamSend. “In fact, industry researchers such as Marketing Sherpa have reported that video in an email can lift conversion rates by 50 percent. Given that kind of power, you want to make sure that your videos are presented in the most compelling, easily accessible way.”

Here’s a quick video demonstration:

The Usual Suspects Lead Online Video Rankings

Pete Prestipino — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 20:00:00 GMT

Comscore released data from its Video Metrix service showing that 181 million U.S. Internet users watched nearly 40 billion videos in January 2012. As you might imagine, the usual suspects round out the top few spots.

Google Sites, driven primarily by video consumption on YouTube, was the top Web video property in January with 152 million unique viewers, followed by VEVO with 51.5 million, Yahoo! Sites with 49.2 million, Viacom Digital with 48.1 million and Facebook.com with 45.1 million. While this is useful information overall (particularly for media buyers), it might also prove beneficial to see the destinations that are emerging as well – but I digress.

Nearly 40 billion videos views occurred during the month, with Google Sites again generating the highest number at 18.6 billion, followed by Hulu with 877 million and VEVO with 717 million. The average viewer watched 22.6 hours of online video content, with Google Sites (7.5 hours) and Hulu (3.2 hours) demonstrating the highest average engagement among the top ten properties. On the whole, if this says anything to you – it should be, “Create more video!”

Comscore also revealed the top video ad properties, and no surprise here, Google again topped the list of video advertising opportunities. One of the many reasons, of course, is its levels of innovation and TrueView Ads is a great example. Google recently surveyed its customers and found some interesting data about the TrueView program offering as it relates to user experience. Eighty percent of viewers preferred TrueView to standard in-stream ads, and 90 percent thought the ads created a better viewing environment.

Video Playing a Featured Role in Holiday Sales

Linc Wonham — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 23:00:00 GMT

Online video solutions provider Invodo has released some new data about the use of video on retail sites during the first holiday shopping spree of the season. Invodo customers such as Verizon, Office Depot, Crocs, L’Occitane and others showed a significant rise in the number of consumer views during the Thanksgiving weekend, and some of the key points of data are below:

• Overall, there was a 337-percent increase in Black Friday video views over last year

• On Cyber Monday, there was an 897-percent increase in video views over last year

• Video views on Cyber Monday in 2011 were 2.5 times the number of video views on Black Friday 2011. It is the preferred online shopping day, and video seems to be a preferred form of gathering product information for online shoppers

• On Black Friday, Facebook accounted for 50 percent of the sharing of videos among users, with email at 36 percent and Twitter at 14 percent

• On Cyber Monday, Facebook and Email were even at 43 percent each. Twitter was at 14 percent

• For both Black Friday and Cyber Monday, shoppers’ overall rating of the videos they viewed was 4.2 out of 5 stars

A common thread among consumers’ comments on the videos they viewed was that the ability to see a product demonstrated was enhanced through video, enabling comparisons to people in size, in terms of seeing how the material in apparel moves, and seeing the features demonstrated. This led to clear enthusiasm in the comments, which explains why video can be a strong driver of conversion for ecommerce retailers.

Brands Take a Closer Look at Online Video

Linc Wonham — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 22:00:00 GMT

The second annual Video State of the Industry Survey from Adap.tv and Digiday has found that brand advertisers who bought online video ads this year are planning to increase their budgets for 2012 by 47 percent.

For brands that didn’t purchase any video ads in 2011, 84 percent say they will include digital video in their campaigns in the last quarter of 2011 or in early 2012. These figures correlate closely with the experience of Wooshii.com, a network of thousands of the world’s top video makers and animators.

In the last six months, the average spend on video projects on Wooshii has risen by more than 60 percent.

“Budgets have been increasing quite dramatically this year and they are likely to continue growing in 2012,” says Wooshii CEO, Fergus Dyer-Smith. “Businesses are now looking to spend serious amounts of money on online video. Everyone is buying into the fact that online video advertising is a very cost-effective way of spreading a brand message.”

The survey found that brands are diverting funds away from print advertising and broadcast TV advertising in order to focus on online video.

Video Production Guide for Merchants

Linc Wonham — Tue, 22 Nov 2011 20:30:00 GMT

You may be an expert in ecommerce. You might also know all the latest design trends and everything there is to know about SEO. However, what do you know about video?

The eTailing Group reported that in 2010, 73 percent of online retailers used video on their product pages. This is up from 55 percent in 2009 and only 20 percent in 2005. According to eMarketer, 74 percent of the top 50 retailers use product videos; 40 percent use category videos, and 38 percent use other types of informational videos.

Web video is no longer “a nice to have” feature for an online business, it has become an essential. It is now one of the most effective sales tools for ecommerce companies and all online marketers.

“Customers respond to video because it provides an effortless way for them to make product decisions,” says James Booker, business development manager at shopping cart software provider Volusion. “Instead of looking through multiple images and scrolling through several bullet points of specs and technical requirements, shoppers receive valuable information all in one place.”

So, how do you make a good video? For starters, understand that producing an effective online video is not too difficult – as long as you remember a few simple guidelines.

Keep it simple and keep it short
Most Web users have a limited attention span, especially for an introduction to your product and/or service. Effective online videos are short – maybe two to six minutes at the maximum. If the video covers a complicated subject, break the video into a series of shorter ones. This is especially true for instructional or “how to assemble the product” types of videos.

Simple means keep the frame uncluttered. Shoot your video with a plain background – maybe a light-colored pastel wall decorated only with your logo. You don’t need fancy backgrounds and camera moves. The simpler the stage, the better the video will look.

When you are in the editing phase, stay with the same concept – simplicity. You don’t need fancy wipes and dissolves. Stay with cuts only and maybe a quick fade-in at the beginning and a fade-out at the end. The only effect we recommend is using captions and subtitles – superimposed text to reinforce the message and to explain the product and services.

If you are anticipating doing a series of videos, you may want to create a standard video intro and title section for the business. Keep it short. I have seen standard intros that went on for 30 seconds, 60 seconds, or longer. Not good. Keep the intro short.

You may also want to create a standard program “outro” – a credits section that includes contact info – the business’ email address, website and phone number so that potential customers can contact the business and buy your stuff.

Another good tip is to superimpose the businesses logo and website address on the bottom right of the video throughout the entire piece. Not only does this reinforce the marketing message, it makes it more difficult for a competitor to steal or co-opt the video.

Make the video and audio look good and sound clear
You don’t need the most high-resolution video or the highest bit-rate audio. The video just has to look clean and the audio has to be clear without break-ups or noise. That is not hard to do with today’s gear that is completely affordable.

Almost any high-end HD camcorder or video camera will work; the major selection factor is to make sure it has an audio-in jack so that you can add an external microphone. The built-in mikes found embedded in many entry-level camcorders are not very good. Usually, they are omnidirectional mikes that capture sound from many directions. Instead, it is preferred to use a unidirectional microphone – one that captures sound from the direction in which it is pointed.

This can be a shotgun mike mounted on the camcorder, a boom mike held over the talent’s head, a mike held in their hand or even a small lavaliere mike pinned to their lapel. All will work better than the inexpensive mike built into most camcorders.

Both wired and wireless types of microphones are good. Wireless is often slightly more expensive but provides much more freedom to move around. Either way, make sure the batteries in the mike are fresh and try to have someone monitoring the audio via headphones while recording. It is much, much easier to fix an audio problem while recording than to later try to repair it in the editing process.

To get good-looking video, follow these two suggestions:

- Use lots of light. Yes, modern-day camcorders can almost shoot in the dark, but by adding an extra video light or two, the resulting captured image will be noticeably sharper and cleaner.

- Use a tripod and don’t move the camera around. Unless you are doing some kind of music, dance or sports video, there is not much reason to move the camcorder or handhold it. By using a tripod, not only will the video look a lot more professional, the camcorder and editing electronics will have an easier time of compressing the video for Web distribution. Similarly, it is not a good practice to zoom in and out. Cut from a wide shot to a close-up if you need to show details – don’t zoom. Live-on camera zooms are the mark of a true amateur.

The video has been shot and edited – now what?
Depending on how much traffic you expect to get, and how professional you want the video player to look, you can create a video player and host the video yourself or use a video-hosting service. One option is to stick it on YouTube or another public site and then embed the video into the HTML. However, for the best customer experience, the highest-quality playback and the ability to create a video player that matches the site’s look and feel, you ought to use a professional online video platform.

In addition to handling compression options and bandwidth costs, an OVP enables customization of the video player’s look and feel, its dimensions and even its shape. Many platforms enable the post-production addition of captions and other capabilities that will improve the overall shopper experience.

“The major advantage of using Web video to market products is that it transforms an otherwise stagnant product image into a moving, engaging sales tool,” says Booker. “Whereas in a retail store there are sales clerks to demonstrate the product and answer questions, online video can take that very role by showing online shoppers how the product can be used and, more importantly, demonstrate benefits that are impossible to portray through mere product images or descriptions.”

About the author: Ian Snead leads the marketing strategy and product focus for online video platform vzaar. The company has positioned itself as a professional video-hosting service providing a low-cost service with an easy-to-use interface and serves over 1,500 companies worldwide.

Four Ways to Use Video for the Holidays

Linc Wonham — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 17:00:00 GMT

It’s that time of year where we look up from our keyboards to find the holiday season freight train barreling down on us at an alarming speed. For obvious reasons, this time of year is especially critical and demanding for online retailers.

Even during a challenging 2010 holiday season, comScore reported that consumers spent $1.03 billion online on Cyber Monday, the highest spending day of 2010. Research shows that holiday spending is on track to level with or surpass last year’s numbers, and that ecommerce sites will play a more significant role than ever in holiday revenue.

Forward-thinking retailers have video deployed on their sites and will use it as a merchandising tool during the holidays. That’s in response to consumer demand; among Invodo’s client base, Cyber Monday video views in 2010 showed a 350-percent increase over the October-November baseline.

There’s still time to make the most of the video assets you have, even if yours is among the numerous companies that implement a “code freeze” for developers during the holiday season. There’s plenty that you can do with video, so look for these opportunities to spice up your holiday sales:

1. Put Video on Category Pages
Do you have time to make one more change before your developers go into a brief hibernation? If you do, here’s a high-impact item: add video to category pages as well as product pages. Customers appreciate being able to compare products by launching videos directly from a category page.

If it is too late and a code freeze is already in place, follow one or more of the suggestions below.

2. Email Campaigns
Even during a code freeze, marketers can typically deploy and tweak landing pages for email campaigns. Brands such as Whirlpool have delivered stunning customer experiences simply by adding video to email landing pages and using an animated GIF as the call-to-action in the email. Retailers such as Golfsmith have seen a 2 to 3 times increase in click-through rate (CTR) by including video in email campaigns.

3. YouTube it
A code freeze doesn’t cool down your YouTube channel. Add a seasonal theme and optimize the YouTube descriptions for extra holiday traffic. Drive holiday YouTube visitors to your site in three ways:

a) Include a link to your site in the YouTube video description.

b) If your videos aren’t edited to include an overlay asking visitors to visit your site, consider it. By using a vanity URL, you’ll know how many additional visitors you’re delivering. You may be surprised by how many video viewers will respond.

c) A YouTube annotation on a “promoted video” (YouTube’s version of PPC) can link directly back to your site. Your rivals are driving the cost of desirable search terms up on Google. But YouTube, as the second largest search engine (ahead of Yahoo! and Bing), may be a cost-effective option.

4. Socialize it
Once you have your YouTube videos optimized to drive traffic, make sure you’re promoting them via your Facebook page and Twitter feed. By pushing your videos out through social channels, you make it easier for your brand advocates to spread the word.

The most creative merchandisers see the biggest gains during the holiday season. We may be past code freeze, but there’s still plenty of video merchandising opportunity with email campaigns, YouTube and social networks.

About the author: Craig Wax is the CEO of Invodo, leading the company’s overall market strategy, product vision and investor relationships. He brings a seasoned general management perspective to guide Invodo’s rapid growth. Craig is a frequent speaker at industry events such as the National Retail Federation’s Big Show, the Shop.org Summit and Innovation Workshop, and eTail.

Social Video's Top Trends: Short, Funny, Female

Linc Wonham — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 17:00:00 GMT

A leading online video platform recently released data that sheds light on emerging trends and usage patterns in one of the category's fastest-growing segments -- social video. The study defines social video as online video programs created for major brands, which users opt-in to watch and which they can share with others.

The findings are summarized below, as well as in this infographic from Jun Group.

The study was based on a sample of more than 13 million user-initiated video views between January 1, 2011 and September 30, 2011. The views were the result of social video campaigns created for Fortune 500 brands across a number of vertical categories including consumer packaged goods, apparel, consumer technology, retail, luxury products, fashion and beauty, sports and fitness, and auto. Key findings are as follows:

• Humor works. Humorous videos are prominent within the social video space, accounting for four-in-10 campaigns. Those who watch a humorous videos are more than three times more likely to click to a brand’s Facebook page after viewing than those who watch other types of social video content.

• Celebrities don’t guarantee engagement. Only one-in-10 social video campaigns feature a TV or movie personality, and they are actually less effective at driving brand interactions than non-celebrity videos. Celebrity videos drive 12 percent fewer visits to brands’ Facebook pages than non-celebrity videos. This data may indicate that those who watch celebrity videos are more interested in the famous personas than the brands behind them.

• Very short and long-form are most effective. Fifteen-second videos produce the best click-through rates, but they are used least. Only 10 percent of videos are 15 seconds or less, yet they are 153 percent more effective than videos between 16 seconds and one minute.

Videos of 60 seconds or more are the second-most effective format, outperforming videos between 16-60 seconds by 70 percent. This may indicate that 16 second-to-one-minute videos are not enough time to tell an engaging story.

• Girl power grows. According to Jun Group’s first study in January, women accounted for nearly 57 percent of social video views. In 2011, that number has grown to 63 percent.

• 18-44 year-olds dominate, younger people gaining interest. Sixty percent of video-watchers are between the ages of 18-44, while viewers between 12-17 years old increased by 48 percent since the beginning of 2011.

• Facebook page traffic. The social video opt-in environment is more effective in driving post-view engagement than interruptive video units, such as pre-roll. Users who opt-in to watch social videos are more than three times as likely to interact with a brand after the view, compared to pre-roll. Social videos are notably effective in driving users to a brand’s Facebook page. “Join a brand on Facebook” is the single most popular post-view interaction, accounting for 40 percent of all post-view activity.

• Social video completion. Social video programs deliver completion rates that are significantly higher than pre-roll. On average, 64 percent of users served a 30-second pre-roll video watch to completion, according to a recent study by the YuMe video advertising network. In contrast, 95 percent of users who opt-in to a social video of the same length watch to the end.

Jun Group’s distribution technology delivers millions of monthly opt-in video views across social networks, mobile devices, premium content sites and YouTube. Jun Group distributes videos from 15 seconds to 3 minutes-long with exceptionally high completion rates and significant post-view activity, such as website visits, coupon downloads, and store locator usage.

Ooyala Facebook Integration Yields Deeper Video Analytics

Linc Wonham — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 17:35:00 GMT

Online video technology provider Ooyala has integrated Facebook data into its latest real-time video analytics solution, allowing Web marketers to customize and track video performance across the segmentations that matter most to their businesses.

Custom Analytics with Business Dimension Reporting enables publishers who leverage Facebook Connect to track detailed demographic and psychographic statistics such as age, gender, hometowns and interests to create more targeted and relevant video viewing experiences for users. Marketers are now able to compare the viewing behavior of distinct audience groups such as males vs. females, Californians vs. New Yorkers, or consumers who love anime vs. those who prefer drama.

These marketers can now really drill down into specific audience segments and make quick decisions based on video performance. This level of insight makes it possible for marketers to specifically target audiences that are most likely to respond to their content, and the data is collected based on tags rather than information associated with individuals, thus protecting the users’ privacy.

“Online, panel data is dead,” says Bismarck Lepe, co-founder of Ooyala. “In a connected world, it’s all about real data that is produced in real-time. The future of targeted video campaigns will revolve around making analytics much more actionable and personalized. Our Custom Analytics offering and Facebook integration marks the beginning of this evolution.”

Ooyala has over 500 customers including global media companies and brands such as Dell, ESPN, Fremantle Media, News International, Sephora, Telegraph Media Group and Yahoo! Japan.