"The video killed the radio star, the video killed the radio star, we can not go back, we went too far."
First released in 1979, the famous song has been raised to the top of 16 international music. Ironically, when MTV was launched two years later, "Video Killed the Star Radio" became the first song to honor television screens in a new format that would change the industry forever: music video.
When a door closes, a new door opens
Nowhere is this more true than in the world of video. In 2016, Ericsson reported (PDF) that, although the viewing time of fixed-screen video has decreased by 2.5 hours globally since 2012, total video consumption has increased by 1.5 hour.
While cynics lament the "death of television," avant-garde brands and marketers can enjoy unprecedented access to consumers where it matters most. We are quickly entering a new golden age of video, with more consumers on more devices that watch more video content than ever before.
The number of Internet users continues to grow, just as time spent online, and the consumption of content is shifting to the mobile, which now accounts for nearly 70% of the time of digital media. Two-thirds of consumers under the age of 35 report using online streaming, while movies and television viewing are down.
Consumers can use new tools to find their content, but they are tuning more than ever before. Online video content is also becoming more popular, with a Cisco study predicting that by 2021, video will account for 82% of mainstream traffic.
Although this may mean the end of video consumption as we know it, brands should be excited about the emerging marketing opportunities presented by the new age of video.
The value of the video
Television and other traditional content sources are still the most reliable, but the perceived reliability of online advertising – and in particular video content – is increasing as younger generations of Internet users enter on the market. Moreover, this confidence often results in action. Think With Google research reveals that 56% of Gen C users responded after seeing ads on YouTube.
While marketers worry that the consumption of mobile Internet content will reduce their impact, the truth is that mobile digital video is quickly becoming the best way to reach an audience. Mobile video not only quickly becomes the preferred type of content, but it retains public attention better than television, which is not surprising, given the number of distractions that disrupt the audience. listen to the television.
New challenges of a new media
As with any new development, the transition to digital video presents serious challenges for marketers. Advertising blockers aside (the real problem with commercials is not that they're there, that's they're boring or disruptive), consumers expect an experience always more personalized. Internet users can easily find the content they want, and can just as easily go elsewhere if they do not like what they see.
The good news is that with the evolution of technology, marketers can tailor content to individual consumers with increasing accuracy just as much as users can organize their own virtual world independently. Advances in content targeting and scalability allow brands to create and serve ads in the form best suited for retention and impact on the media or platform.
Building a winning video strategy begins with five simple steps
1. Start with a great idea.
Everything does not change in this new MAdTech world. As always, memorability, retransmission and action all depend on a good story.
It starts with a "big idea" that touches the heart of a problem that the product solves, or a vision of the brand and its role in everyday life. Once this "storyline" has been developed, brands can take advantage of it by explaining how they solve the problem or how to overcome the challenge.
Stories should be succinct and economical. The consumer's attention is in decline, but, more importantly, simplicity translates into digestibility. To this end, stories should be seen as incarnations of the virtue of the mark, rather than as entertainment accompanying a message. Remember that creative expression is responsible for 75% of the impact of an ad.
2. Customize to the context.
Where you tell a story can be just as important as the way you say it. Announcing the end of a drought amid the devastation caused by a recent flood will probably not produce the desired results. Placing an ad in a context where the product's value is clear – flood insurance during a rainstorm – increases the conceptual fluidity of the ad, bringing home the viewer's need for the product .
Better still, proper contextualization prepares an audience, allowing users to mentally process the ad more easily by relying on a pre-existing stream of thought.
Above all, it is important to remember that viewers approach the media with intent. Rather than going through the content of a publication, consumers access specific content that is relevant to them at that time.
Contextual ads are less intrusive and reduce mental pressure on the viewer. They can also benefit from the halo effect: the openness and perception of media content influence their reaction to the advertisements that accompany them.
3. Tie everything together.
One of the most obvious constraints of the new form is the length. Instead of compressing content into smaller and smaller parcels, brands should synthesize a story system linking discrete content vehicles into a larger narrative. Each piece operates independently, encoding specific brand values, while responding to a global vision of the brand. Consumers can then interact with the content that suits them best without losing sight of the overall vision of the brand.
Story systems facilitate non-linear consumption and processing, allowing users to connect multiple facets of the brand. They also promote a holistic approach to marketing content, in which the product's usefulness, brand narrative and consumer interests come together. Bringing these often disconnected narrative components into a functional whole helps brands integrate their story more consistently into the consumer's content experience.
4. Fail smart.
One must expect failures in such a dynamic area, and an exploratory state of mind is essential to long – term success. A good formula to use is 70-20-10: the foundation of a successful strategy is the known (70% of the budget), but the integration of the content or techniques you think will work ( 20%), and even a few that you only hope (10 percent), can help test new ideas while mitigating risk.
Although success, whether measured by brand purchases or fairness, will still be the main objective of advertising, learning and l '. adaptation are also essential for the growth of the brand.
5. Ask the right questions.
In the midst of a host of new and tailored advertising metrics, it may be tempting to try to incorporate them all, but not all metrics are created in the same way, and more is rarely better . Brands must choose the measures that best evaluate the components of their strategy that they want to improve, and how they want to improve them.
Once selected, these measures must be continually reevaluated as part of a perpetual learning system, where new knowledge informs the path of future research and experimentation.
The most important thing to recognize from any metric is that it involves a direction of change. Measuring points of view will help a brand to increase its audience, but will leave the consumer's attention totally irrelevant.
Visibility, impact and context are good starting points, as they are essential to successful campaigns, but it is also important to understand if the message is clear, if viewers are attentive and if this attention is reflected in actions. increase in the value of the brand.
Intelligent film
Television may be dead (or maybe not yet), but smart marketers, platforms, and agencies will ensure a bright future by following consumers in a new era of video. Real challenges are associated with this media revolution, but they are also striking growth opportunities.
First and foremost, brands must become more and more responsive to consumers and their way of interacting with the media by building a strong experimental framework that allows for more and more targeted evolution of their brands. video strategy.
Some opinions expressed in this article may be those of a guest author and not necessarily Marketing Land. The authors of the staff are listed here.
