Online Video Effectiveness at generating leads and sales
eMarketer says US companies will spend double on online video production in 2010 compared to 2008. Spend is also being diverted away from tv. (source: Clickz)
But what does this massive growth mean for the corporate marketing manager?
A recent study by Yahoo and Warner Brothers states the most engaging online advertising video productions translate into:
- high satisfaction for users
- high brand recall for advertisers
- and a greater inclination for consumers to seek product information (source mediapost)
In addition, eyeblaster worldwide state that online video achieves more than 2.5 times the interaction rate achieved by other Rich Media online advertising, ie, flash (see eyeblaster)
Video creative is critical here.
But companies are planning to double their spend because they know that engaging video wins online customers and, in addition, it wins 250% more clicks than flash or a banner.
Conclusion: Video dwarfs flash.
Google's view on online video
Google's view can't be ignored.
Google make over $20BN per year, and it's growing around 20% year on year (source: Google)
They make these vast sums of money from selling web advertising, including online video ads.
And they own YouTube.
Google don't make a public case for proving that online video production increases website performance. They know this already, and use it themselves.
Google's biggest concern is to help companies be more successful with their websites because then they'll spend more on web advertising.
One of the main ways they do this is by providing free web metrics, like Google Analytics.
Google say that a key website metric is Bounce Rate.
Bounce Rate is the % of visitors who arrive at a web page and leave without exploring the site further. They arrive – and just go!
Google say "It's really hard to get a bounce rate under 20%, while anything over 35% is cause for concern, and 50% or above is worrying.” (source: Wikipedia)
This clearly suggests that any company with a key web page, and a 35% or more bounce rate, is haemorrhaging web visitors, and should urgently take steps to stop this as it's costing them money.
Combine this with what we already know, that an engaging online video production wins 250% more clicks than flash and banners.
It clearly suggests that an online video production will reduce bounce rates.
Google's actions directly support this view.
They recently added Event Tracking to measure online video plays to their free Google Analytics web statistics package.
Incidentally, Google Analytics is increasingly being used by Times 1000 companies who no longer wish to pay high prices to understand customer web activity.
Conclusion: Google provide online video metrics to help you reduce your bounce rate
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