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February 15 2008

Video’s overrated

Online video isn’t the captivating vehicle that it’s cracked up to be

If you’re thinking about putting video on your site then keep it short, very short. According to the latest comScore research the majority of video users watch much less than an hour of online video a month, and even the heaviest users only watch less than 30 minutes a day.

The research was designed to understand the consumption habits and mindsets of Internet video users as they relate to online video, TV, and advertising and content across both media. The results revealed differences in orders of magnitude: the heaviest viewers (top 20 percent of viewers) averaged 841 minutes – (14 hours)of online viewing per month, while moderate viewers (next 30 percent) averaged 77 minutes, and the lightest viewers (bottom 50 percent) watched just 6 minutes each.

“The difference in consumption levels was astounding. The usage differences are reminiscent of the early days of the Internet,” said Jarvis Mak, VP of Research and Insight at Media Contacts. “However, the networks’ online distribution of first-run content will go a long way to bridging the gaps between heavy, moderate, and light viewers.”

YouTube is the common thread among the heavy, moderate, and light segments – it is the top video site for all three and reaches the most overall video viewers (54 percent reach).

by Marcus Austin (Web Editor)

This article is tagged as: YouTube Video

Online Video

Posted by Matt Thorpe - Ecommerce Manager at 2008-11-21 03:37
It is true that individuals do not spend hours watching streaming video at this moment in time. Online video is still in it's infancy and will play a major part in the future of e-commerce. Once retailers grasp how powerful this tool can be in terms of conversion we will see people spending more time watching video. Selling on the web is all about delivering targeted and useful information to customers when they want it. Video reinforces products messages, brand and enables you to deliver key USPs. Embrace it now before the competition do but make sure it is relevant and useful to your customers.


Selling online using video increases ROI

Posted by Jim Haysom at 2008-11-21 05:41
From my own experience buying online, having product videos enables you to get a much better look at a product than a 2D image, more often than not, not as enlarged as one would want. Video allows you to have audio descriptions, zoomed in areas of the product features, and better opportunity to see the quality of a product. Funnily enough, it's an area that few online retailers are exploiting, and would image it's down to resource and budget that is the barrier. Why haven't the shopping search engines steam rollered this yet? Imagine a central website that has SKU based products, appliances, electronics, computing, etc, and a product video review as well as consumer editorial. Bingo.

As an individual selling online, e.g. eBay, product videos have worked wonders for increasing the number of bidders and watchers of products. One example can be seen here, http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&Item=130196135189

I wouldn't say video is overrated, more that it's under utilised - in the area of ecommerce alone.


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