Online Video and Social Media: That's a Marriage Made in Marketing Heaven

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Maybe it has been like this forever, but I’m just noticing now that when I visit Facebook, there’s virtually not one poster who’s not including content with their comment--usually a video or just a photo that has come from some Website. The plain fact is that online video and social media are a perfect match.  

A new report from the Boston-based online news and content marketing agency Brafton, made that same point eloquently a few days ago when it advised its content marketing clients to add video—heavily---to the mix of what they provide to their end users because it will inevitably be re-circulated on social media.

In short, their report gives three reasons businesses should rely increasingly on video marketing.  People watch it. People share it. And, presuming your brand provides good video, making it adaptable to social media sites sets your brand apart from competitors.

As proof of the first point—that we can’t get enough video—Brafton notes the phenomenal fact that the average viewer watched 1,182 minutes of video in November alone, according to comScore.

 Brafton reported another poll that found Web video ads have impacted purchases for half of all American consumers. (It’s easy to check the Truth-o-meter on that one today, a day before Christmas. That stat works for me.)

Secondly, social media sites are a showcase. If you make it, folks will share it, like crazy. The Brafton report notes that last month, Facebook users watched more than 340 million videos, again according to comScore. And according to data from AddThis, sharing on Facebook grew by 18%, and an even more astounding 55% on Twitter.

As a final point, Brafton says marketers are missing big fat opportunities by not providing video that is likely to be drift along to millions of Facebook and other social media users. It quotes Nielsen’s State of Social Media Report to note when that PC are on the Internet, they’re on Facebook 17% of the time.

Obviously, that’s a place marketers want their videos be hanging around.  

A fun companion read to this number-based essay is a thoughtful piece by Brafton’s Andrew McDonald who notes that while social networks make us feel part of a community, they also force a user to come to realize that “although we may be connected in unfathomable ways to the biological and physical world around us, our singular kind of puny perspectives always sets us apart.”

That, McDonald also theorizes, is why silly videos catch on. He reflects on the comic style of Jerry Seinfeld who made millions of us laugh with observations that begin, “Don’t you hate it when…” followed by a humorous perception of common quirks. Odd viral videos have the same attraction. That's what makes them viral. 

“The more inane something is, the more it seems to be shared….The dumber the content is, the more empowering and humanizing it is to participate and admit that you like it, ” McDonald says. He might have a point. I can’t get over a friend’s post yesterday of an artist’s depiction of Kevin Bacon--made out of bacon.  I’ll send you a link. Then pass it on.

pjbednarski@comcast.net

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1 comment on "Online Video and Social Media: That's a Marriage Made in Marketing Heaven ".

1. Herb Lair from CUO,Inc.
   

   commented on: December 24, 2012 at 10:31 a.m.
   Behavioral Based Social Media System for the Cable TV Market Cable has long history of failing to develop 1-1 target marketing,touted as the Holy Grail of targeted advertising and was less than a success. http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2011/01/03/the-56-billion-ad-question/ Excerpt from above link on January, 2011 Fortune.com – “Advertisers will spend $56 billion putting ads on TV this year...The cable industry thought it would be a big opportunity too, but its efforts have fallen short." http://www.businessinsider.com/jason-kilar-here-are-my-thoughts-on-hulu-and-the-future-of-tv-2011-2 Excerpt from above link “Advertisers have weighed in heavily on the future of TV, with both their thoughts and their considerable wallets. Advertisers are increasingly expecting to present their advertising messages to just their desired audience…and not to anyone else. For over 60 years, video advertising could only be bought via a TV show’s projected audience, which served as a blunt proxy for a certain target audience. The result has been many wasted impressions and an often irrelevant experience for consumers. In the near future, advertisers will demand the ability to target their messages to people rather than targeting their messages to TV shows as proxies for people.” The obvious alternative, with the least cost to implement is an independent Cloud CRM solution designed to cross index cable subscriber households with their corresponding social network interests. The current regulatory and privacy issues experienced by cable TV operators gathering unauthorized data from set-top boxes could be minimized, by validating subscriber and even eliminated by essentially having an opt-in plan (provided conveniently by the social media). Access along with profile and interests of households would be controlled by the subscriber’s social media platform of choice. Facebook has high consumer acceptance and could be used for household profiles, product interests, social interests, and viewing entertainment interests. There would be incentives to the subscribers to opt-in including notification and reminder of viewing favorites, Groupon type ads, and specific ads matching interests with infomercial type group discounts and urgency to buy. The current design of target marketing advertising ventures is fundamentally flawed. They focus on demographics, and fail to identify the individual behavioral current and future household interests. Project would involve developing a bidirectional Cloud interface program using a CRM application between the social media and MSO subscriber records and communicating behavioral marketing - business advertising, discounts, specific videos/groups, family albums – providing subscriber awareness of TV programming -- movies, products, etc. similar to Amazon and Groupon. This would make subscriber stickier and substantially reduce turnover.

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