• by Laurie Sullivan , Staff Writer @lauriesullivan, April 7, 2015

U.S. digital video advertising spend will reach $14.38 billion by 2019 -- up from $7.77 billion this year, per eMarketer. Cisco Systems estimates that video content will represent between 80% and 90% of global consumer Internet traffic by 2018. The two trends feed into several insights found in a report released Tuesday, such as how much responsibility digital media teams take for social media buys.

Yes, it's a stretch, but think about it. Many of the digital media teams include search experts. This year, more brands plan to run video ads on Facebook compared with YouTube, which reverses the trend seen in 2014, per a study released Tuesday. The Mixpo survey of 125 U.S. agency, brand, and publisher executives compared results from January 2015 with January 2014, and found that video views per person on Facebook rose 91%, compared with 9.9% decrease on YouTube.

The study identifies at least two new Facebook features that seem to feed into the reversal and make it more appealing for search engine marketers to use, in my opinion. The two most familiar features highlight the ability to create remarketing audiences from video watchers, and the ability to buy ads in an auction marketplace. 

The report points to people-based marketing as a significant differentiator for video ads on Facebook, as well as Twitter. It gives brands the ability to use individual user IDs for targeting and attribution, without having to actually provide the user data to the advertisers. Cross-targeting devices without depending on third-party deleted or expired cookies, analyzing behavioral data per individual from inside and outside of Facebook, are among others, as well as attributing movement based on view through and/or click-through -- even in mobile, including mobile apps and without passing on personally identifiable information (PII) to advertisers.

In another interesting observation regarding Facebook's support of social marketing, the report shows that 83% of companies running ads on the site do not appoint the social team as the primary ad planner. Of those surveyed, only 17 of the respondents' social teams drove the primary planning. The responsibility falls under the digital media team.

Engagement has become the most important metric when measuring video advertisements, with 47% of survey participants rating it No. 2. This was followed by shares with 43%, conversions at 40%, total time spent watching at 38%, and views rounding out the top five at 4%. 

Despite all this, yet the study reveals that nearly half of respondents spend less than 10% of their digital media budget in social.