• by Zoe Dowling , January 5, 2018

Figures from HubSpot earlier this year revealed that over half of marketing professionals worldwide named video as the type of content with the best ROI. But without the budgets or the means to test all this content prior to air, how can marketers ensure they are optimizing their videos for their key demographics? 

With one billion hours of video watched on YouTube, and 500 million users consuming video on Facebook on a daily basis, it’s important for marketers to understand the differences in the engagement with and appeal of video between different generations. With so much content being pushed out through these channels, pre-testing is just not an option, so guidelines can minimize wasted marketing budget. 

Millennials, the Video Generation

Not surprisingly, our data revealed that online video is integrated with the daily habits of the younger generation compared to older generations. While Gen X and Boomers both watch videos to a high degree, it is Millennials that do the bulk of video consuming and sharing. Sixty-three percent of Millennials are consuming video content on a daily basis compared to 50% of Gen Xers and 30% of Baby Boomers.

Forty-two percent of Millennials reported having posted or shared an online video with someone in the past month. While Facebook and YouTube are the most used, video sharing also takes place on Twitter and Instagram, with 41% and 38% of Millennials reporting they shared videos on Instagram and Twitter, respectively.  

When it comes to the types and themes of videos shared, Millennials had a higher propensity to share across the entire spectrum of content, with the exception of pet/animal content, the only category that Boomers share more than the other two generations. The study found that in some categories, there was little to separate the generations; sports clips, for instance, have only a 6% variance for the different generations in terms of the type of content they like to share, the same with news clips, although Millennials are slightly less likely to share news than Gen X and Boomers.

However, some content types such a movie trailers see a much higher variance in user search; 58% of Millennials like to share movie trailers on social media, compared to 47% of Gen Xers and only 30% of Boomers.  Millennials were also far more likely to share entertainment, educational, and health and fitness content, whereas Gen Xers were more likely to share music content and Baby Boomers more likely to share pet/animal content than Millennials. 

Furthermore, the study found that 62% of Millennials are more likely to share content they find fun or exciting, compared to 48% of Gen Xers and 49% of Boomers, whereas slightly more Gen Xers are more likely to share content that’s funny than the other two generations, while all three generations score similar for sharing entertaining content. 

Merging Online & Offline Worlds

When it comes to reasons for sharing, Millennials are more likely to share because the content is part of an ongoing conversation they are having, but both Millennials and Boomers are more likely to share because they felt the content might be of interest or entertaining to someone else. The study also found that video sharing among Millennials tends to be more intimate, with the younger generation sharing more often but with fewer people. They are more selective with whom they share, which supports the idea that the boundary between real and virtual for Millennials is less defined than older generations, who tend to share across their whole network. 

As marketers build marketing plans for different generations, guidelines that explore what resonates more with certain generations can optimize marketing budgets in a world of marginal gains. What’s more, the link between the in-real-life and virtual conversations for the younger generations can play a key part in the success of a multi-channel digital marketing campaign.