Online video is going to be crucial to the success of luxury brand marketing going forward. How can we be so sure? Well, there are 3 key factors that are fueling its growing adoption:
Video Consumption Online is Growing
According to ComScore, 33m unique viewers in the UK consumed online video content in January – that’s over 1/2 the UK population. 22 million, about 1/3 of the population, consumed video ads in the same month. Video consumption is popular, and on the rise.
What’s driving the growth? The popularity of catch up and other video-on-demand services are certainly playing their part, driving an increasing convergence between the PC and the TV. And with 50% of households able to connect their TV to the internet – either because they have a games console or an internet ready TV - this popularity is only going to grow. In fact, forecasts predict that by 2019 on-demand video viewing will have overtaken live TV viewing, with only TV blockbusters such as The X-Factor and major sporting events attracting significant live audiences.
This ‘hyper fragmentation’ of the traditional TV audience and their migration online suddenly makes them much more accessible and targetable by luxury advertisers who may not have been able to afford to play in the ‘TV’ market before.
And research indicates that the online video advertising audience is an attractive one for premium and luxury brands. ComScores stats show that there were almost as many video ad consumers aged 45+ (7.4m) as there were aged 15-34 (8.8m) in January. Earlier studies have shown that consumers of online video are better educated and have a higher level of household income than average too.
Online Video Ads are Highly Effective
Online videos ads are the most effective form of online display advertising.
Figures from online ad server MediaMind show that video ads are up to twice as effective in terms of engagment than traditional banner ads, and audiences are engaged with them for up to 39% longer.
A further study by Nielsen found that online ads delivered high levels of overall recall (65% vs. 46% for TV) and message recall, and had a marked impact on brand metrics such as brand preference and purchase intent.
So not only does online video make attractive audiences accessible to premium and luxury brands, it also offers a highly effective way to engage and persuade them to purchase products.
Video Commerce Works
The burgeoning area of video ecommerce seems to have huge potential too, according to the results of a recent initiative by Jaegar.
Three full length catwalk videos from London Fashion Week were encoded on Jaegar’s site to allow visitors to ’shop the catwalk’. In these videos, products were highlighted by a subtle greyed out box as the model moved down the runway – each of these highlighted products was clickable to purchase.
Jaegar observed a 27% engagment rate across all the videos, an overall click thru rate of 13% and, most remarkable, an increase in basket size of over 300% from those who purchased via the video.
So online video can deliver relevant and accessible audiences, can render online advertising more effective and can swell average basket size when used to support ecommerce. Combine this with its undoubted ability to effectively convey luxury brand offerings in a high quality way and you have a compelling case for investment.
Combine some of these factors - for example, delivering video commerce within online advertising so consumers can purchase products without having to leave your ad – and things really start to get interesting.
Now can you see why we were so sure that online video is the future?
