It’s Christmas Ad Season – but what emotions are leading brands playing on?
Yep, it’s that time of year again, that time when in true festive style we all become a little child-like, eagerly awaiting this year’s fresh batch of Christmas ads to see what beauties lie in store for us. You know it’s true don’t you? These Christmas themed ads give us a warm, cosy feeling inside, making us feel a whole range of different emotions right across the spectrum… happiness, nostalgia, thankfulness, warmth, protective, loving…..the list goes on.
However, despite watching and experiencing some of the above mentioned emotions, the question that we never stop to consider is simply, why do we react in this way? What, precisely, is it that makes us feel the way we feel when watching these ads, and what is it that makes us want to watch Christmas ads, when we quickly skip over any…
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November 7, 2014
How to measure the marketing effectiveness of video content
Your video is clocking up hundreds of views, which is great. But does that mean it’s successful?
Not necessarily.
A revved up view counter in YouTube may indicate that your video is popular, but it doesn’t tell the full story.
For example, it doesn’t tell you how many people only watched the first couple of seconds before dipping out, if they re-watched any sections or if they skipped entire parts.
Rather than watching views, you need to be measuring a much broader set of metrics.
If, like most people, you choose to host your video via YouTube, the metrics you need to consider lie deep within the analytics section of YouTube.
YouTube Analytics options
YouTube Analytics offers in-depth video data which is much more than just views.
One of the first places to start is the Traffic Source. Find out where your viewers have come from and how long they spend…
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September 29, 2014
Tools to uncover competitor video content approaches
In the past, competitor analysis meant hours of trawling through your competitors’ social media sites and building time-consuming reports.
Nowadays, SaaS based systems can do some of the hard work for you. All you need to do is log on, input your competitor details and see for yourself exactly what’s going on behind the scenes. Some systems are free and do not even require a login.
In this post you will find out about some great tools that will help you uncover great video marketing strategies and ideas.
Changing landscape of video strategy
After Google, YouTube is the internet’s second largest search engine. A growing number of viewers are beginning to subscribe to business channels too. In fact, the number of people subscribing daily has increase three-fold since 2013.
As more businesses start to tap into the power…
Don't lose sight of your brand personality your #video strategy
Storytelling has been around for millennia. As children we grew up with tales and fondly remember stories opening with 'Once upon a time…'. With this nostalgic link in mind, businesses use stories as central parts of their advertising and messaging campaigns when seeking to humanise their brands.
Source: Shutterstock
Today, social media are an ideal vehicle to distribute these stories. And with good reason, the online landscape is becoming noisier every day. Storytelling is an effective method for getting heard above the din.
On a practical level, storytelling is a great way to engage, motivate and connect with your readers. But with so much content being shared daily by so many brands, the written word just doesn’t have the same impact anymore -- particularly for the reader who has grown up expecting…
Avoid the mistakes of video marketing by using animated videos effectively
Traditional video marketing is declining in viewing popularity – this post looks at what can be done to reverse this trend and highlights animated videos as a simple, cost-effective and highly engaging way to get more eyeballs on your video content
Video marketing is becoming increasingly popular with more and more marketers using videos to get their message out there, as well as competing for as many eyeballs as possible! In fact 50% of users watch business related videos On YouTube once a week.
But whilst we’re seeing a rise in brands creating videos we’re also witnessing a slight decline in people actually viewing them. Is it because we’re now being flooded with videos and it’s becoming a saturated marketplace? Or is it because this flood is marked by boring, 'me too',, non-engaging videos
The answer is both. But while the flood…
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August 6, 2014
Techniques and tools to improve video effectiveness
Embedding video into your website is an effective way of engaging visitors and making your brand stand out in a text-heavy internet world.
In fact, the popularity of internet videos is increasing so much that by 2015, it’s estimated that videos will make up 55% of all internet traffic.
However, simply including a video in your website and hoping for the best is not enough. You need to test how well your visitors are engaging with your videos and make changes if necessary.
There are several online services that offer web performance tracking. Most offer a free trial period, with the option of upgrading at a later date.
Using Quantitative Tools to Test Performance: Google Analytics and Crazy Egg
Google Analytics profiles your users’ onsite engagement metrics. These include: average time spent on a page, average visit duration and average pages per visit.
Every time a user visits a page,…
A guide to best practices in video scripting and production to convert more prospects to customers
It happens to far too many businesses. They decide to make their first video, with the idea that it will bring in more customers, get shared by influencers, and maybe even go viral. What’s wrong with this picture? They're set to fail... To avoid this, I've taken all the mistakes I've seen made and highlighted 12 best practice tips, tools and techniques to help create a more effective, higher impact video.
1. Identify ways which highlight your video will fail - ask yourself these questions
While video can be a great medium for achieving these top-of-funnel marketing goals, I see three key ways in which this sets you up for failure:
1. ‘Bringing in customers’ and ‘engaging influencers’ tend to be slippery goals. How many more customers should it bring in? Which influencers are going to…
Is User-generated content in advertising the ultimate in brand advocacy?
"So now all we need is a load of people with cameras to tell everyone else how great our product is..."
Recently, in the US, Coke launched what’s being hailed as ‘the world’s first TV ad made completely with user-generated content’. The ad was produced by W+K and was made up of short videos filmed on the fly by real customers/brand advocates, whereby Coke asked the question: “What does it feel like when you take a sip of Coke?” And thus, the ‘AHH Effect’ ad was born…
[youtubevideoembedder id="XokGFN86ljc"]
Whilst the slight advertising cynic in me wonders whether there are a few rather contrived elements to the content, one has to temper that with the notion that hardcore Coke fans really would do all sorts of crazy sh.. for the chance to be in a TV ad with such a hugely potential reach.…
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June 17, 2014
Including video marketing examples inspired by The World Cup
A quick browse of the current Mashable Viral Video Chart reveals an unsurprising trend – with the World Cup well under way, marketers from across a wide number of industries are looking to the forthcoming tournament to generate a buzz around their products.
At the time of writing, this offering from Samsung Mobile advertising the new Galaxy S5 was leading the way over the last 7 days. (more…)…
Using video for brand storytelling
There is no shortage of people out there telling us that marketing today is all about storytelling, and that if you want people to connect with your brand, you need to tell stories that they can relate to. Of course, this is easier said than done, so in this post I wanted to introduce you to some ways of determining what story you should tell.
Making a video about your product
When you first consider making videos about your product, the natural tendency is to think about making videos that revolve around the product itself - demonstrating its features and benefits. This is our connection to traditional sales-focused advertising talking.
Here is a Fairy Liquid advert that anyone based in the UK of 30+ years should remember. It is a good example of a product-focused advert that clearly shows some awareness of the importance of ‘story’ and emotional connection –…
