We’re in an age where it’s never been easier to create an online brand presence and e-commerce business (thanks to Instagram, Amazon and dropshipping). This, coupled with an already increasingly integrated world due to globalisation, has resulted in an oversaturated social media feeds.
Social Strategy 101: What’s Driving Demand For Videos?
As social media platforms noticed the increase in the popularity of videos, their algorithms are designed to push these videos to the top of feeds. Video captures the user's attention for longer, so it performs better against algorithms. Whether it’s Instagram, Facebook, or LinkedIn, video content normally appears within the first ten seconds of logging in. If brands want to cut through the noise and stay relevant in a cluttered feed, putting out engaging videos on their brand stories or reels of products allows you to do this.
Social strategies benefit from the use of videos on Instagram and TikTok because the algorithms keep the videos in feeds for even longer than a regular post and especially in comparison to a story, which disappears after 24 hours. On the search pages on Instagram and the For You Page on TikTok, Reels and videos stay in the suggested posts for users for months at a time, because when it is first posted, they generally result in more interactions and shares allowing them to stay in social media ecosystems for longer. Again cutting through a heavily saturated page to reach ideal customers, building follower counts and ultimately sales.
WHAT'S THE DRIVING DEMAND FOR VIDEOS?
HOW DOES THIS AFFECT BRAND SOCIAL MEDIA?
VIDEO REACH
An honest and open conversation around products has grown in recent years and changed the tone of the conversation from hard sales; people no longer want to be sold to by paid ads on Facebook and Google. Consumers are craving authenticity and originality.
They want transparent conversations around the products they buy and videos allow this. Pictures and words absolutely have their place in branding and design, and a brand couldn’t be a brand without them. However, on social media, videos humanise brands and creators that, previously in a digital world, have seemed somewhat opaque and distant. Consumers and users are able to see the people and voices behind the brands and build an honest and true connection. It mimics personal interactions, which consumers could only previously get in stores, and even then it would be with a shop assistant or floor manager as opposed to a live Q&A with a founder, or video content behind the scenes at luxury brands headquarters. This personal connection converts into true brand loyalty. When your consumer trusts you, what your brand stands for and your work practices. It taps into a deeper emotional connection; a connection that can’t simply be broken by a competing brand’s Instagram post.
With the steady rise in TikTok and YouTube popularity as well as the use of reels in recent years, all signs are pointing to videos as a clear social media must for brands to keep their posts relevant.
As millennials grew up playing with Gameboys and nursing Tamagotchis, Gen Z grew up on YouTube. What started as an easy way for parents to placate children through educational and interactive videos on YouTube, has turned YouTube into Gen Z’s go-to social media platform, and consequently video form as their choice of content, which explains the leap to video-sharing platform TikTok.
GenZ may have kickstarted this video trend, but millennials and even boomers have quickly picked up on the benefits of watching videos too. By 2018, studies showed that 54% of consumers wanted to see more video content from the brands or businesses they support and, since then, video has continued to grow in popularity across every channel, including Facebook and LinkedIn. In 2019, users spent a weekly average of 6 hours and 48 minutes watching online videos, a 59% increase from 2016 which has resulted in YouTube growing faster than any other platform, including TikTok, with more than 5 billion videos consumed every day. After Google, it is the second most visited website online.
Naturally, social media platforms responded to the data they were seeing, with Meta’s Head of Instagram, Adam Mosseri, confirming that their main focus would be improving video sharing opportunities on Instagram due to the increased amount of video across all platforms, this was, of course, announced through a live video on Instagram.
Videos on Instagram generate more engagement than any other type of content and Tweets with videos see up to ten 10x more engagement - as reported by Later analytics, a social media scheduling platform. Consequently, these platforms are pushing video features even more.
VIDEO SALES
Whilst creating quality video content may be more time-consuming than taking a simple photograph, it pays later in dividends. Videos can be repurposed across multiple platforms as the format is the same on Instagram reels and TikTok, generating a greater reach to consumers which is often converted into sales. Later analytics reported that Pinterest users are 2.6 times more likely to make a purchase after viewing a brand's video on the platform and 93% of marketers on the platform credit video content to securing a new client or customer by products being broadcast in a live stream or curated through a dynamic video.
As the digital age continues to take charge, video is only set to rise in popularity. The brand that pivots to include video content in its social strategy is the one that will continue to break through the social feeds, to resonate with its customers in a personable, real and transparent way.
Whilst creating quality video content may be more time-consuming than taking a simple photograph, it pays later in dividends. Videos can be repurposed across multiple platforms as the format is the same on Instagram reels and TikTok, generating a greater reach to consumers which is often converted into sales. Later analytics reported that Pinterest users are 2.6 times more likely to make a purchase after viewing a brand's video on the platform and 93% of marketers on the platform credit video content to securing a new client or customer by products being broadcast in a live stream or curated through a dynamic video.
As the digital age continues to take charge, video is only set to rise in popularity. The brand that pivots to include video content in its social strategy is the one that will continue to break through the social feeds, to resonate with its customers in a personable, real and transparent way.
Consumer feeds are full of similar brands offering a similar product in a similar packaging, which explains (partly) why only 1 in 5 start up brands succeed. Quality digital campaigns and relevant social strategy have never been more vital in an ever-evolving digital world. But how do brands cut through the noise to distinguish themselves from the next post on a feed?
In contrast to the traditional, analog marketing strategy through print, which, of course, has its own intricacies, social apps are updating daily, data is processed in real time through algorithms and apps are constantly responding to the analytics they receive. All social media platforms share the sole aim, which is to keep users hooked and on their sites for longer. So if a brand’s posts aren’t keeping users engaged, algorithms won’t push these to the top.
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