How big is the impact of video in today’s digital environment? According to a new report by Animoto, 93% of marketers say video is responsible for landing them a new customer.
When it comes to consumers and social media, video is first with everything else coming in second. This essentially means brands and marketers have to take a video-first approach when they are looking to reach their audience on social media.
As small businesses increase their digital presence with social media, video has to play a bigger role. Because video consumption will only grow in the coming years as 5G networks are rolled out and speed is no longer a factor.
Animoto carried out an online survey with the participation of consumers and marketers. For the consumer side of the survey, 1,017 respondents participated with the goal of finding out how they interacted with video and brands on social media.
On the marketer’s side of the survey, there were 501 participants who revealed how they use social media and video to connect with customers.
Consumers
In the consumer survey Animoto was looking to find out how consumer engage with video from brands, what they like, what they want to hear from brands, and what do they want more of?
When consumers are making a purchasing decision, 73% said they have been impacted by a brand’s social media presence. Forty-five percent said video is their number one favorite type of content to see from brands, with photos coming in second at 22%, followed by links at 13%, and text at 10%.
How does social media compare to TV? For millennials, 57% of consumers watch more video ads on social media than on TV, but it goes down to 46% for the rest of consumers.
Social media is also responsible for allowing consumers to discover brands. This is primarily driven by the fact close to a third of the respondents or 32% take a look at a brand’s social media before they even go to a website.
When they do watch a video from brands, 45% said it was responsible for the first introduction to the brand/product before they make a purchase. Another 31% said it was based on recommendations from friends, Facebook Groups was next at 30%, and sponsored influencer posts were last at 29%.
As to the best platform for watching social media videos from brands, Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram took the top three spots in that order.
When consumers are watching, the top three types of branded videos they like best are how-to videos, videos about sales and promos, and top five lists.
Marketers
The majority of marketers or 73% said they created at least two videos a month for social media marketing. When they do create the video, 93% said it drives results in the form of getting a new customer.
Video also gets the best ROI for their social media marketing effort for 63% of marketers. This was followed by 56% who said photos/graphics, 25% blog posts, 23% texts/quotes, and 22% infographics.
As to the challenges of using video, marketers identified the time it takes to make the videos, the complexity of video creating tools, and the budget as the top three.
You can take a look at the rest of the data for both the consumer and marketer’s side of the survey in the infographics below.
Consumer’s Social Video Trends Infographic
Marketer’s Social Video Trends Infographic
Image: Animoto