Online video content, just for the sake of it, has as much substance as the emperor’s new clothes. The latest Authority Report from parse.ly suggests it is the LEAST engaging format for posting online.
It’s easy to understand why, on the face of it, video is so attractive. It’s cool. A shiny bauble that consumers and CEOs love.
YouTube is busy racking up billions of views each month. And budget dedicated to producing branded content for it is also increasing exponentially.
Nielsen reports that 64% of marketers expect video to dominate their future strategies. Video ad spend in the UK is set to hit £1billion this year (from £771million in 2015).
But we are drowning in footage. Far too many campaigns are ill-conceived vanity projects. So much of this is money down the drain.
The parse.ly report shows that video is 30% less engaging than a simple post of a few hundred words. Shocking, huh?
The most common fails are a result of poor planning; creatives; reliance on auto-play and slow load times.
Long-form content (more than 1,000 well-crafted words) and slideshows, or galleries (with fewer than 200 words) generate the highest levels of engagement.
And therefore offer far bigger bang for your marketing buck.
The former is a good source of growth, it attracts new visitors to media sites and doubles the engagement compared to articles of 200-600 words.
While slideshows are a great hook for bringing in Facebook traffic. And they are a great format for brands looking to produce more than simple text content.
Both these formats allow brands to be authoritative and own their subject. This is essential in the online space.
So while video is undoubtedly the next big thing. Dedicating the lion’s share of your marketing budget to it may not be the smartest thing to do.