2018 was a great year for online video. As a format, video has well and truly cemented itself as the king of content.
There are so many awesome and inventive concepts doing the rounds at the moment and creators of all kinds can share video more inexpensively than ever.
Video is also an undeniably powerful marketing medium. YouTube is the world’s second largest search engine after all – larger than Bing, AOL, Yahoo, and Ask combined! And on top of that, tech giant Cisco predict that video content will account for 82% of internet traffic by 2021.
Could 2019 be the year your business starts harnessing the marketing power of video? Let’s look at some of the growing video trends that’ll take us through 2019 and beyond!
360-Degree Video & Virtual Reality
As VR technology prices decrease, more and more of us now have access to virtual reality headsets in our own homes. At the same time, it’s becoming cheaper to produce 360-degree videos too. These two factors could be a match made in heaven for marketers.
You can enjoy 360-degree video from most devices, either with or without a VR headset; YouTube and Facebook both support headset and on-screen 360 viewing. 360-degree video can be used in a wide array of industries with a bit of inventiveness; however it’s really come into its own in the realm of tourism marketing.
Pair a 360-degree camera with a drone, and you’ve got the potential for amazing fly-over footage…
Or simply for use around the office for immersive “behind the scenes” potential…
Though this format has the highest potential price tag for both creators and viewers, it still has a considerable novelty factor that may set you apart from the competition.
Social Live Streaming
Thankfully our next trend is much more affordable – all you need is a smartphone or tablet, an internet connection, and an account on any social media platform that supports live video (as most of the big players do nowadays). If you fulfil these basic criteria, you can broadcast live video from anywhere you like, sharing it with followers from around the world. This obviously has significant marketing applications.
Live video streaming can provide an essential human touch to your business. You get to candidly chat and share ideas with your followers, provide a live look behind the scenes, and answer incoming queries on the fly. Followers from across the globe can get to know you and your company personally.
Square Video Formats Prioritise Mobile
More and more people are consuming video through mobile – and especially through mobile-based social media apps. This understandably has a knock-on effect on the shape and format in which video is presented across platforms.
Many social media platforms – including Facebook and Instagram – favour square shaped video formats, so if you’re looking to focus on social video then it’s finally hip to be square!
Also worth noting is that Facebook and Instagram autoplay videos within feeds without audio unless the user opts to switch it on, so you may want to focus on visuals and provide explanations through stylised in-video text allowing viewers to appreciate the content silently.
Ecommerce Video Applications
We’ve all been there – deciding whether or not to buy a product online because mere photos don’t do the item justice. If you’re an online retailer and you haven’t harnessed the power of video in your product descriptions yet, you may be missing a trick.
Video gives you the opportunity to demonstrate your product thoroughly, and gives the viewer a more practical understanding of your items. Additionally, 96% of consumers find video helpful when making buying decisions (Source: Animoto).
Using video comes with a couple of other benefits too. Firstly, if you’re showing people how to use your product correctly from the outset, you’re less likely to receive complaints from customers who are using it incorrectly. And secondly, when you upload your videos through public sharing platforms like YouTube and Vimeo, then there’s a chance that people may stumble across your branded video content whilst idly browsing.
It’s also worth considering how social video content is also becoming increasingly shopper-friendly with “swipe-to-buy” functions available on Instagram Stories and Snapchat video ads.
Machine Learning & Subtitles – Making Video More Searchable
If you’ve ever selected closed caption subtitles on YouTube, chances are you’ve seen how the platform can provide “auto-generated” captions, formulated through AI and machine learning. As with anything of this ilk, they’re not 100% accurate all of the time but they do a pretty good job.
Providing accurate subtitles for your videos can be great from an SEO perspective. Search crawlers can’t read video content visually, so they rely on any textual content associated with a video. This means that search engines read the title, description, tags, and – you guessed it – the subtitles provided. Accurate captions are essential for YouTube SEO.
The quickest and cheapest way to provide accurate YouTube closed captions is to edit the automated caption track manually; it’s far easier than inputting everything from scratch! Want to know how? Here’s today’s bonus tip…
How to edit the auto generated closed captions on YouTube
Visit YouTube.com on a desktop machine and log in. Click on your channel icon on the top right and select “YouTube Studio”. This will take you to your channel’s dashboard. From here, choose “Videos” from the menu on the left and pick a video whose captions you’d like to edit by clicking on its title.
Once this page has loaded, hit “Advanced” and head to “Subtitles and CC”. Click the 3 dots next to the CC track you’d like to edit and choose “Edit on Classic Studio”. This page will visually display your current auto-generated subtitles alongside the video. Just hit the “Edit” button in the top right and edit away! Don’t forget to click “Publish Edits” when you’re done.
So there’s our top 5 video marketing trends that small business should harness in 2019. I hope you’re not camera shy! Video is a valuable marketing avenue, and one that certainly shows no signs of stopping as we move into the new year.
