Online video has evolved, but has your brand’s comms strategy?

Creators of branded social content are led by the social networks themselves. Work carried out behind closed doors by techies in the San Francisco Bay Area has a wider impact for the marketing industry at large. A couple of developments over the last few years have contributed massively to the ballooning popularity of social video for marketers.

In 2014, Facebook altered its algorithm to boost video content that was uploaded within Facebook directly, and penalise content from external sources (like YouTube or Vimeo). Therefore, content uploaded to Facebook directly would be delivered to more news feeds than content posted via YouTube.

Then, in March 2015, Periscope was released, an app allowing users to broadcast whatever was going on around them live to the world. Almost immediately, Facebook began working on its own version, and rolled out Facebook Live for verified accounts in August that same year. Eight months later in April 2016, it was rolled out for every user. Facebook’s feature had an advantage over Periscope too; the videos are automatically saved to the user’s Facebook account to be viewed later. This was another key moment; allowing marketers instant access to a brand's fans and followers through the highly engaging medium of video. And if you think that means you just get your phone out and start recording, you’re not thinking big enough. Using Facebook API, you can now use a mixture of different video and audio sources, bringing high production values to your live video. When it’s done right, it’s like having a mini-TV studio that you control from within the Facebook app.

What was the social video landscape like in 2016?

As far as Facebook goes, video is hugely important; they reported in January 2016 that 500 million people watch videos on the platform every day. The news feed is still heavily populated by video content, and they’re exploring new ways to monetise it. Rumours suggest that they’re testing mid-roll adverts on video content, whereby adverts are played after 20 seconds of a video. The ad revenue would then be shared between the video uploader, and Facebook. This is clearly a spin on YouTube’s non-skippable pre-roll advertising, that shows a video before the main content. YouTube have been doing this for years, but Facebook have been hesitant because of their commitment to user experience. That hesitance looks to be quickly waning.

On top of this, throughout 2016 there was a clear marketing push to ensure that Facebook Live consigns Periscope to history.

One of the biggest social developments last year was the introduction of Instagram Stories, a new feature that essentially ripped off Snapchat Stories, so much so, that the name wasn’t even changed. Like on Snapchat, the feature allows brands to post photos or short videos that are removed after 24 hours. This allows brands to broadcast directly to their fans, without ‘cluttering’ their regular Instagram feed. The uptake on this has been rather slow, but the recently introduced ‘swipe through’ feature could change that. The feature allows brands to place a link directly into the story; users simply swipe up to read it. However, only verified accounts can use the feature at present; here’s hoping it receives a wider rollout in 2017.

Additionally, at the time of writing, Instagram rolled out live video in the UK, having already done so in November in the USA. This adds another live video tool to the arsenal of marketers, an exciting prospect when the technology exists to stream from multiple platforms at once.

It’s worth noting that the iPhone 7 introduced the ability to film in portrait, rather than just landscape. I’m sure everyone’s seen dodgy phone footage shot in the wrong orientation, with two big black blocks either side of the content. Technology is changing in line with social networks, so that we can share video, on any occasion, at a moment’s notice.

So what about YouTube? You’d be forgiven for assuming that the increasing prevalence of video on other platforms has undercut YouTube. Not so. The statistics show that more people are watching YouTube than ever. 1 billion videos are watched every day on mobile alone, and 300 hours of video are uploaded every minute. If those mind bending stats are difficult to comprehend, consider this instead; it’s the second most used website in the world after Google, with a third of all the people on the internet having visited it.

What should marketers take away from this?

There are two primary takeaways here. Firstly, live video appears to be the future, so you should consider it as soon as possible. With Facebook Live, Instagram Stories, Snapchat, Periscope, and other platforms, there’s never been so many ways for a business to communicate to its fans instantly through the medium of great video led content.

Secondly, with so many video platforms available, marketing strategies need to consider this from inception. It’s not good enough to make a 3-minute video, and then assume it can be used across all platforms. While a 3-minute video would work for YouTube, the same probably can’t be said of Facebook. Twitter and Instagram both have strict limits on the length of videos posted on their platforms. What about Facebook Live and Instagram Stories? How do you incorporate these new platforms? Tackle these challenges during the planning stages, and you’ll be far more likely to ace your social video campaigns.

Louise King is head of content at creative social media agency Media Bounty