The Rise of Social Video and Its Effect On Marketing Strategy

Today, there is a battle being fought over people’s attention. Social media giants like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Snapchat pull at the consumer from all sides, trying to get viewers to pay attention for as long as possible. In this conflict, the only strategy is to one-up the competition. The most recent new feature that the social media industry has been focusing on is social video, a possible game-changer for marketers.

Facebook vs Snapchat

The most recent battle has been between Facebook and Snapchat. Snapchat has been very successful with its image and video sharing platform, allowing the content creator to choose from several different filters to alter your face or the entire photo. Many companies and celebrities ranging from popular YouTubers all the way up to Dj Khaled are creating accounts and producing content.

What is Snapchat?: Snapchat has an advantage over other social media platforms. Privacy is a rare quality that many feel has been violated by the larger competitors like Facebook. In Snapchat, when sending any kind of message the user can decide how long their followers are able to view it, and the sender is notified if a screenshot of their content is taken.

What is Facebook Live Video?: On Facebook Live Video, people who are connected or are followers will receive a notification when a content creator starts their live feed. The video will also be recorded and posted to your profile, allowing those who missed the live feed a second chance to participate. This platform also offers filter features just like Snapchat. Live Video is a new service, and it is trying to catch up with Snapchat by signing on celebrities like Gordon Ramsey and companies like Buzzfeed.

Pros and Cons: Snapchat has established itself as the first platform in this niche of the social media industry. They developed their service from the ground up, and according to USA Today, have 2 billion more daily views than Facebook. However, Facebook has a gargantuan amount of users, currently at 1.65 billion monthly, which could mean that once Facebook Live gains popularity, it could potentially surpass Snapchat

So what does this mean for businesses? If a business is looking for a platform that is established and they don’t mind their content being up for only a short period of time before disappearing, then Snapchat would be the best fit. However, if a business wants to keep its content up on its profile for users that were late and don’t mind a platform that isn’t quite established yet, then Facebook Live Video would be the platform to choose.

Twitter Bolstering Video Capabilities

Periscope was bought by Twitter in early 2015, and essentially gives users their own personal broadcasting channels. The mobile app, allows users to quickly start recording videos, choosing to make their broadcasts open to the public or accessible to only a specific group. When the user is finished, the video is available to view for a 24 hour period, then it disappears. Additionally, viewers can leave comments to each video.

How to use Periscope as a business:

Create a community: Since the app is free to use, anyone can try out anyone’s broadcast. This level of accessibility can be used as an advantage to broaden your audience and grab people’s attention that might not normally be your target group. If encouraged and used correctly, the comment section can also be used very effectively for starting and retaining relationships with old and new customers.
Brand Release Video: Video allows a business to show emotions like passion, excitement and fun, engaging viewers more than through other forms of communications. By showing a more human side of a brand, consumers can connect through personality rather than data, and adding personality into a product release helps businesses engage their potential customers on an emotional level.
Use it like a Podcast: If a business doesn’t broadcast frequently enough, the channel will not retain its audience. However, if a company is consistently posting new content, it will keep the brand fresh in the viewers minds, even if it isn’t award winning.

Now 140-second Videos: If Periscope is too much of a commitment, then posting short videos on Twitter can be the middle ground. Recently, Twitter has extended their video posting length to 140 seconds, which can be used for many different purposes. If a Periscope video is too lengthy, then posting a snippet on Twitter might be a better fit.

Marketing is Storytelling Storytelling is a great marketing strategy when it comes to connecting to your consumers, and is even more effective when it comes to making videos. But not all of us are gifted with the natural talent of telling a captivating story. As Disney has taught us all from childhood, a story has a hero, an obstacle and the hero’s victory A brand fills the role of the hero, who must overcome some kind of challenge. The obstacle can be simple objectives that a business already sets for itself, like a certain number of monthly sales. Obviously, the victory would be accomplishing the goal that a brand sets for itself. Everyone can connect with a story based around these three components, humanizing a company and allowing anyone that sees a video to desire to know more.

Where is this going?: There is a lot of speculation on which will be the next platform to make a move to social video. Some wonder if other social media players, like LinkedIn or Pinterest, will introduce a version of social video. Now that 5G is being introduced, it will be faster to upload video, which might which might encourage more users to post video content.. Humans can process 60000 times more information visually than through text and with those kinds of numbers, it’s no wonder everyone is trying to hop on this social video train.

Photo courtesy of Pexels user Teono123