How do you feel when you visit a website and they entice you to click a link to watch a video? If the video plays instantly, and it’s worthwhile or entertaining, you probably enjoy it. That’s why video is booming on the web!
However, what about when instead of cutting to the chase, they push a typical commercial at you BEFORE the thing you opted to watch? You must endure from :10 to :30 of wasted time, usually trying to ignore what’s playing in front of you and try to fill the time with some other productive activity until the real reason you clicked begins to playback.
Same old interruptive technique of conventional marketing again. And stats show the vast majority of people can’t stand it, or at best, simply tolerate it. Are these commercials good for branding? I don’t think so—unless you subscribe to the “any-attention-is-good-attention” school of promotion.
I certainly don’t. “Conversational Marketing,” which is loosely defined as using the internet to talk with your markets, not at them. Of course, blogs do this really well, but I also believe web video can be a strong medium for effective Conversational Marketing.
Our belief at StoryFirst is, the key to a web video’s effectiveness is often directly proportional to the respect you show for your audience, both in how they are offered the opportunity to watch the video, and how the video communicates with them once it fires. Engage with your stories – and they’ll want more.