Everyone knows online video can be a great way to market businesses and products, but some businesses are finding that it can be quite beneficial for actually selling products. “Shoppable video” is a trend that has been slowly rising for several years, but new capabilities from a variety of platforms indicate that it could be poised to become much bigger.
Is video already a part of your marketing strategy? Is it part of your selling strategy? Tell us about your efforts in the comments.
“Retail video brings merchants’ products to life in a way that only e-commerce video can, often resulting in higher customer satisfaction and higher retail sales conversion,” says video marketing news blog ReelSEO.
YOUTUBE FOR SHOPPING
Greg Jarboe writes on the site that YouTube Shopping is the new window shopping and that “unlike the mall, YouTube never, ever sleeps.” He cites data directly from Google claiming that one third of all shopping searches happen between the hours of 10PM and 4AM.
A couple months ago, Google announced that it is extending its product listing ads (PLAs) to YouTube with TrueView for Shopping, its new format that lets businesses run product ads with related videos.
“Whether it’s watching a product review or learning how to bake a soufflé, we look to video in countless moments throughout to the day to help us get things done,” Google said in a blog post. “We call these micro-moments – when we reflexively turn to our devices to learn more, make a decision, or purchase a product.”
It said it launched TrueView for shopping to “connect the dots between the moment a person watches a video and the moment they decide to make a purchase,” while also making it easy for viewers to get more info on the business’ products with the option to click to buy. (view image)
With these ads, businesses can showcase product details and images, and users can click and purchase from a brand or retail site from within the video ad. The option is available for TrueView in-stream video ads, and works across mobile, desktop, and tablet. 50% of views on YouTube come from mobile.
The ads are integrated with Google Merchant Center, so you can connect campaigns with a Merchant Center feed to dynamically add products and customize ads through contextual and audience signals such as geography and demographic information. (view image)
“Brands that have participated in our early tests of TrueView for shopping have seen strong results for driving interest and sales,” Google noted in the announcement. “Online home goods retailer Wayfair, for instance, saw a 3X revenue increase per impression served when compared to previous campaigns. And beauty retailer Sephora took advantage of this new ad format to drive +80% lift in consideration and +54% lift in ad recall, and an average view time of nearly two minutes.”