The Future is Native: Personalised Video Marketing
In a visual era, videos are replacing more traditional media as a powerful tool for Marketeers. This trend is amplified by the fact that millennials are watching the most videos online and both Millennials and Gen Z (those born into an internet age), they find ads on Social Media to be more relevant than on any other channel and strongly prefer less disruptive forms of advertising.
A key challenge for Marketers today is consumers’ ever shorter attention span. A couple of years ago it was reported that that our ‘on-the-go’ lifestyle means we now have a shorter attention span than a goldfish. Unsurprisingly 90% of people skip pre-roll video ads appearing and of those who watched the majority cannot even recall the brand or messaging.
Native Advertising and Social Media
The major question now is, how do you cut through and reach consumers who don’t want to be bothered by irrelevant marketing? Many companies have turned to native advertising, which can be defined as the integrating paid adverts into the media format in which they appear and therefore not interrupting the editorial flow of the page. When it comes to Social Media, most ads are native by nature – good news for marketers as these types of ads are not always blocked by ad blockers. However, the concern among regulators is whether ads on social disclose sponsorship clearly enough so that consumers aren’t misled. A recent study showed that whilst consumers are good at differentiating between adverts and content, adverts still have a significant influence.
Personalisation and Native Advertising
Personalisation can really take native advertising to the next level. Consumers want to be served useful content that matches their needs instead of a news feed full of irrelevant adverts. Marketers need to adapt and embrace a new approach. According to McKinsey & Co experts, simply addressing customers by their names is not enough. To really drive results, attention should be paid to relevant, contextual triggers, for example moving into a new home, celebrating a birthday, social trending topics, etc. Done right, personalised, contextual advertising can lead to a 10-30% uplift in revenue.
To deliver long-term value through personalisation and native advertising companies should implement agile data and analytics processes, feed in the right data and refine their marketing activity accordingly so that their message to their customers is up-to-date and relevant – and scalable! Secondly, marketing regulation and industry guidelines should not be ignored. Establishing your brand as reputable and trustworthy from the very beginning is essential for survival in competitive markets.
At Spirable we believe that inspiring storytelling via contextual, personalised video is the key to a more successful marketing strategy.