Brightcove and Demand Metric have released the industry’s first Interactive Video Benchmarking Study report. This report is full of useful suggestions for marketers on how interactive video can be used in marketing activities. What is very interesting is that, despite the surprisingly high ratings given by marketers for the effectiveness and satisfaction of interactive video, marketers still cannot give a clear answer to the simple question of “what is the ROI of interactive video?
This is a major obstacle to the full-scale adoption of interactive video, but in fact it is very easy to calculate ROI. So, based on the case studies of Brightcove customers who have already adopted interactive video, I would like to explain how to calculate ROI.
First, here is a summary of the results of a benchmark survey on interactive video
– Interactive video is moving into the mainstream. 32% of survey respondents are already using or planning to start using interactive video.
– Interactive video is owned by creative marketers. 60% of respondents are marketing managers or executives, creative directors, content managers or executives, or video editors.
– Early adopters are actively purchasing interactive video. The average annual investment is $30,000 to $40,000.
The following points were the most important points in the report.
– The more interactive video is used, the more uses and benefits it has. 68% of interactive video users said that it is becoming more important. On the other hand, the percentage of those who said that it is decreasing was 2%. This is a rare percentage for a new technology.
## The Problem of Measuring Effectiveness
We know that marketers who use interactive video like it, and they want to use more of it. They like it because they can see the benefits it brings and the reactions it gets from viewers. So it should be easy to calculate ROI.
But there is a problem with how we measure it. What kind of statistics are you collecting on the videos you are working with? Is it the number of views? The average viewing time?
When using video for marketing, these metrics are not very meaningful.
We have heard many times about the frustration of not knowing how to measure the effectiveness of your efforts. The CEO of one of our early Brightcove customers said it best when he said, “For the last 20 years, I’ve had the HapYak platform in my head. I’ve been looking for something that would push video beyond its limits.”
HapYak takes a different approach to video analytics than Brightcove’s customers. We treat video like any other element on the web. Specifically, we do the following
– Track click-through rates from video to landing pages
– Track participation rates in polls and surveys within video
– Tracking the true engagement rate of each lead and potential customer (including dwell time and time spent re-watching specific items)
– Tracking direct responses to questions (for each user and viewer)
– Tracking the rate of viewer movement to specific parts of the video (e.g. “This potential customer seems to be reviewing the benefits and pricing sections twice. Interesting.”)
This is the strength of the interactive video medium. Behind each interaction is a data point, and each data point can be input into an information system that can track leads, prospects, and customers in a revolutionary way that has never been done before.
## Lead Qualification: Top of the Funnel Filtering
One of Brightcove’s long-term customers is a global bank that specializes in online trading in financial markets around the world. The bank needed to provide training to its traders so that they could make the most of the products and solutions on offer. To this end, it set up a new academy with a focus on interactive videos.
As it is possible to track viewers who have signed in, it is possible to accurately ascertain which chapters they have viewed and to check whether they are watching the appropriate content. Only those who have reached a certain engagement rate are then allowed to proceed to the next stage of the funnel. In this way, they become educated leads.
As the marketing strategy of the client company evolves, it will become possible to ascertain which chapters the viewers as a whole are most interested in, and to customize future content to meet these needs.
## Planned use of interactive video
This bank was an early adopter, and cases like this are still rare. If we go back to the report and compare it with the top four current or planned uses of interactive video, we can see that they are all used in the early stages of sales and marketing strategies.
**Top four current or planned uses of interactive video**
– Customer relationship building: 60
– eLearning or customer training: 59
– Lead generation, scoring, and selection: 59
– Expanding target markets: 56
Where is interactive video most effective at the top, middle, or bottom of the funnel stage?
## Lead behavior analysis: middle of funnel filtering
Let’s take the example of another one of our customers. This customer is in the business of social research, helping their clients make better use of sales and marketing techniques and resources, such as internet marketing, website optimization, and lead generation and nurturing.
Four years ago, they decided to spread their research findings through video. They set up a studio and hired video experts. But there was something missing. They had no way of measuring the results.
Luke, the senior manager in charge of multimedia production, was frank: “We’re convinced that video is effective, but we have no way of proving it.”
So, they created interactive videos with embedded surveys, and the submission rate of the survey became the main effectiveness measurement standard for the video.
By using surveys and quizzes in the video, you can subtly engage your audience with the video. Then, you can use specific responses to nurture leads using marketing automation.
You can obtain a wealth of data that allows you to evaluate high-quality leads, and you can ultimately connect the actions of video viewers to established marketing evaluation criteria. The days of simply counting views are over, and the days of focusing on the number of high-quality leads have arrived.
Luke says that the use cases for interactive video are expanding beyond the final stage of filtering to the entire filtering process. “We use it for marketing, sales, and training.”
## Video at the Final Stage of Funnel-Based Filtering
The Demand Metric report revealed an interesting trend: the introduction of video at the final stage of funnel-based filtering.
When you look at the benefits of interactive video, you can see that the companies that use this technology the most expect to see benefits at the bottom of the funnel stage.
Benefits of using video: In contrast to a little use and moderate use, the benefits increase as the video usage rate increases.
And of course, the closer you get to the bottom of the funnel, the easier it is to quantify success.
What is the value of a good lead to you? Is it a demo with your sales team? Or a new customer?
## Calculating ROI
Now let’s get back to calculating ROI. How do you calculate ROI for implementing interactive video? Start with the following two steps
– Define the two or three most important pieces of information you need to identify a good lead
– Use the interactive video as a tool to extract that information
– Place a chapter menu in the video. Track when a particular viewer watches two or three chapters (indicating they are very interested).
– Subtly include a survey in the video that directly elicits the information you need to identify the lead above.
– Place a clickable CTA in the video so that leads can download a white paper, view a landing page, fill out a form, etc.
Rather than measuring that 1,000 people watched the video, we focus on identifying the 117 people who were determined to be high-quality leads based on their actions in response to the video. In other words, it is important to understand how many people moved to the next stage of the funnel, such as the number of clicks or downloads.
## Easy-to-understand benchmarks
HapYak provides more interactive videos than YouTube. In 2015 alone, we tracked 425 million video data points.
We examined this data in detail and established simple benchmarks for predicting and calculating ROI. The initial benchmarks were based on 13 million video views.
We use these benchmarks internally to predict the number of leads and high-quality leads that can be generated from 1,000 views.
__1,000 views x 62% submission rate x 5.5 high-quality leads per 100 submissions = 34 high-quality leads__
The sales cycle begins with these high-quality leads. If the lead shows strong interest in the video, the internal sales team is notified and the lead is transferred to Salesforce, the company’s CRM system.
By properly integrating this technique with marketing automation and email systems, you can steadily secure high-quality leads at a predictable cost.
However, please understand that the benchmark for interactive video is still in its infancy. In the future, we will see specific CTRs, survey submission rates, and conversion rates for each type of video, i.e. those at the top, middle, and bottom of the funnel.
By keeping this in mind and refining the benchmark further, and by widely sharing the results, we should be able to identify the ROI of interactive video.
