Say It In 6 Seconds

in ,

The :15-, :30- and :60-second spots have company. These standard video units are becoming anything but standard with new ways of looking at video advertising coming from Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. But that only scratches the surface of video when you start to look at how video content is being shared on Snapchat and live video through Facebook Live and Periscope.

The latest ad unit comes from YouTube of all platforms. It now has six-second ads called bumper ads. The ads run as pre-roll and cannot be skipped by users. YouTube views these ads as being an add-on to more holistic campaigns with longer creative, but the fact is they represent yet another ad format that advertisers need to, at the very least, think about when developing their ad campaigns.

Read More

Social Commerce’s Tipping Point

in , , , , , , , , , ,

Commerce on social channels is at a major tipping point. It’s going to succeed, or it’s going to fail. And we’ll know which soon enough. Commerce on social platforms is nothing new. Some brands launched storefronts on their Facebook pages years ago. For a variety of reasons, these never took off, and in today’s environment of Facebook tabs being deemphasized, they wouldn’t stand a chance.

Now, we’re entering the new era of social commerce as platforms roll out native commerce solutions. Pinterest now has Buyable Pins, enabling anyone to buy a product they see on Pinterest directly on the platform. Instagram is improving its ads by adding options for users to ‘Buy Now,’ as well as take other actions. Google is introducing a buy button in search results, while adding a click-to-shop CTA to YouTube videos. Then we have both Facebook and Twitter testing buy buttons of their own.

Social commerce is the new video. Everyone’s doing it.

Read More

Discovery is Facebook Video’s Play

in , ,

Facebook has started a new video content initiative dubbed Anthology. Anthology will be made up of content creators  like Vice, Disney and The Onion that create video content for brands. This video content will then be distributed through Facebook media.

Video will succeed on Facebook if it proves to be something that people want to watch, and Anthology gives Facebook a degree of control over the content and user experience with trusted third-party content creators given access to Facebook’s troves of data. The social network also benefits by requiring a commitment of at least $2 million per campaign of which Facebook keeps at least 50%.

Beyond the monetary and user benefit, Anthology makes Facebook’s vision for video a bit clearer.

Read More