If Digital Video 1.0 was characterized by the repurposing of TV content for the PC, then the current growth in mobile video is anything but repurposing Web or TV video content for mobile devices, according to new research commissioned by mobile growth platform YouAppi.
The research, conducted by Dimensional Research, found that 94 percent of the 218 global mobile marketer and agency employees surveyed in May and June 2017 said that mobile video best practices are different from traditional desktop video best practices.
It’s the differences between mobile video and legacy video implementations that is creating the challenges for mobile marketers and their agencies as they increase their use of mobile video.
In the research, 96 percent of respondents claimed they faced challenges with mobile video and that the leading challenge cited by 44 percent of them was “developing compelling creative,” making it clear that mobile marketers understand that repurposing video from other platforms won’t cut it on mobile.
The second leading challenge cited by 35 percent of respondents was “finding properties to effectively deliver video.” This challenge of finding the right properties and channels was also seen in another question, where 42 percent of respondents said that they run their mobile videos on six or more channels, while 17 percent run mobile videos on over 20 different channels.
A third major challenge cited by the respondents was the broad range of metrics and KPIs used to measure performance. Though digital media is known for its accountability, the respondents surveyed cited 15 different metrics/KPIs, including Cost Per Install (CPI), Click Through Rate (CTR), Video Completion Rate (VCR) and Cost Per Completed Video (CPCV), with none used by more than half.
“This research shows that mobile marketers are dealing with a significant number of different metrics and KPIs for video, and an enormous range in the types of measurement. When you combine this with the fact that not even half can agree that any of these metrics is worth tracking, it clearly indicates a metric standardization challenge for the industry,” said Diane Hagglund, founder and principal of Dimensional Research, in a news release.
In addition, 55 percent of respondents are using three or more metrics / KPIs, and still, 46 percent are not satisfied by their ability to measure the success of their mobile video programs.
Regardless of the challenges, marketers see tremendous opportunities with mobile video. Among the respondents who work in a range of mobile marketing and mobile user acquisition positions, not inherently focused on mobile video, 94 percent said that the importance of mobile video has increased in the past few years and 93 percent said that mobile video will continue to increase in importance in the coming years.
Concerning channels and applications, 75 percent of respondents found Facebook important, followed by in-app advertising on other apps (69 percent), YouTube (66 percent), the company’s own app (20 percent) and Snapchat (18 percent).
Regarding video lengths, 70 percent of respondents believe that the ideal length for a mobile video is 15 seconds or less.
“As a data-driven mobile growth solution, we see opportunities among the creative, channel and measurement challenges mentioned by the survey respondents,” said Moshe Vaknin, CEO and co-founder of YouAppi, in the release. “Along with our partners, we expect to roll out a range of solutions, which will enable our customers to overcome these challenges and utilize mobile video to grow their businesses while enhancing their customers’ experience.”
YouAppi’s research supported research from the Boston Consulting Group and the Google Digital Academy, which shows that the weakest digital capabilities for marketers and agency employees are mobile advertising and mobile web and apps (along with testing).