Did your video effectively ask for the order? That is what a Video Call to Action (CTA) needs to accomplish. Video marketing is about generating conversions. If your video isn’t converting, you might as well add some kittens doing cute stuff and hope that they’re cute enough to get millions of views. (Hard to believe, but cat videos now account for 15% of all video traffic.
Video Traffic – 82% and Growing
By 2020, Cisco predicts that video will account for 82% of all consumer internet traffic and that the internet will continue to expand at a rate of 22% a year. Facebook and Google are prioritizing video. Companies ranging from the Fortune 500 to small family businesses are becoming their own media companies, publishing their own content on their websites.
Video is everywhere, the competition is ferocious and will only get worse. Love it or hate it, video is the internet’s 900 pound gorilla.
- Adding a video to a landing page can bump up conversions by an astonishing 80%.
- Almost all consumers (90%) say that watching a video about a product helps them to make a decision.
- After watching a video ad, 46% of the viewers will take action in some way.
- Videos are memorable – 80% of consumers remember a video ad viewed within the last 30 days.
- Videos are shared – 92% of those using mobile devices share videos that they liked.
- Mobile video consumption doubles every year, according to YouTube
Determining Video ROI is a Concern
Many marketers have concerns that limit their spending on video ads. Forrester Consulting reported that about 40% of marketers are concerned about the difficulties in measuring results and verifying the ROI of their expensive videos. This is certainly legitimate. Whether you’re your own boss or a marketing manager, there’s never an unlimited budget and someone—even if it’s only you—wants to know what they got for their money.
It’s easy to track products sold, but not always so easy to measure reputation or brand awareness. Carefully constructed CTAs not only make videos more productive but also easier to analyze. Clear video CTAs ask for the order and let you track how well the video is performing.
The Importance of Effective Video CTAs – Never Neglect to Include a Call To Action
Video can be supremely engaging, drawing in the viewer in ways that other advertising formats only dream of being able to do. However, video viewers are extremely sophisticated in choosing what to watch and must be engaged immediately. Approximately 20% of viewers abandon a video in 10 seconds or less if they don’t feel the video will answer their question or offer the solution they’re seeking.
The biggest error that can be made when producing a video is not including a call to action. Neglecting a CTA will make it very likely that the video won’t repay the time and effort expended in its production.
The Psychology of a Call to Action
Every CTA is a sales pitch, but many of the best aren’t hard sells. Every viewer who didn’t abandon the video in the first few seconds has some level of interest. The CTA has to attract attention as the logical next step to be performed immediately without irritating viewers by coming off as a pitch from a used car salesman. They liked the movie enough to watch it to the end, and now is the time to capitalize on the viewer’s interest.
CTAs differ in the type and subtlety of the action to be performed.
- Sales-oriented: Buy the product or click for a discount
- Lead generation: Sign up for a newsletter
- Social engagement: Share this video with your friends
- Watch other content: Watch these videos
Edit Calls to Action into the Video
This may be the most basic type of video marketing CTA and includes a screen that tells the viewer what to do next. A voice over that repeats the CTA generally increases the effectiveness. This type of CTA is commonly seen in videos requesting charity or political donations.
YouTube Annotations
Annotations are those little text bubbles that occasionally pop up on YouTube videos. These aren’t “buy now” ads, but attempts to persuade the viewer to subscribe, comment, view another video, or sign up. Annotations can be placed anywhere in the video that makes sense. The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis ends each episode of This Week’s WOW with annotations encouraging the viewer to watch additional episodes of this popular series.
YouTube Ad Overlays
Ad overlays can be included in videos if Google AdWords is enabled on your YouTube channel. The ad overlay will link the video to anywhere on the web. Currently, the only cost of an ad overlay is the views bought in the AdWords campaign.
Call to Action Best Practices
- Should the CTA appear at the beginning, middle, or end of the video? YouTube’s best recommendation is that annotations at the end of videos have much higher click rates than those placed in the middle of the video.
- Ensure that annotations or other CTAs don’t obscure the video.
- Don’t place your CTAs in the lower third of the video as they will be chopped off by advertising or other CTA overlays.
Using your Video Call to Action intelligently will increase conversions with video marketing. The ever-increasing importance of video makes it suicidal to neglect including well-crafted CTAs that will convert viewers into leads or customers. Choosing a multitalented video production company that understands how to effectively incorporate CTAs into marketing videos will become an increasingly important marketing decision and one of the keys to generating a healthy bottom line.
