Do People Really Watch User-Generated Online Videos?
February 4, 2008
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One of the things that social media is great at is soliciting and distributing user-generated video. With all the platforms available now (from YouTube to Viddler to Seesmic and JustinTV), creating and sharing video has never been easier. As a social media agency though, we come across clients all the time (usually old-school marketers or PR types) who are just skeptical.
"Sure, Jim, you can get the video and put it out there, but do you really think people sit around and watch this stuff?"
Um, yes. They do. And not just a little–a lot. Only 22 billion views of user-generated video in 2007. This is projected to rise to 34 billion views in 2008. So, yes, note to all clients, people are watching this stuff.
So the next question that always follows is some version of, "Really, what’s wrong with these people? Who watches this stuff?"
According to the Pew Internet & American Life Project (as reported by e-Marketer), there is a clear age difference, with 30% of 18-29 year olds reporting that they actively visit these sites versus only 4% of folks over age 65.
Men are also about twice as likely as women to watch user-generated video than women (20% to 11%), but there is not much difference as you look at education level, income or ethnicity. Remember this is user-generated video. The numbers are different for all online video viewing. I’ll share those numbers in a couple of days.
The bottom-line lesson here is clear: There’s a tremendous opportunity for video to help folks with their social media marketing. If you do it right, people are clearly willing to watch. Here’s a little video I did to explain what a social media agency is and does. Ya know, just in case you’re looking for something to watch right now…
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5 Responses to “Do People Really Watch User-Generated Online Videos?”
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I totally agree with you. At Liberate Media we have trialled an interactive social media video release as an alternative to the more traditional press release, containing various links to social sites. For our client iCrossing, formally known as Spannerworks, we released a video (http://www.icrossing.co.uk/search-sense/wp/2008/01/28/spannerworks-announces-icrossing-re-brand ) that has had over 1000 views so far. There is tremendous mileage for a social media video, and we really believe in this approach and will be tinkering with our original concept to make it even better.
They watch it…but how as a social media agency do you measure on behalf of clients “who” “when” etc? Is it even possible?
@ Rob: You can certainly look at how many are watching, what platform and when. The “who” is currently the tricky part. But you can get good video watching metrics a few ways, none of which (that I know of) solve the “who” part…
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Great post. Let the numbers speak for themselves. User generated videos are hot right now with the 18-29 year olds!