Savvy brands know the ticket to connecting with consumers is through emotion, be it happy or sad. If a brand can make you feel something, they’ve got you. But 2015 will be the year of the YouTube star and virtual reality will move to the forefrontJae C. Hong/The Associated Press
Savvy brands know the ticket to connecting with consumers is through emotion, be it happy or sad. If a brand can make you feel something, they've got you.
It started with WestJet surprising travellers with gifts rather than luggage, moved to Budweiser's Puppy Love and recently wrapped with Air Canada's latest surprise: tickets home for an entire pub full of Canadian ex-pats. Plain and simply, 2014 saw brands clamouring for moments that moved consumers to feel something.
Looking back, it was also a year of social video. Native video ads on Facebook changed the game in terms of getting your story heard and shared in the simplest ways. With displayed thumbnails much bigger demanding attention and their auto-playability removing the barrier to accessible viewership, Facebook became its own video viewing platform.
Twitter, the ultimate content sharing platform, also embraced organic video this year. What's great about Twitter video sharing? Brands can immediately monitor and track video shares to figure out who's engaging and what's working.
And it didn't end with these two major players – Instagram introduced its Hyperlapse app, creating new opportunities for users to become content creators. We also saw brands embracing self-made video through Snapchat's video advertising platform.
As social video exploded, it brought forth a simultaneous explosion in user generated content (UGC) in video form. This summer's Ice Bucket Challenge saw a surplus of consumers creating video of their own, indicating the idea that everyone is able and willing to make content when it's on behalf of a notable cause; when it allows them to be part of something good.
But how are brands leveraging the UGC opportunity for themselves? Doritos has already made a mark in leveraging UGC video content for its Super Bowl ads. One of, if not the, biggest advertising opportunities of the year is left in the hands of everyday content creators – and it's awesome. It gets people involved in something, and that is what drives them to create.
So what trends will continue to own the game in 2015?
1. The rise of the YouTube star. YouTube stars will run the show as content producers. A recent survey shows that YouTube stars are more popular with certain segments of the population than mainstream celebrities and brands have recognized their influential power. From J. Crew to Google Glass, partnerships with YouTuber Casey Neistat allowed these names to effectively leverage not only his video creativity but his audience – an audience that is literally sitting and waiting to see what Casey will do next. With the continual rise of bite-sized, social video content, longer form video content is simultaneously finding an audience online. Consumers crave authenticity and brands are seeing the value in taking them deeper into the story.
The ideal length of any given YouTube video is under three minutes – but consumers are willing to commit more time if there's something worth hanging around for. For example, British Airways Go Further to Get Closer ran at almost five minutes – but more than two million people watched because it made them feel something. It was worth sticking around for.
2. Virtual reality. Finally, emerging technologies such as the Oculus Rift will continue to move to the forefront, and brands will be eager to find ways to leverage these new platforms. Virtual reality (VR) storytelling dipped its toes in this year with travel agencies like Destination BC exploring a VR experience, promoting this travel destination by fully immersing an audience into the beautiful space.
Video has been done – people have seen the surprise-and-delights and 'making ofs' – so how will new technologies transform traditional videos into some sort of new experience?
Ian Buck is the managing director of Notch Video, a Toronto-based video production company.
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