We All Know Video Will Reign Supreme In 2017, But Best Practice Is Anyone’s Game

Last week the State of Play panel discussion was held at Yahoo7 with top digital media gurus, content creators and chaired by the head of the IAB, Vijay Solanki. In this opinion piece, Andrea Rule, head of strategy and integration at Yahoo7, (who happened to be on the panel) takes us through what happened.

Last week I sat on a panel discussing the state of video in Australia. The conversation started with the rise of video consumption habits in Australia, however what the panel ended up debating was best practice – including how to measure return on investment and also the different perspectives on the buy side versus the sell side.

The panel discussion was held at Yahoo7 and included the top digital media gurus, content creators and was chaired by the head of the IAB, Vijay Solanki.

It was very clear to me from the panel discussion, that we have moved on from simply discussing how video consumption has grown in Australia. We have all agreed this is the case and in 2017 video will be even bigger. Aussies are watching more video content at varying times and locations. The latest data streaming figures show that we are increasingly streaming more online video and in terms of data, this again is predicted to grow in 2017.

The conversation has moved beyond just content creation to content delivery. We now need to use the data at hand to understand how Australians are consuming video as part of their daily habits, how we can best deliver it to them and how we can best measure this.

We are at the tipping point of video in Australia and media agencies are under pressure from clients to show return on investment.

Australians are increasingly using a variety of devices, particularly smartphones and tablets to regularly watch TV shows. Smartphone video consumption is up 75 per cent in one year.i The rise of Smart TV connectivity is also bringing the online video back to the lounge room. In fact, 70 per cent of Australians who acquired a Smart TV in the past three months are using it weekly to stream videos, shows or movies from the internet.ii

We also know that our smartphones are with us throughout the day and the data we’ve collected from our apps, including PLUS7, demonstrates that we are consistently engaging with them all the time, while traditional TV still peaks in the standard evening periods.iii

While our panel could agree on best practice for targeting a certain audience, the delivery method was a topic where opinions were varied. For Yahoo7, data, content and technology go hand and hand, so for us the best outcome for a video campaign comes when we pair these together through products such as our BrightRoll DSP+ and global native marketplace, Gemini. These are still new technologies and while we are seeing strong results the general rhetoric of the industry and panel is that its constantly evolving and we will see further shifts in 2017.

Once the content has reached the users, we arrive at the most unchartered territory yet – measurement. While our panel had varied opinions on how video content is best measured for ROI, at Yahoo7, we believe that it should be measured on specific campaign and marketing objectives. While we know video advertising outperforms other formats in terms of

advertising engagement, adding online platforms to TV delivers more effective outcomes for advertisers. Our Yahoo7 insights data shows that consumers have a stronger brand recall when TV, online and app formats are combined (50 per cent versus 29 per cent for TV only).iv

What we can agree on is that in 2017, a lot of advertising dollars will be heading towards video. What’s next is refining how as an industry we can best deliver this for brands, publishers and consumers.

N.B, the panel at the State of Play Event included:

• Vijay Solanki, CEO, IAB – moderator
• Andrea Rule, Head of Strategy and Integration at Yahoo7
• Sarah James, Chief Digital Officer, Carat
• Peter Ostick, Vice President, Tremour Video
• John Miskelly, Chief Digital Officer, GroupM

i Yahoo7 Companion TV (1,226)

ii IAB Australia : The Changing TV Experience: Attitudes and Usage across Multiple Screens. August 2015

iii Share of Eye. per cent of minutes viewed in home by platform. iv Nielsen Brand Effect 2015