Consider this quote from Tony Rhoades Executive Director Information & Consumer Strategies Gunn Automotive Group:
“Live Event Stream (LES) Video has been extremely effective for us. We are experiencing a 90% completion rate on our Videos now that they are real. Prior to LES we only achieved a 65% to 70% completion rate. The increased engagement suggests an increased conversion so we are very happy with the results. We would not go back to slideshows.”
Part of the statistic that Tony does not mention is that the completion rates achieved with his slideshows was calculated from ones that were 45-60 seconds in duration. In the case of the REAL video completion rates; those were calculated from videos of 2-2.5 minutes in duration. So in effect he is getting 2 to 3 times the engagement.
Slideshows are good. Real, full-motion video is better. Have slide shows grown stale? Probably. The fact is that they deliver limited if any additional information than the photos and the textual information that is on the VDP. Consider that all the images that a viewer sees are the same as the ones in the gallery and that they play in the same sequence. Sometimes the slideshow runs long enough to where it starts the same set over. As for the overlays of scrolling and fly-over text, again it is all information that is available on the VDP. The overlays are really a holdover of 1950s television technology and advertising because viewers had no interaction and could not interface with the source like they can with a website. Today's Internet shopper is not ignorant and they know where the information is and how to access it. When they click on a video play button they are expecting a video and want to see the content. As far as the voice overs, there are some that are more effective than others. UWM is of course the standard. But then they have people reading customized individual scripts. The rest could have the logic built in to make them better, but at the end of the day, a laundry list of options can still be found in the VDP specs.
The facts that are cited by the Slideshow companies to tout their value such as the ones from Comscore about viewership are not about slideshows. They are about video. Does anyone believe that hundreds of millions of people get on YouTube to watch slideshows?
So...in the coming next few years the shift will be made away from slideshows and to real video.
“Live Event Stream (LES) Video has been extremely effective for us. We are experiencing a 90% completion rate on our Videos now that they are real. Prior to LES we only achieved a 65% to 70% completion rate. The increased engagement suggests an increased conversion so we are very happy with the results. We would not go back to slideshows.”
Part of the statistic that Tony does not mention is that the completion rates achieved with his slideshows was calculated from ones that were 45-60 seconds in duration. In the case of the REAL video completion rates; those were calculated from videos of 2-2.5 minutes in duration. So in effect he is getting 2 to 3 times the engagement.
Slideshows are good. Real, full-motion video is better. Have slide shows grown stale? Probably. The fact is that they deliver limited if any additional information than the photos and the textual information that is on the VDP. Consider that all the images that a viewer sees are the same as the ones in the gallery and that they play in the same sequence. Sometimes the slideshow runs long enough to where it starts the same set over. As for the overlays of scrolling and fly-over text, again it is all information that is available on the VDP. The overlays are really a holdover of 1950s television technology and advertising because viewers had no interaction and could not interface with the source like they can with a website. Today's Internet shopper is not ignorant and they know where the information is and how to access it. When they click on a video play button they are expecting a video and want to see the content. As far as the voice overs, there are some that are more effective than others. UWM is of course the standard. But then they have people reading customized individual scripts. The rest could have the logic built in to make them better, but at the end of the day, a laundry list of options can still be found in the VDP specs.
The facts that are cited by the Slideshow companies to tout their value such as the ones from Comscore about viewership are not about slideshows. They are about video. Does anyone believe that hundreds of millions of people get on YouTube to watch slideshows?
So...in the coming next few years the shift will be made away from slideshows and to real video.
