Sisters/Unity Works etc.
- Thread starter ajholland
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- May 1, 2005
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- Jeff
Aaron, this is a question that I know many dealers and many of our dealer community members ask each month before signing the monthly invoice for one of these services. I too ponder over this question and diving back into video was/is on my agenda for 2012.
Let me start off by saying that my dealers use UnityWorks and I've been working with UWM for over 5 years now and I have a great relationship with Phil Sura and my account manager Dyan, is second to none. So as I speak up, I mostly reference my experience using their services. With that being said, I hope that I don't step on any toes here because I agree that some changes and innovation to video for our industry NEEDS to come about very soon.
IMO the stitched video has become stale. However, I do believe it still has some shelf life and when done correctly can still be very engaging and effective.
The engaging and effective part is where many video services are loosing their edge.
I like to use my father as a test subject. He's your typical/average internet user. Knows just enough to get where he needs to go and do what he wants to do. Three years ago I sat my father down in front a several stitched videos and asked him to give me his opinion on each video. The videos kept him well engaged, and most of the videos he had no idea were nothing more that stitched photos with a voice over. The only aspect he didn't care for was of course the "general" features spoken about, and the automated digital voice was something he was not particularly fond of.
Fast forward to today. I just sat my father down (right after you posted this) and we did the exact same exercise. I jumped on a few dealer websites (including my dealers) along with a few other listing sites (autotrader.com and cars.com). My fathers expressions and opinions have changed over the last 3 years. He was able to quickly pick out the stitched videos VS non stitched. The digital voice was now a complete turn off and he was amazed that most of the videos STILL included the same generic information as it did 3 years ago.
What kept his engagement were actual live videos, though a few stitched videos did as well. However most of the stitched videos that kept his engagement were not videos from our industry. He did like the fact that some of the dealer videos had what he thought were actual voice overs and not digital.
A few other key factors to mention after several questions...
- Once he had watched one video that didn't keep him engaged he was NOT encouraged to watch any more and at that point stuck with viewing the still photos.
- Long intros were an annoyance - we wanted to get to the video of the vehicle. He did mention that he was OK with a short intro so as long as it was no longer than 5-8 seconds.
- QUALITY of the video resolution was something that he picked up on quickly. He's now past the low quality resolution used by many of the photo services and would much prefer to watch a video in a higher resolution.
Several weeks ago I also asked the question around increased time on site with video - http://forum.dealerrefresh.com/f43/does-video-really-increase-time-site-1974.html - be sure to read this thread. What promoted this post was a tweet from Matt Murry over at Delaer.com
"Top 10 reasons to use Video"
Matt's quick recap included:
Time on site is 67.5% higher for dealers with video on their site
Conversion rates are 20% higher on sites with video
Now, you will notice that the study focused solely on the sites with inventory videos. So they did not look at custom dealer videos, staff vids etc..
Now I have seen the videos that Dealer.com offers and I'm sure we can agree that their service would be comparable to UnityWorks and Sisters offering. If I'm wring about that please speak up but don't over run this thread with your response.
I hope the video service providers are reading this thread - better yet, maybe they'll take some time to actually respond
and offer some hard stats, best practices based on time engagement. When I read what Joe is offering here (great stuff Joe) and then watch my photo stitch videos, it's reminded me where we are missing the mark and why I had this on my 2012 Agenda for improvements. I want New and Current hard stats on engagement rate. I want to know on average how long are people watching these stitch videos on my website vs YouTube. I want to see some A/B testing and case studies to support.
With all this being said, I really value my service with UnityWorks due to all the added features above and beyond our stitched videos. My customer service is top notch, I use our Specials Videos in our email marketing, many of the sales people use the video email feature and I love having video on our mobile sites. This might come across as a plug for UnityWorks but IMO they do offer a great service and have always been great to me so take it for what it's worth. But I'm also going to be a pain in their ars in 2012.
- May 1, 2006
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- Alex
I haven't read this whole thread because I'm on my 9th shot of Espresso this Monday morning and my ADD is revved way past red line.
Shoppers do watch these "videos." However, they aren't fooled by them when there are a bunch of image overlays (phone numbers and ego bullshit). Good imagery and knowing what order your "stitching" vendor displays the images in makes for a huge difference in how much is watched.
We did a quick study when I first got to Dealer.com that showed dealers who used the photos-to-video-stitched videos averaged an extra 3 minutes Time on Site and received an additional 20% in form submissions and a very nice increase in phone calls.
EDIT >> Oh....just seeing Jeff referencing it:
I'd love to see how much photo overlays screw this up. I have a feeling they detract from the consumer experience instead of helping to do whatever someone thinks they're supposed to do.....after 10 years of seeing them I haven't quite figured out what they're supposed to do yet
But anyway I'd like to echo the sentiment that quality trumps everything.
Shoppers do watch these "videos." However, they aren't fooled by them when there are a bunch of image overlays (phone numbers and ego bullshit). Good imagery and knowing what order your "stitching" vendor displays the images in makes for a huge difference in how much is watched.
We did a quick study when I first got to Dealer.com that showed dealers who used the photos-to-video-stitched videos averaged an extra 3 minutes Time on Site and received an additional 20% in form submissions and a very nice increase in phone calls.
EDIT >> Oh....just seeing Jeff referencing it:
I'd love to see how much photo overlays screw this up. I have a feeling they detract from the consumer experience instead of helping to do whatever someone thinks they're supposed to do.....after 10 years of seeing them I haven't quite figured out what they're supposed to do yet
But anyway I'd like to echo the sentiment that quality trumps everything.
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What I would really like to do is real walkaround videos on every used vehicle, I just haven't found a fast/efficient way to do it. Now that would keep people watching if done well.
- Dec 8, 2011
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The easiest way to do it is when stills are being taken. I would shoot video with our still image guy in the video. Made it fun.
- Apr 7, 2009
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HomeNet Automotive offers a video product that allows you record your own video walkarounds with your iPhone4 or Droid. You can access your inventory from the phone, select the vehicle, hit record and replace the stitch video for that car with a real walkaround video. It's easy to use and it allows you to export one "approved" video to most websites. You can save money by using one video to source most of the important websites and make sure your dealership branding message is delivered correctly.
- May 1, 2005
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I forgot HomeNet had that feature.
I was messing around with the new Animoto iPhone app and while doing so was thinking now here would be a cool feature us to have. Allowing dealers to shoot images and or video right from their phone app, edit and upload. Not a bad idea at all. I'm sure the vendor would say "Jeff, that's a lot of money and resources to put into something that that only a select few dealers will ever take the time to use". And you know what, they might be right. Let's face it, there are only a hand full that would constantly take advantage of a neat app/tool like that. Heck, I have to remind the ILMs and sales people every other month to use the simple UnityWorks email tool we have available.
However, is that their excuse for not innovating?
- Apr 7, 2009
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Is homenet's video vendor optimized for mobile use? My video vendor (ooyala.com) is flash and it wont work on an ipad.