YouTube is a consumer focused platform. It’s free, easy to use, and constantly improving to make our online video experiences better. The YouTube team is always making strives in online video streaming technology: testing 4K (ultra HD) streaming, automatic branded bumpers, and so much more. Here are our top five reasons why we love YouTube for eCommerce videos:
1. User friendly
YouTube is extremely intuitive. It feels second nature to us now, but even a first time web user (do they exist somewhere?) could start out on the homepage and easily navigate the site. That’s great for eCommerce because online shoppers want things quick and easy. When a YouTube video is embedded on your product page, the video player is recognizable and feels comfortable to the user. They already know how to scale the product video to full screen, follow the link back to YouTube, and manage other player functionality.
2. Always Reliable
eCommerce never sleeps. That’s kind of the point isn’t it? YouTube is backed by an incredible infrastructure of web servers, back up solutions, and an army of engineers constantly maintaining and updating the site. So when an eCommerce video is embedded on your product page you can guarantee it’s going to load up quickly- limiting buffering and not slowing down your customer’s web browser like other third party video players. Plus YouTube videos automatically detect the viewer’s streaming capability to display the product video at the most efficient resolution.
3. Supports Brands
YouTube is free and always will be. It makes its money off running pre-roll ads before videos and embedding banner ads at the bottom of videos. But YouTube also supports non-paid advertising on its platform pretty extensively. You can brand your channel to keep all of your messaging consistent, include links and product info in video descriptions, link back to channels and other videos within your product video, and more. YouTube recently included a feature that allows users to play a 3-second or less branding intro before each of their videos. That way even when you are uploading customer product reviews or homemade videos you can still tag each eCommerce video with your company’s branding. Video Review Labs can work with your team to brand your YouTube channel and control your brand’s voice across all your video streaming platforms online.
4. Social Networking
At its core, YouTube is a social network. A place where users can come to share their videos, support their favorite creators, and open up discussion. YouTube’s social functionality is great for eCommerce video. Online video is an interactive experience so you want customers to engage in a dialogue between each other and with your brand. Enabling comments on your brand’s product videos allows customers to ask questions and provide feedback. You should talk to them and get involved. The more genuine and human a brand can be, the more trust and confidence it instills in a customer when they are making a purchase decision. YouTube’s subscribe, share, and embedding functionality also support organic SEO and distribution for your product videos so your eCommerce videos are getting the most engagement. Video Review Labs works with clients early on in the strategy phase to plan for inciting customer engagement and direct interaction.
5. SEO and Content Curation
YouTube knows its users well. It tracks what they are watching and provides them with instant recommendations for other content they may be interested in. That’s wonderful for eCommerce videos, especially if consumers are not yet aware of your product. They may be watching a product video for one of your consumers when YouTube suggests your product video as a next watch. This generates new awareness for your brand, getting people into the sales funnel, and organically distributes your product videos across the web to new customers. YouTube can’t interpret audio and video (yet). So to get your product videos ranking in the curation functionality and search results you have to do some work to prep them for SEO with text and metadata. Sometimes it can get a little advanced for certain keywords competing, but our team at Video Review Labs provides full SEO support for all of our customers’ videos. Video Review Labs makes sure you are maximizing impressions online and driving qualified leads to your product pages.
Get in touch with our team to discuss what video strategies and deployment options are right for your eCommerce videos. Video Review Labs is always willing to talk shop and help guide you to enhancing your online customer experiences.
