Internet Video Is Virally Sound

Recently the world’s biggest sports marketing company, Nike, alluded that it may cut both its advertising and sports sponsorship budgets. This is in addition to laying off 1,400—about 4%—of its workforce. As the dominant category leader, this should come as little surprise, as even they need to reduce costs amid slower sales due to the recession. Even if they do reduce their spend, their market share will likely be unaffected.

Why? Because Nike is a smart marketer.

As such, they will rely less on “expensive TV campaigns” and reallocate a portion of their budgets to Internet video, likely on YouTube, where they will get “more bang for less buck.” This is a trend that’s not unique to Nike.

As media becomes more fragmented and we rely increasingly on viral information sent from friends, this decision makes good marketing and economic sense. Consider the recent T-Mobile Dance YouTube video. In just weeks the video has generated over 4 millions views and nearly 7,300 text comments. The length of the clip is 2.41, not a typical 15, 30 or 60 seconds like traditional TV. The format allows for better story development and storytelling.

Marketers today need to use their marketing dollars very prudently, and they need to measure effectiveness. While the T-Mobile video is a buzz-generating hit, it also must sell phones/plans. If it doesn’t , it will be buzz without biz, and that’s typically just noise. In the case of Nike, while measurement and sales are important, it’s not as critical because of their market position and brand recognition. They are likely to use online video as an economic alternative to help keep brand awareness and desire high.

Internet video is growing because it’s economical, people are viewing the pieces and it’s as easy as an email to pass along to friends and colleagues. However, online video will continue to grow, and not because it can create such wide exposure cheaply. It will grow because it can do a much better job at segmented targets audiences and be measured, especially when a call-to-action like a phone number, e-mail address or microsite/microblog is smartly included.

Because we live in a world of over-communication, we crave simplicity. The messages that we view are mostly predicated by us. Thus, relevancy (ultra niche marketing) plays a paramount role in your marketing success. Relevancy will determine your results.

Here’s some interesting stats that prove we rely more and more on the Web as our communication channel of first choice:

· 2 billion searches done daily on Google alone
· 1 trillion unique URLs in Google’s Index
· 13 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute
· 77% of us read blogs

Think of the ability to not only hone in on consumer segments, but the possibilities among business-to-business segments. Internet video gives you more targeting options than ever before.

You can use online video on Web sites, microsites, blogs, microblogs, in e-mail marketing, as part of your PR efforts, in social media, and even as a stand-alone tool burned to a CD or DVD to help tell your story. It’s powerful because it can be measured.

There is no denying that the Web has changed how we live, work communicate and interact. Think of MySpace, Facebook and LinkedIn as prime examples. So what does this all mean for you and your business, specifically your marketing success?

It means that you have an opportunity to do much better niche marketing. You can now also better track and measure your results. You can test faster, more cost efficiently than ever before. You can spend more efficiently to increase ROI; determine if new niche markets are viable more quickly and it means you better start using internet video in your marketing mix ASAP.

Like TV, Internet video allows you to use emotion – sight, sound and moving images, just like TV, but with much more targetability. Keep in mind, however, with this emerging technology comes more feedback from happy—and unhappy—viewers. Thus, try to entertain, inform, educate and then sell your product and service. If you try a hard sell too fast, people will typically not respond favorably and will let others know (Remember what was mentioned about ease of pass along? It applies both ways.).

With mass media audiences dwindling and uber fragmentation becoming the norm, Internet Video just may be the tactic to incorporate into your marketing strategy. It’s worth exploring.

Grant A. Johnson ([email protected]) is the CEO of Brookfield, WI-based Johnson Direct LLC.