Obama Wins in Online Video
According to recent figures released by Nielsen Online, presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama has a healthy lead in the battle taking place in the realm of online video. Obama’s Web site welcomed about 518,000 unique viewers of the video content on the site during the month of March, compared to 351,000 viewers of video content on Senator Hillary Clinton’s Web site, and 38,000 viewers on Senator John McCain’s site.
On Obama’s site, a total of 828,000 video streams were seen in March, with each viewer spending an average of 16 minutes watching videos on the candidate’s Web site. Clinton’s site saw a total of 551,000 streams, with each viewer spending an average of 4.8 minutes watching videos on her site. McCain’s Web site saw 66,000 video streams in March, with each user spending an average of 1.5 minutes watching video content on the candidate’s site.
An interesting finding from the study revealed that video viewers on the candidates’ sites are most likely not watching videos on these sites as a part of their research, but because they are already supporting that candidate. There was virtually no overlap between the three candidates’ sites in terms of the viewing habits of these online video viewers.
Candidates seem to be tapping into this by using their sites as online rallying stations for their supporters, “as a place to disseminate talking points and to gather contributions,” said Jon Gibs, vice president, media analytics at Nielsen Online. Obama’s plush coffer of campaign funds reflects this.
Those who are still undecided seem to be conducting their online video research through other mediums, such as news sites and even YouTube.
Regarding the broader video landscape, there were over 115.4 million unique video viewers in the U.S. during March, which reflected a slight decline from the 115.8 million viewers observed in February, and the 116.7 million viewers seen during January.
Still, the total number of video streams has been steadily increasing, reaching 6.97 billion in March. This number was 6.33 billion in February, and 5.99 billion in January.
In March, 60.4 streams were viewed per viewer, which was an increase from February’s 54.7, and January’s 51.3.
Viewers are also spending more time watching online videos, with the average viewer spending 137.3 minutes doing so in March, which was an increase from February’s 130.7 minutes, and January’s 124.4 minutes.
YouTube was easily the top online video brand in March, drawing 69.6 million viewers in the U.S., who accounted for 3.65 billion video streams. Fox Interactive Media, Yahoo!, Nickelodeon Kids and Family Network, MSN/Windows Live, ESPN, Disney Online, Turner Entertainment New Media Network, CNN Digital Network, and Google rounded out the top 10 list.
