Phil Cooper, European Managing Director of video advertising network BrightRoll tells Figaro about the marketing opportunities associated with mobile video
One of the many great benefits of video for marketers – aside, of course, from the raw creative potential – is that it lends itself so successfully to reporting, search and targeting. In the social sphere it's infinitely sharable, particularly if it reaches targeted consumers within a favoured social space. But how can marketers ensure they make the most of video on mobile?
Phil Cooper is European MD of BrightRoll, a pure video advertising network launched in San Francisco in 2006 and now ranked among the top three operations working in this field in the US. BrightRoll recently opened their first London office and began working with mobile towards the end of 2010. So what sorts of opportunities does Cooper see for mobile marketers seeking to incorporate video into their mix?
Brand new tools
"If a picture tells a thousand words," says Cooper, "video tells a lot more. It's a great opportunity for a brand to communicate core values. The internet was tilted on performance marketing because it was able, from the early days, to prove the validity of its performance. If a company spent £20,000 on marketing, they could see if there was £20,000 worth of profit made on the goods sold. So the internet has grown top heavy on performance. But we shouldn't forget that branding is a sales tool as well, and it can be missed in the media mix online. Video is a very useful tool in communicating those brand values. It's not necessarily as good at selling, for example, flights or holidays instantly. But the growth of video has really been based on its ability to communicate those core brand values."
Whether content is being viewed on a desktop, laptop, smartphone or other mobile device, as marketers move into the social space, one of the keys to success is that content should be genuinely and instantly sharable. Video, says Cooper, is well-placed to fulfil that role.
"There's video," he says, "and there's video advertising. To put it another way, there's the user and the advertiser, or the content-owner. With social media the relationship between the user and the content-owner is interactive. It has viral opportunities for scaling, and the opportunity to redefine content as something distinct from the sort of thing people are accustomed to seeing on TV. The opportunity for content online is really for the user to define what they want - and to get what they want. And of course social media is at the front end of that."
App opps
BrightRoll's own move into mobile in 2010 has thrown up some sharp insights into the particular opportunities associated with video in this sector.
"We found that there's a lot of adverting inventory available within apps," says Cooper. "Pre-loading, within the app itself and within games on mobile. Advertisers have the opportunity to target at app level, by geographic location or according to the interests of their audience, and can then serve a 15-second video ad with a call to action at the end. Where are the opportunities for marketers working in mobile video? They're endless, actually. But for us, the key is serving video ads to a vast audience with precision targeting. Other opportunities exist around geo-targeting of course, or around coupons, where the instant aspect is very significant."
Future investment
What does Cooper think about the proliferation of operating systems and devices? Blackberry and iPhones may be the most ubiquitous, but Apple, he believes, currently have the edge. "Will there be one operating system, though? Not for a while. Unfortunately. Operating systems are possibly a bit entrenched with mobile manufacturers who may not be wholly focussed on usability, from a marketers' standpoint anyway. Too much money will probably go into iPads and Tablets, considering the opportunities they currently represent. However, once these do get traction, in terms of growth and sales, that will be a good forward investment. But the opportunities for Tablets are still round the corner, not necessarily now in terms of volume."
Given the extraordinary speed at which mobile marketing has evolved since the iPhone first landed in 2007, how does Cooper see the future unfolding? The answer, it seems, lies in integration. "All screens," he says. "That's the phrase that springs to mind. It's never about one specific thing. It's always about everything in the eco-stysem. Increasingly a campaign will be run and mobile will be connected to TV or a computer screen - they'll all be deemed components of the same campaign."
www.brightroll.com
Article by Jon Fortgang