Short-Form Video Is In It For the Long Haul

NAB

TikTok’s runaway success, growing to one billion monthly active users by September 2021 (per Statisa), has got social media scrabbling to react. They are responding in only one way: video, and lots of it.

article here

Lisa Montenegro, founder and president at digital agency DMX Marketing, makes the case at Forbes.

Last June, according to TechCrunch, Instagram reformatted its IGTV and in-feed video into the combined Instagram Video, increased the length available for video clips in Stories from 15 to 60 seconds, and has pushed the use of its TikTok contender, Reels.

YouTube launched YouTube Shorts out of beta last March, per The Verge, and encouraged creators to publish on the site with a $100 million pot.

It’s not just short-form. Live streaming grew nearly 100% between April 2019 and April 2020, reported Influencer Marketing Hub. Facebook, Insta, YouTube and TikTok all have their own Live features alongside more dedicated platforms such as Twitch.

Montenegro says, “While short-form is all about the quick, snackable content, many people are turning to live video for the opposite, namely more substantial interaction and information from the companies they are interested in.”

These trends are being quantified by independent research. Short-form videos are the media of choice for businesses in search of engagement, according to Hootsuite.

HubSpot reported similar findings in its 2022 Marketing Industry Trends report. And when marketers were asked what trends they would be leveraging for the first time in 2022, 29% said short-form video content, and 22% voted live streaming.

Montenegro goes on to provide advice to marketers about how best to apply video to social channels. The essential point — that video is now the media of communication — may not be new, but understanding the ideal length and format and tailoring messaging to audience remains evergreen.