Bullseye Buzz: What's a "Video View"? Plus Other Burning Questions

April 2, 2019 Mark Eting

By Mark Eting

Bullseye Strategy Special Correspondent

There’s a lot of money in play when it comes to charging advertisers for a “video view”–$27.8 billion in 2018, to be precise. But different platforms count views in varying ways, some going by seconds, some going by completion rate and some using other factors. So we were excited this week to discover a handy guide breaking down this information, whether you’re advertising on YouTube or Reddit…it was literally the answer to one of our most burning questions. We also got some good intel this week on when Google Ads will be adding cross-device attribution to its reporting, and the answer to the most important question of all: what makes a brand’s social media campaign emotionally compelling?

So What is a “Video View?”

Video ads are a giant slice of the revenue pie for digital platforms: more than half of all Twitter and Snapchat ad revenue is from video ads, and it’s 30% for Facebook. So what counts as a “view”–and therefore hits advertisers’ wallets–is important to understand. But it’s also pretty confusing to navigate, as platforms count views so differently. LinkedIn, for example, considers a 1/3 of a second of sponsored content on mobile as a view, while YouTube and Google Display Network require 30 seconds of a skippable ad to count it (or the complete ad, if less than 30 seconds.) We love this guide from Marketing Land, which breaks down how each major player defines a view and differentiates between mobile and desktop where appropriate.

Google Ads to Add Cross-Device Conversion Attribution

In the category of “finally!”: Google Ads is including cross-device conversion attribution in its reporting, so you can figure out exactly how customers interacted with an ad at various points of their journey. Information including total conversions, last-click conversions, and conversion value will be located within the reporting beginning May 1 and won’t be retroactive for previous months. We’re excited to get a better understanding of how multiple cross-device ads impact conversion because this allows us to pinpoint how and when customers convert, so we can improve overall campaign efficiency for our clients.

Social Media Genius, Explained.

That famous Supreme Court quote about obscenity–“I know it when I see it,” Justice Potter said in 1964–seems like it should apply to good social media as well. It’s hard to define what makes one campaign thumb-stopping and another one, even with similar creative and copy, yawn-worthy, but most of us have found ourselves awestruck when we’ve seen a particular social post knock it out of the park. PR Daily did a great job of explaining one principle that unites all examples of brand social media genius: storytelling. Their round-up of 10 examples of brands that get it right includes UGC campaigns such as Apple’s #ShotonaniPhone and Warby Parker’s #WearingWarby, as well as uplifting and 100% product-free Instagram streams from brands like Always, Dove and BarkBox. When we approach our clients’ social media strategies, we’ve always got our eyes on their long-term brand story as well as the opportunity to be more pointed with messaging on a campaign basis, and it’s exciting to see how some of most intriguing brands have woven both of these goals together with storytelling.

“Mark Eting” is the pen name of the Bullseye Strategy team. Check back with us next week for more news on what’s buzzing in the digital marketing industry.]]>