Television has long been the target destination for advertisers. At once, a business (either locally, by state or even nationally) may reach a broad audience. But all that is changing; retail advertising in most forms is losing ground to e-commerce. That includes TV losing ground to web video.
The Statistics
A poll by IPSOS MORI, a large and prestigious polling organization in the UK, reported that 29% of respondents purchased goods and services directly due to e-commerce web video. This is not unique to the UK; facts bear this out globally. The e-commerce industry is now worth some $2.7 trillion. It’s 19% of China’s retail sales and studies in the US since 2016 have shown television’s dwindling influence.
If the growth in e-commerce isn’t enough to convince, we already know that video is over 90% of viewed material. 74% of all viewed online video in 2017 was e-commerce content.
Step Forward Instagram, Facebook, YouTube et al
Television is already under threat from subscription services such as Netflix and Amazon Prime and the changing viewing habits of the younger generation. For the 16-24-year-old age group, TV viewing fell around 12% in 2017 in the developed world. For the 26-34 age group, TV viewing is down some 8%. TV advertising is losing ground to the web and when looking at the growth in e-commerce, it’s not difficult to identify the culprit.
Short form videos especially are harnessing the power of changing viewing habits. Increasingly, all of us want convenience and immediate attention grabbing. Such videos have just 6 seconds to harness that attention. Further, these now link directly from social media sites to the webshop. The flexibility of each platform (and the convenience) is certainly contributing to this growth.
No matter the platform, web video is clearly a better investment than television.