The other day we wrote about research where people zoned out of viral videos after the first minute. Another study, which Roger Dooley has pointed to on his neuromarketing blog, seems to take a more nuanced view. Something that's basically along the lines of - if your video is cr*p people will zone out after 60 secs!
The 'T=Zero Emotion, Engagement and Internet video' report by OTO Insights involved researchers making test subjects watch six videos out of a choice of 60 and assessing them for 'physiological measures' (breath rate, heart beat etc), as well as behavioural / psychological responses.
The researchers found: "That data from the study does not suggest any correlation between engagement, emotion, and the length of a video. Long videos (three minutes or greater) and short videos (two minutes or less) are equally likely to have high or low engagement scores. This finding suggests that Internet videos do not need to be limited to sound bite productions or even standard television commercial length."
Well, yes and no. The main flaw is that the test subjects had to watch the video to the end.
A true test environment would have been a You Tube style menu where they could have had the ability to video-surf at any time they wanted, as well as a number of other distractions in the background. That after all is often the challenge marketers face, the 100 other things competing for someone's attention, as well as the ability to deliver something engaging and compelling.
But - the study does make the point that a lot of the most popular You Tube films have been a few minutes long, so it's obvious that if you produce kick a** content, people will hang around.
Internet video affects emotional state
What is interesting is the finding that Internet video is used to alter people's emotional states (cited by 86% of respondents) and that many deliberately watched something on-line if they wanted to change their mood. Which makes sense as Internet video channels is of course a true form of video on demand. Want to get in the mood for going out? Watch your favourite music videos on You Tube, Metacrawler etc.
Finally, T=Zero's report finds that high 'emotional engagement' has been the common ingredient in successful Internet videos. So not so different to having a TV ratings winner. Make viewers laugh, cry, angry, inspired and so on, and the chances are they will not only watch it to the end, but also tell all their friends about it.
Emotion, engagement and Internet video is available as a free download from here.
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