During last week’s very impressive Celebration of Entrepreneurship the scene was so loaded with CEOs, CTOs, CIO, and what ever C you can think of, it was hard to decide who to ask for what.
But in all the ruckus of C-level executives and entrepreneurs, then VCs and Angel Investors you notice a small army of young and energetic guys more online than off who were lighting up two giant screens with tweets, blog posts and Facebook page updates that was forming an informative and inspiring part of the event.
That same team was responsible for getting lazy old tech bloggers like myself, and every other ranter with a blog that matters onto the event floor. They go by the name: The Online Project.
I had been checking these guys out for over a year but never got the chance to have a sit down with any of their people till last Tuesday which was when I got to meet Nina Mufleh, a leader in The Online Project and a charmer I was lucky enough to steal for 15 minutes to let her tell you an amazing story about Marketing, Social Media and Italian clothing.
TNW: Many ask, what is it you guys do?
In a nutshell The Online Project does Social Networking Solutions for companies, what that means is we set stragtegies for how companies are going to interact with their clients using Social Media. We put the long term vision then implement the strategy.TNW: What is your position in TheOnlineProject?
I’m one of the co-founders and Director of Operations.TNW: How long have you guys been working?
We launched June 1st 2009. We are part of a larger umbrella company called Modern Media that include 5 companies in totoal.TNW: How large is your team?
We’re about 20 people, while some are shared resources among Modern Media companies.TNW: Do you actually help clients make money using Social Media? Give us an example if possible.
We help them increase ROI through Social Media. It’s different from client to client, but our proudest example is a fashion brand called Veramoda which is an international brand which is very accessible to young hip Middle Easterners which is also where they operate.They have a lot of competitors which are getting the attention of the young consumers in the region and are one of the early companies interested in getting into this field.
So we started off with them about 8-9 months ago starting with a basic Facebook Page and building a community around their brand making sure they connect to their consumers, solve problems, build their social image so users can know more about their products, clothes lines they are producing.
And we did something for them, which is as far as we know, the first user generated catalog. We identified 25 of the most passionate Veramoda customers. So what we did is, we created a regional FB fan page, but it got international fans it has grown to around 80,000 fans.
So we chose the most active fans, 25 female fans from Jordan and we asked them to come in for a couple of days learn a bit more about Veramoda and live for a while at the offices.
Then we took them to the Veramoda stores, so from 12-1 fan1 would come and pick her favorite outfit and style a model and we took pictures.
So then we uploaded the pictures up to the FB fanpage and we gave each one of the 25 girls a link to the pictures they chose and told them why don’t you give them to your friends and family to see what you’ve done. And then we empowered them with the tools to spread them.
So we immediately noticed an increase in fans on the page, we had 20,000-30,000 fans come in within 2 weeks. But that’s not the best part, the best part is the fact the day after this offline event, we had a 27% increase in Vermoda sales. A week later saw a 40% increase in sales.
And so now we’re planning on implementing it for other clients, because some say the first time is luck, the second is science, and we’re all about getting it right.
I hope this is as informative for you as it was for me, and a good case study on how Social Media has a proven track of relevance and effectiveness in a region where skepticism is the only main stream sentiment you can count on. Till now that is.
Online video is well and truly, having the best time of its life right now. It seems to be factoring in every marketing plan worth its salt, with some incredible videos being produced by brands that are lighting up social media. I wanted to explore the state of the online video industry a bit further and delve into the stats that show the huge growth curve online video is currently on. Right now it is one of the most fascinating aspects of online, as brands continue to push the boundaries of what’s possible and engaging the audience in completely new ways. It is a seriously big business and one that every brand wants to be a part of. And it’s easy to see why..
Over 35 hours of video uploaded to YouTube every minute
This stat on its own is pretty stunning and quite hard to get your head around. But when you look at in in the context of the past 3 years, or even 6 months, you realise just how impressive this is. The graph below from Youtube shows the average hours of video uploaded every minute, back to June 2007. While this started at 6 hours, in the past 6 months it stood at 23. That’s a huge increase of 12 hours per minute in just 6 months :
That is some seriously impressive growth and also shows that just as much as brand video is growing, ugc is growing at a staggering rate, due largely to the growth in mobile and ease of uploading. As Youtube note themselves there are other factors, such as upping the time limit in videos, which would obviously attribute for an increase in the total length of video uploads. But this is impressive nonetheless.
Blinkx shares up by 400%
At the business end of video, Blinkx are showing that online video is starting to become a profitable industry. While Google still won’t reveal whether Youtube is making them money or not, Blinkx have recently announced their first ever turn in profit in the 6 months up to September. And it comes 3 years after they first launched. Blinkx make money through running ads alongside the videos they index, acting as a huge video search tool. They have certainly had a good year, as the 400% share increase shows. It’s also encouraging to see that online video isn’t just about Youtube and there are some other serious players in the market with unique offerings.
Online video ads reach half of U.S. users
While some research shows that advertisers are cautious over online video advertising, due to factors such as standardisation of ad formats, online video advertising is going from strength to strength. A recent study from ComScore (the people who measure things), found that just over 45.4% of users in America viewed at least one video ad over a month. But more impressively, were exposed to 32.2 videos each, on average. That’s over 4.3 million video ads that were served to the online U.S. population in September 2010. This shows the power of online video ads to get right in front of your target audience. And while there are some definite rights and wrongs in the content of the video ad, I think we’ll see this grow even more and prove itself as a valuable industry up there with TV.
Comedian makes $315,000 from online video
A recent study found that comedians top the bill for online video earnings, and one in particular is doing very well. A recent study found that comedian Shane Dawson, who amassed 431.7 million online video views in the past year made $315,000 from his content, through ad revenue. He came out top for independent earners on Youtube and it’s certainly an aspirational case study that shows the business of online video isn’t just for big brands.
Kia spend a third of budget on online video
In a bold move, Kia Motors have invested a third of their £2 million marketing budget for the new Sportage model, into online video. We’ve seen the motor industry embracing social media more and more – with Ford launching a model through Facebook – and this shows the commitment that some brands are making to online video. Not so much an add-on or a nice to have, but a central facet of a multi-million pound campaign. The online campaign will focus on the central characters from the TV adverts and include home-page takeovers and video ads. Cases like this help to solidify online video as a serious marketing avenue that can bring a campaign to life and help you get that extra bang for your buck.
20% of downstream internet traffic is to Netflix
In a huge coup for Netflix, a recent study found that 20% of peak time donwstream internet traffic was streaming video from their site. This is great news for Netflix, and perhaps not so great news for the DVD market. If Netflix were available in Ireland I would be there in an instant and would choose to view all films in this way, as it simply doesn’t make sense to invest in a DVD anymore and I expect that even the gift market for this may eventually die out. 20% is a huge figure and shows how much Netflix has staked its claim in this market.
2 billion videos viewed each month Facebook
In June 2010 Facebook released some interesting stats into their online video offering, which show the huge potential it has to own this market. They revealed that as well as 2 billion video views on its site each month, there were 415,000 online video uploads each day. While it may not be a contender to Youtube just yet, the sharing capabilities within Facebook and the ease of connecting with your community show the potential for this to grow. Interestingly, Youtube now offer the option of connecting with Facebook instead of logging in with your gmail account. This shows Youtube recognises the power to use the huge community on Facebook, something it can’t compete with, to combine with its own wealth of online video.
Live stream video viewing up by 650%
In their most recent report into online video, Comscore announced that the amount of live-streamed video we’re watching has grown by 648% over the past year. This is absolutely phenomenal growth and compares to a (still impressive) 68% increase in video views on Youtube. While it may still form a minor part of the online video market, live streaming is growing in popularity and use, as we become more accustomed to this form of content, both as consumers and producers. UStream are owning the market here, but Facebook are quickly getting in on the game – recently introducing LiveStream integration with Facebook pages. This has the potential to hugely increase the live stream video market and see it really reach the mainstream.
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