9 Surefire Ways to Boost Your Video Ads ROI

Congrats, you savvy, insightful marketer! You are keeping up with advertising trends and have your ideal masterpiece video content ready for the masses. But how do you make sure they see it — and most importantly, how do they react to it? Time to find out!

In 2021, the average person will spend 100 minutes watching online videos each day. So, why won't they spare just a few seconds to watch your video ads? See, it's doable. Really, it's not them, it's you. But worry not, we have compiled these 10 proven strategies to boost your video ads ROI just for you.

Online consumers are veering away from “old school” text-only advertisements and taking a keen interest in videos. In fact, according to recent research, 72% of consumers admit they favor videos to texts. That means, by pressing just a few right buttons in your advertising campaign, you'll certainly be in for a windfall.

Fast fact: currently over 80% of all internet traffic is video-based and that number continues to rise.

Generally, users find interpreting visuals much easier and faster compared to text. A recent study revealed that the human brain processes images 60,000 times faster than text. For these reasons, it's only wise that marketers embrace and optimize the newest trend in town. In this article, we look at 10 ways to improve your video ads' ROI to boost traffic and make conversions.

Video Ad ROI Booster #1: Match the Intent

There are various reasons why brands opt for video ads. Whatever the purpose, being aware of what stage of the sales funnel your prospects are at is critical to the success of your campaigns.

As you can see above, there are various stages a prospective client has to go through before making a purchase. Realizing early enough where your potential client stands will help you establish the best possible strategies to push for a sale. To keep up, most companies use CRM tools. These solutions are vital as they will help you identify your prospects and understand them better.

So how is this connected to making your video ads perform better? Understanding the sales funnel is crucial from the first steps of making a video ad. Here is a list of video ads that can be made at different stages of the sales funnel:

• Awareness. Ads that last less than 15 seconds are delivered as pre-rolls, mid-rolls, or outstream videos. Can be served programmatically or through the means of social media ad platforms.
• Interest. Video ads served as part of retargeting campaigns will do great here.
• Consideration. As you gather more data about the user, it's possible to narrow down the targeting and retarget users with more personalized messages in your video.
• Intent & Evaluation. Here, advertising should be put on the back burner for the audience, and you focus on content marketing instead. Check out how we incorporate videos on our blog, social media, or Youtube.
• Purchase. Once the lead becomes your customer, keep combining video advertising and video marketing methods to hold their interest.

Video Ad ROI Booster #2: Split Test

When posting a video ad, it's impossible to predict its reception. However, with split testing, you can! This technique allows you to run two variations of your video ads at the same time — for instance, you can show one variation to half of your audience and the other variation to the rest.

Experimenting with video ads will help you get the most out of your campaigns and drive better results. A slight change in the thumbnail, for instance, can make a huge difference; did you know a YouTube thumbnail accounts for 80% of video CTR %?

A/B testing enables you to compare the results and choose the better variation, thus keeping you one step ahead. Conducting a split test is a simple yet effective strategy to drive results.

Video Ad ROI Booster #3: Optimize for Mobile

Mobile users are expected to exceed 6.9 billion in 2020 and grow to over 7.4 billion by the end of 2024. By 2025, there are predicted to be over 1.7 billion subscribers for 5G networks which could offer download speeds of up to 10 gigabits per second. This indicates that mobile traffic is going through the roof and will only continue to rise even further.

For this reason, optimizing your video ads for mobile is non-negotiable. It not only improves user experience but also significantly increases the chances of converting.

For starters, to optimize for mobile you simply have to make sure you choose the right resolution and format for the video ads. Improper resolutions cause black borders, commonly known as a shrinking screen. Black borders are unsightly, affect user experience and make your video ad seem low-quality.

Also, keep in mind the size of the text, among other things. Everything should be legible on devices with smaller screen sizes. Failing to do so affects how readers consume the content, mostly scaring them away and allowing them to revert to competitors.

What video ad formats are best to use on mobile, though? Our picks are mobile video interstitials or interscrollers, rewarded video ads inside the apps, and in-line video formats such as outstream in-feed.

Video Ad ROI Booster #4: Grab the User's Attention

We live in a fast-paced world where consumers' attention spans decrease with every few years that pass. As such, the importance of grabbing your clients' attention from the get-go is of the utmost importance.

According to AdAge, marketers have approximately 10 seconds to capture consumers' attention. The same research also notes that by the time the video clocks one minute, if you have not captured their attention, 45% of viewers would have stopped watching.

That means, if you fail to catch the viewers' attention early on you will lose them, significantly hurting your ROI.

So, how can you ensure that consumers remain glued to their screens?

• Use an attention-grabbing thumbnail;
• Introduce a problem and promise a solution in the first 3 seconds — If you seem helpful and promise a solution to your customer early on, you will win them.
• Tell them a story in your ad.
• With all the information you give, strive to build curiosity.

By using these simple strategies, you arouse the prospect's interest in your products and services. In turn, you increase your video ad's watch time, which is instrumental in improving your video ad's ROI.

Video Ad ROI Booster #5: Include Captions

Captions are an essential element of videos. They are particularly helpful to people with hearing disabilities, those who don't understand your language, or simply the few that don't get your accent.

To tap into the lucrative international market, brands must acknowledge that the language barrier exists. Due to cultural differences, some people might face difficulties understanding video ads. Thus, it’s essential to make the video voice content multilingual with text to speech software and include captions translated into different languages. It can help expand your reach and connect with a wider audience.

Also remember, to keep up with IAB standards, the video ads' sound should always be turned off when your videos first show up to the viewer. Captions can help grab their attention and motivate them to turn on the sound and watch the whole video.

In short, captioning allows brands to reach a wider audience, which is great for ROI.

Video Ad ROI Booster #6: Incorporate a Call-To-Action

The essence of creating video ads is to prompt people to take action, right?

Right!

And that is why a call-to-action is vital in improving ROI.

A call-to-action simplifies the customer journey, directing them to the next stage of the customer conversion process. When customers know where to click to purchase your products or service, click-through rates will increase, as well as sales and ROI.

Video Ad ROI Booster #7: Run Video Ads on CTV

Connected TV is one of the fresh channels to run your video ads, which dramatically grew after the pandemic unfolded. Programmatic and spend for CTV ads rose by 40% during the worldwide lockdown. Quite obvious results, as most people stayed at home, where they preferred a big screen to smaller ones.

According to Epom research, 57% of marketers have observed higher engagement levels for CTV ads than for any other forms of video advertising. Indeed, CTV video ads can't be easily skipped and are overall better tolerated by people, who got used to traditional television ads, which emerged inevitably and on schedule.

Moreover, connected TV advertising opens up new opportunities for attribution and retargeting. Even though it's almost impossible to track clicks and conversions on CTV, you can later retarget your ad campaign to those who viewed your video on mobile. Unlike regular video ads that can be skipped or go unnoticed, CTV ensures almost 100% viewability, which increases the chances for conversion after the user sees your ad the second time and is familiar with your brand.

Video Ad ROI Booster #8: Measure Video Analytics

Analytics are the lifeblood of any advertising campaign and video ads are no exception. Without them, brands cannot measure the success of their campaign.

When used correctly, analytics in video ads will help you gain deeper insight into your campaigns, understand the campaign's strengths and weaknesses and — make insightful decisions.

In a video ads campaign, marketers should consider analytics on the overall engagement, average watch time, and CTR. Measuring these metrics will help you understand how to improve your video ads and boost your ROI.

Video Ad ROI Booster #9: Outstream video

Remember how focused you were when you went searching for something specific, only to realize 30 minutes later that you are still watching “irrelevant” stuff?

That's how powerful video content is. An outstream video is an ad format that may help with expanding reach even more, as it can be placed on any website, even those which do not contain any videos.

Outstream videos are ads that are displayed on a website as the users scroll. They do not need video players to be incorporated and run by themselves on the website. Implementing this ad format will guarantee a high view rate and potentially a higher CTR.

Summary

Here is a summary of the key points on how to increase your video ads potential and maximize ROI:

1. Match the intent — Be as relevant as possible and appeal to your prospects.
2. Split test — Test different variations of your videos to find the best one.
3. Optimize for mobile — Most people watch videos on mobile, so that's crucial.
4. Grab consumer attention — The value of your video is established in the first 3 seconds of the video.
5. Include captions — Video ads are often muted by default, so to convey your message better add captions.
6. Incorporate a call to action — Show people where to click, persuade them to do so, and thus get more sales.
7. Adopt connected TV ads — Use almost unskippable creatives similar to traditional TV ads in the new era of TV advertising.
8. Measure video analytics — Analyse ad views, clicks, see what works, fix the problem areas, and increase the quality.
9. Use outstream video ads – They do not need support from video players and run by themselves on the website.

Also, be sure to choose the best video ad format to yield as many sales as possible.

Now it's your turn... Are you ready to break into the online advertising world?