Why Interactive Videos are the Next Cool Thing

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To understand the significance of interactive videos we must follow the trajectory of content in marketing.  

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The paper era  

We saw the Michelin Food Guide emerging as a directory with recommendations, reviews, and directions. This was an example of a brilliant piece of content marketing. It not only catered to brand registration and affinity, but it also drove consumption.  

The aim of the guide was not as obvious as one would think. It was to prompt car owners to use their cars more often and for longer distances. The more the cars drove, the sooner the tires would need replacement.  

Today, Michelin star restaurants are sought after places across the world. Though the purpose of the Michelin guide may not be the same, but the brand legacy continues to reap rich dividends.  

Digital mediums  

What started from paper in black and white, progressed to color, gloss, textures, and coating. Content soon started appearing in the digital form, PDFs and HTML was just the beginning.

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Digitization meant cheap reproduction. Once you have designed a piece of content and saved it in a pdf format, the cost of duplication was cut to minimum. 

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Enter Videos  

While this served the purpose of content marketing, with time it also led to saturation. As technology progressed the eco-system started ripening for videos. Internet Bandwidth started getting cheaper, devices that could play multimedia were not prohibitively expensive anymore. Finally, with the right software and cloud storage, players like YouTube and Vimeo made it all the easier to distribute video content.  

Linear video content saw phenomenal growth in the last decade and today with platforms such as TikTok video has become ubiquitous. Instagram that was originally made for pictures is driving towards video, and Facebook already streams billions of hours of video each year.  

While social media allows the audience to participate through comments and likes, the videos are still linear.  

On top of this, the bandwagon was joined by all kinds of organizations. Videos are now widely used by corporates not only as a 30 second video advertisement but also to explain products, services and for educational purposes. 

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What are interactive videos  

An interactive video is one that requires action from the audience. Viewers must engage and take action to advance the video. This could be a quiz they have to answer, some form of navigation, path, and branches in the video.  

• 360 views  

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• Quizzes / polls videos  

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• Gamification  

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• Hotspots - clickable areas  

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• Data entry areas- e.g. name, city 

Why should you consider having interactive videos in your library?  

The first reason would be that there are too many linear videos, the whole scene is getting saturated.  

However, that is not the only reason, interactive videos bring a host of possibilities and benefits along.  

Interactive videos are engaging

They turn a viewer into a participant. While linear videos do help you capture attention, there is a good chance it may be passive. Our senses have learnt to adapt to linear videos, however, with interactive video active participation is required and the quality of attention is much richer.  

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Interactive videos have better recall

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Consider this: why does the driver remember the route better compared to the passenger at the end of a journey. Because the passenger is a passive observer in the journey. The example fits the case of interactive videos perfectly well. By getting the audiences actively involved you can etch yourself in their memories.  

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Interactive videos help you sell  

You can use interactive videos as shoppable videos. By allowing the audience to make a purchase on the click, you can harness their interest effectively. Shoppable videos allow you to gain maximum currency by allowing an immediate emotional response.  

Interactive videos give you insight into customer preferences

Interactive videos are trackable and the possibility of gaining user data will help you with important insights. You can conduct A/B testing using interactive videos. What is measurable is also improvable, this is the core pillar of digital marketing and interactive videos make it possible.  

Interactive videos are entertaining

Why do people spend much longer on gaming platforms, because of their interactive nature gaming is far more entertaining, so are interactive videos. 

Interactive videos keep audience attention for longer

Interactive videos can aid long form content and provide a better interaction in the absence of a human. Induction videos and training videos with interactivity features tend to perform much better.  

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Interactive videos present a solid case to be applied as a core component of your video marketing strategy. Although interactive videos are a great asset, studies show that over 60% marketers avoid using interactive videos owing to technical challenges.  

With our help you can have a rich library of interactive videos that will deliver results and ROI for you – just write to us at hello@allinmotion.com