LINKEDIN CATCHING UP WITH NATIVE VIDEO ADS
LinkedIn may be the last major social network that is being considered by people to share videos natively. However, not only will LinkedIn allow people to natively upload videos onto the social network via its mobile app, the platform will be able to share details or information about the people who view those videos. The information includes viewership stats, details about viewers, companies and job titles. These videos will play automatically in people’s newsfeed with sound off. Videos can be disabled from playing automatically from the account settings.
Last year, LinkedIn had rolled out a separate app for its most influential users to post short videos. Now with LinkedIn bringing the video-sharing option to its main app, users will be able to take and upload videos with LinkedIn’s updated in-app camera or upload clips from their phone’s camera roll. This native video is currently being tested in the US and LinkedIn plans to bring out the functionality worldwide in the coming months.
Though video best practices recommend that videos range between 30 seconds to 5 minutes, LinkedIn allows advertisers to run a video up to 10 minutes. The video can be horizontal or vertical. Similar to Facebook, Twitter, YouTube & Instagram, an advertiser will be able to see how many views, likes and shares a video has received. LinkedIn will count a view once a video has played for 3 seconds. Though this appears to be pretty standard, but with most things with LinkedIn, it has a unique business twist. Though LinkedIn will not share a complete list of all viewers, employer names and job titles, it will share the selected top ones. This information may not seem critical or important to a YouTube creator or someone uploading a video of their kid on Facebook. However, it definitely has a high impact and significance for the business crowd that LinkedIn caters to, particularly if LinkedIn users like watching videos as much as users of seemingly other social networks.
Native LinkedIn videos with such unique analytics will prove to be revealing in several domains such as – Networking & Sales, Media distribution, User engagement and Advertising revenue.
In conclusion, though LinkedIn does not currently serve video ads on its service, it won’t likely remain the case for long, considering how every other social network has turned to videos to bolster their ad businesses.
Source - businessinsider.com, marketingland.com
