I admit that I am biased, and have long been an advocate for increased use of video communications in business to improve impact and emotional connection. It is nice to see more and more data supporting this position.

I have just been looking at a bunch of marketing data from MarketingSherpa.  One thing that caught my eye was a a survey snappily titled, ‘MarketingSherpa Social Media Marketing and PR Benchmark Survey 2008’.  In the survey they asked respondents to consider something called a “social media release” which is a Web2.0 version of a traditional press release where the template is formatted for multimedia content.

The great advantage of a social media release (SMR) is the variety of multi media content that can be used to engage an audience (video, photos, graphics, webinars, podcasts).  Interestingly, according to the survey, marketers pick video as the most effective multi media content for achieving their social media goals.   64%, said video was very effective in SMR’s and 92% said very effective or somewhat effective.  They state, “Video offers business and consumer marketers a way of getting across a visceral experience (driving a sports car) or to quickly explain a complicated or new idea (why one server is more powerful than the competition)”.

In another survey, this time the GetResponse “2010 Email Marketing trends survey”published by Implix, video got further endorsements.   In the survey 64% of marketers believe that video email marketing can have a significant  or moderate influence on conversion rates.  They state that, “marketers who have already used video emails recognize the benefits on overall email marketing results. Almost 64% of those marketers claim that it results in significant rate increases!”   Moreover 73% of marketers who didn’t use video in emails in 2009, but will start in 2010, felt video would have a significant or moderate increase in impact when they use it.  Finally over 50% of responders thought that video emails increase click-through rates and drive customers onto landing pages.  Video in emails was used for a variety of purposes including product demos, customer testimonials, product promotions and training.