You already know that Americans have spent WAY more time on their digital devices while social distancing. You also probably know that most consumers would rather absorb information by watching it rather than reading it. However, you may be under the impression that the shorter your client’s online videos are, the more effective they’ll be. This is false, according to Extreme Reach’s most recent Video Benchmarks Report.

What Should the Length of Online Videos be?

Last year, according to Extreme Reach, the online videos with the most impressions were 30-​second videos. 15-​second videos made up 21% of ad impressions last year, and 6‑second and 60-​second ads didn’t even earn 1% between the two of them. Not only did 30-​second online videos make up the most impressions in 2020, the total was also an all-​time high for this video length.

Now, don’t take too much of a breather just yet. You may have more time to incorporate your client’s content into their online videos, but you still need to grab the viewer’s attention quickly. Extreme Reach says that, last year, video completion rates were lower than they’ve been since 2017 across all lengths. Between 2019 and 2020, completion rates dropped from 89% to 80% for 30-​second videos, 88% to 81% for 15-​second videos, and 78% to 76% for 6‑second videos. So, your clients need to grab their customers’ attention quickly and keep ahold of it with quality and entertaining content if they want their videos to be watched in their entirety.

How Consumers are Watching

Another aspect of online videos that you may think you know is that most videos are watched on mobile devices. This is barely true. Last year, consumers watched online videos using:

• Connected TVs: 38% of impressions
• Desktops: 22%
• Mobile Apps: 21%
• Mobile Web: 18%

While online videos should definitely be made with mobile viewers in mind, your clients shouldn’t forget customers who are watching via their connected TVs and desktops.

Before you brush off connected TV and desktops because the impression percentages are too closely tied with mobile as a whole, take a look at Extreme Reach’s video completion rate data. 95% of online video ads watched via connected TV were viewed to completion last year. Comparitively, only 74% of online videos watched via mobile app were finished by consumers. And 67% of those viewed using mobile web were completed. That’s less than the 71% of online ads viewed via desktops that were finished by viewers. Convinced yet?

Ad Response

According to AudienceSCAN, within the last month, 31.6% of American adults have taken action after seeing a pre-​roll video ad. Additionally, 38.1% of U.S. adults have used a mobile device to watch an online or streamed video within the last six months. Online video ads have a considerable reach among consumers and influence many to take action on a yearly basis. Want to know exactly how many of your client’s target customers say that online videos have influenced to take action? Check out the Marketing section of their audience profiles on AudienceSCAN on AdMall by SalesFuel to find out.