eCommerce Video Drives Conversion, Sales and Traffic While Reducing Returns

• Online retailer Living Direct found that videos boosted conversion as well as increasing time on site by 9%. (Internet Retailer, October 2010).
• Internet Retailer reports that visitors who view product videos are 85% more likely to buy than visitors who do not, based on OnlineGolf.com results. (Internet Retailer, April 2010)
• Retail site visitors who view video stay two minutes longer on average and are 64% more likely to purchase than other site visitors. (Comscore, August 2010)
• In tests merchants such as Archie McPhee experienced conversion rate increases averaging 30%, with a range from 12% to 115%. (Practical Ecommerce, November 2008)
• According to Internet Retailer, Shoeline.com saw a 44% increase in online sales conversions by using videos to showcase their products. “With such positive results on our existing videos, the goal right now is to add video to as many of our products as possible,” says Frank Malsbenden, VP and GM of Vision Retailing Inc., the parent company of Shoeline.com. (Internet Retailer, January 2009)
• Zappos reports a 6% to 30% increases in sales for products with video. (ReelSEO, December 2009)
• Discovery Channel increased video streams 123% by properly implementing video sitemaps
• 20% of all males surveyed cited online video as a significant influence in recent purchases of jewelry and watches. (Ad-ology Media Influence on Consumer Choice survey, September 2008)
• Ice.com found that viewers who chose to view video converted at a 400% increase over those who did not. Ice.com also credits video with decreasing returns by 25%. (Internet Retailer, December 2009)
• Implementation of video decreased returns by 27% for PFI Western. (Videocommerce.org, December 2009)
• Simple video merchandising best practices can nearly double the impact of eCommerce video (Invodo research, February 2010)
• Shoppers who view video at Onlineshoes.com convert at a 45% higher rate than other shoppers, and the site has seen a 359% year-over-year increase in video views. Product pages with video have higher conversion rates than product pages without video. (Internet Retailer, February 2010)
• With proper optimization, video increases the chance of a front-page Google result by 53x. (Forrester, January 2010)
• Video in email marketing has been shown to increase click-through rates by over 96%. In response, the number of marketers planning to use video in email campaigns has increased 5x since the beginning of 2009. (Implix 2010 Email Marketing Trends Survey)
• Consumer packaged goods firm Reckitt Benckiser found that online video delivered a 6% increase in in-store sales. (Reckitt Benckiser / Nielsen, May 2010)
• Rich media ads containing video increase purchase intent by 1.16% and drive success more than four times that of Flash animation. In addition to the increase in purchase intent, video ads appear to increase consumer brand loyalty. Viewers favored a brand 2.30% more when exposed to rich media with a video ad opposed the tiny 0.15% increase simple Flash animation experienced. (DoubleClick, The Brand Value of Rich Media Ads, June 2009)

Consumers Use and Trust Online Video

• Over 90% of shoppers surveyed found video useful in making purchase decisions, according to a study of Swimwear Boutique customers. (Internet Retailer, October 2010)
• From July 2009 through July 2010, the number of US video viewers on retail sites grew 40%, outpacing 17% growth in the number of total US online video viewers. 96% of online shoppersalso watch online video. (Comscore, August 2010)
• Video views doubled from 14.8 billion to 33.2 billion between January 2009 and December 2009. 86.5% of all US Internet users watched online video during the month. The average viewer watched 187 videos and 12.7 hours of online video during the month. (Comscore, February 2010)
• A minute of video is worth 1.8 million words according to Dr. James McQuivey of Forrester Research. (Forrester, January 2009)

Online Retailers are Implementing eCommerce Video

• 33% of online retailers plan to add video to their sites in 2010, making it a higher priority than any other advanced feature. (eMarketer, March 2010)
• Leading online retailers added video to their sites in 2009 to increase online sales. PetsUnited, the owner of 10 eCommerce sites, saw a 50% jump in average sales when shoppers made a purchase after viewing a video. (eMarketer, January 2009)
• eCommerce video success can be clearly measured. Conversion rate, cart abandons, increased traffic and View Through Rate (VTR) are key to demonstrating success. (Practical Ecommerce, March 2010)
• eMarketer senior analyst Jeffrey Grau characterizes the benefits of video as including “…a lower number of abandoned shopping carts, reduced return rates, and higher sales.” (eMarketer, January 2009)
• Search engine optimization (SEO) and online video were the two top priorities for online retailers in 2009. Online shoppers who viewed video had a larger shopping ticket than those who viewed traditional rich media such as flash animations. (Internet Retailer, January 2009)