Video personalization: what is it and why it’s so efficient

Automated creation and distribution of videos that adapt to the characteristics of individual recipients and that change their storytelling based on browsing choices. 

Today, all of this can be done thanks to video personalization. 

It’s an unprecedented breakthrough.

And it’s a breakthrough within everyone’s reach.

The rest of this post will be devoted to answering this question: why is video personalization so effective? 

We will answer this question without getting lost in too many theories, but instead bringing data and statistics to support it and dividing them into two sections: the first will deal with the effectiveness of video in the digital echo system. The second will go more into the specifics of personalization.

First, let’s see what video personalization is and how it works.

Video personalization: what it is, how it works

We mentioned it above: personalized videos are one-to-one communications that are tailored to the characteristics of individual recipients.

The starting point for building them is knowing who these recipients actually are, to have a very precise idea of who is “on the other side” of the audience.

However, how is this possible when the audience is potentially endless?

The answer lies in the collection and analysis of data, the digital traces that each user continually disseminates in the digital world.

Demographic, psychographic, geographic data; but also data about the context around individuals and then, crucially, First Party Data, which the company collects directly.

After collection comes interpretation. 

Cross-referencing this information in a broad, deep, intelligent way makes it possible to reconstruct the characteristics, behaviors, personalities, and desires of each individual person who makes up a potential or actual audience. You can move from an imprecise macro-target to many highly relevant micro-targets.

Having acquired this in-depth knowledge, it is then a matter of creating a video matrix that adapts differently depending on the individual user it is aimed at.

By relying on Babelee’s Video Personalization platform, the process from data analysis to personalized video distribution is put on track in a simple and automated manner, based on the goals and needs of the company and creator. 

(For more on this, see here)

The effectiveness of video in the digital ecosystem – some important data

We promised that we would talk about the effectiveness of video personalization from data. 

So, let’s get started.

The starting point can only be data and statistics about the video tool itself; here is a selection of some of the most up-to-date information. 

Let’s start with video’s popularity and familiarity by the audience, with a single significant piece of data: 

– According to the most recent estimates, there are more than 3.3 billion people who watch online video on a regular basis. In 2019, there were 2.78 billion. (insiderintelligence.com). 

– In early 2023, the total number of monthly active users on YouTube stood at around 2.6 billion. 

In 2019, it was 2 billion. 

In 2010, “only” 200 million. 

(demandsage.com) 

– In 2023, the average user viewed 17 hours of online video per week.

Now, let’s move on to the aspects that have to do with business and marketing.

– Also in 2023, as many as 91% of businesses use video as a marketing tool; this is the highest percentage ever. 

– 96% of marketers consider video an important part of their strategies; again, this is the highest percentage ever. 

– 92% of video marketers reported a positive ROI related to their video campaigns.

(wyzowl.com) (hubspot.com)

Now, we come to two pieces of data that are focused on the communicative effectiveness of video:

– 55% of people pay more attention when approaching video than any other type of content (omnikick.com).  

– On average, the user viewing a video understands and believes 95% of the message contained. When it comes to text only, this drops to 10% (insivia.com). 

– Not surprisingly, blog posts that contain videos see a 157% increase in traffic compared to those that contain only text (searchenginepeople.com).

Finally, we will close with a focus on engagement for social networks:

– A study conducted by Buffer on nearly 800 million Facebook posts found that videos generate an average of 59% more engagement than other types of posts (buffer.com) 

– On Instagram, the content that generates the best engagement rate is, once again, video (mention.com). 

– On LinkedIn, videos show an average engagement rate that is three times higher than text-only content (businessinsider.com). 

– Finally, there is the overwhelming success of TikTok and related snackable content, especially among younger segments of the audience.

In short, it’s all very telling.

Now, let’s move on to even more specific data on the effectiveness of personalization.

The personalization boost…again some data

Without much preamble, let’s start with the power of personalization in marketing, more generally:

– More than 98% of marketers believe that personalization improves their relationship with their customers. (komarketing.com)

Moving to the customer front:

– 81% of people want the companies they come in contact with to have prior knowledge of their characteristics and needs (marketingdive.com)

– According to Epsilon Research, 80% of consumers are more inclined to do business with companies that are able to offer personalized experiences (destinationcrm.com)

Let’s come to retention and loyalty, which is more critical than ever in today’s market ecosystem:

– When personalized marketing strategies are implemented, customer loyalty increases by an average of 47%. And customer satisfaction, again on average, by 36%. (qualifio.com).

Consequently, after what we have highlighted above, this figure is not surprising:

– 97% of companies are planning to increase their budgets related to personalized and data-driven marketing (vedia.ai)

And now let’s move to the more specific area of video personalization:

– 93% of companies that use personalization elements in their videos have noticed an increase in conversion rates (econsultacy.com).

– In addition, personalized calls to action improve conversions by 202%, compared to standard, one-size-fits-all calls to action (hubspot.com).

– If we talk about email marketing, personalized videos increase click-through rates by as much as 10 times compared to traditional videos (planable.io).

– Finally, a finding having to do with engagement and retention: 80% of users who start watching a personalized video will carry the viewing to completion.

The bottom line: effectiveness that comes from afar…and still has much to offer

We’ve offered up a long series of data and statistics, first related to the effectiveness of video, which is not coincidentally referred to as the “king of digital content.” Then, we focused on the impressive boost that comes with personalization.

These numbers are worth more than many words.

Now, let’s conclude this post by looking at the deeper motivations behind the unprecedented power of personalized video.

On closer inspection, the effectiveness of personalized video comes from a long way back. It is a very simple and, at the same time, a very profound issue because it goes straight to the heart of one of the oldest secrets of communication and commerce. A secret that we can summarize as follows: there is no such thing as “the perfect message.”

There is no such thing as a message that can interest and engage everyone equally in any context or situation.

This is an incontrovertible fact. Another fact is that messages are effective because they fit that person like a tailored suit.

To put it another way: everything in communication revolves around the recipients. It always has been.

And just think about how we adapt the way we communicate, every day, instinctively, based on the people we face, time after time.

So, Digital Transformation has done nothing more than fit into an already well-trodden groove. 

And multiplying its power exponentially.

Thanks to video personalization, companies have the opportunity to tailor communications for thousands of people at a time, starting from a single matrix, leveraging automation, without wasting time and with a very important and fruitful return on investment.

There remains one final consideration.

We have seen that the starting point is always data, which is used to get a snapshot of the audience, and thus to create personalized videos in an automated way. 

Beware, however, of a further step, which can and should be crucial: we’re referring to the moment of analyzing the performance and results of your personalized video campaigns.

There is a moment when marketers find themselves with a new and valuable wealth of data…data that must be put to good use, to make sure that their communications are increasingly surgical.

In this way, we can create a spiral of continuous improvement: it’s a matter of learning how to trigger it!