CREATIVITY Magazine’s website offers up an excellent article titled, It’s Time To Picture A New Web, written by Gary Shenk, CEO of Corbis.
The article touts the pending criticality of online video as “the ultimate frontier”. I’m not so sure that there won’t be something beyond online, two-dimensional video in the next 100 years, but … In the piece Shenk tells us, “...factors are converging for us to accelerate towards a more visual web. Broadband penetration is now more than 80 percent amongst regular internet users and growing steadily. Meanwhile, online media companies are increasingly welcoming adventurous creative ideas and formats to more effectively advertise to—and monetize —their growing audiences.”
He goes on to say, “Imagery is accelerating as the shorthand for communicating messages and conveying meaning.”
I couldn’t agree more, in general. That’s why INDIUM CORPORATION is producing more and more video (ads, product training, etc.).
That said, tecchies still seek data, numbers, and other, non-image information. We need to take care not to walk away from CONTENT. At the same time, we need to create meaningful CONTENT in video format where possible.
Jeff Ferry:
Hi Rick,
Excellent insight from the author. Corbis is big time into images so the viewpoint is understandable.
Video is on the move and you folks have been out front blazing a path. In addition to the excellent videos you’ve put together how about including voice audio?
The style of video you’ve put together is still a bit beyond the scope of many smaller businesses. You can see something I’ve been working on that integrates still/video images with audio spoken by an animated character. These are relatively easy to put together and we plan to create one for every key product on the CircuitMedic website. Take a look on the CircuitMedic home page to see the concept in action. http://www.circuitmedic.com
Jeff Ferry
Publisher
Circuitnet
Steve Gold:
I think Corbis is right on with his observations: getting a readers attention means having compelling imagery to grab him—especially when the editorial is strong and in some ways you’re competing with that.
Here’s a perfect example of how an image grabs you, causes you to click, and ends up surprising you: http://www.vimeo.com/614784.
The really cool thing here—and a trend you’ll want to follow—is how the video ad “takes over” the header ad. What looked like a text complement to the video ad actually becomes part of it. This is something we’ll see more of in 2008, as advertisers start embracing more of a television mindset and programmers tap into ways to deliver video that aren’t just 30 second TV ads in a viewer.
Not sure if our B-to-B world will catch up as quickly, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see sites that are serious about video trying to implement something like this….
Steve Gold