LinkedIn launches video for Sponsored Content and Company Pages

BW Online Bureau Apr 18, 2018

A new LinkedIn study, titled ‘The B2B Video Report’ revealed that 73 percent Indian marketers see the video as the most important content format in digital marketing for 2018. However, 50 per cent of B2B marketers find it difficult to reach the right audience of decision-makers while using video. Realizing this challenge to reach quality audiences in the professional context using video, LinkedIn, the world’s largest professional network, has rolled out the video for Sponsored Content and Company Pages.

The video for Sponsored Content helps marketers and businesses make the most of LinkedIn’s targeting and measuring capabilities to effectively reach and engage with the right audience in a quality environment using video. Marketers can use native video ads to achieve their objectives throughout the marketing funnel -- to build brand awareness with rich visual stories, target the right audience by traits such as job title, seniority, company name, industry, skills; and collect high-quality leads with a persistent “call to action” button or through the integrated Lead Gen Forms product. Additionally, LinkedIn’s Matched Audiences solution also allows marketers to target their sales team’s highest-priority accounts with account-based marketing (ABM) campaigns. For marketers, everything hinges on delivering greater ROI and through LinkedIn’s proprietary Conversion Tracking tool that is integrated within the video ads feature, they can measure the success of video ads, enabling marketers to measure the number of leads, sign-ups, website visits, and other valuable actions that video content generates.

In addition to native video ads, LinkedIn has also introduced the ability for business and publishers to upload the video on their Company Pages. The new video feature for Company Pages helps organizations share first-hand looks into their culture, news, and events, and effectively attract high-potential talent and build a stronger employer brand.

“By 2023, 75 per cent of all mobile traffic is expected to be video and our internal survey shows that Indian marketers are planning to spend an average of INR 15 million on video marketing this year. But for too long, the video has belonged to the realm of B2C marketers. The year 2018 will see the rise of the B2B video, where brands and businesses will tell a creatively rich story using sound and motion to connect to decision-makers, earn trust and become thought leaders in a professional environment. New formats of video such as explainer videos, employee advocacy videos, TVCs and testimonials will take the B2B video beyond the talking head this year,” said Virginia Sharma, Director Marketing Solutions, LinkedIn India.

The state of video marketing in India

‘The B2B Video Report’ by LinkedIn found that video marketing was a critical area of investment for B2B marketers in India this year. The survey found that INR 1.5 crore (approx 15 million) is the average budget that Indian marketers have allocated to B2B video advertising in 2018, which is 21 per cent higher than the average budget spent on video in 2017. For Indian B2B marketers, Product Videos (64), TV Commercials (55 per cent), Live Stream and Explainer Videos (46 per cent) came out as the most popular types of B2B video formats they plan to use this year. About 56 percent of digital marketers in India strongly feel that using video gives B2B brands more room for creative storytelling. Close to 79 per cent of Indian B2B marketers currently use video advertising for raising brand awareness; 56 per cent of them use video for product/service promotion, and 48 per cent use it for lead generation. Moreover, 54 percent strongly believe that video helps in identifying higher quality leads.