Why Taking Online-Video Polls is Important
It’s unfortunate that most online-polls don’t provide an incentive. But if you do see a poll invitation surrounding an online video (on YouTube or other sites), I encourage you to participate, and do so thoughtfully and honestly.
I’ll briefly explain how they work, and why viewer feedback is so important to sustaining online-video model.
- As you know, ads fund our online-video experience.
- Content creators and YouTube don’t make a dime from viewers, so selling viewer eyeballs back to advertisers is the only way for them to cover costs and, daresay, profit.
- But advertisers have to know if their ads work. Since few people click ads, we marketers are interested in if the ads changed people’s perceptions about our products or services (and if they’re more likely to buy).
- It’s extremely difficult to get reliable data from a consumer about what drove their decision (they can’t accurately attribute the element of the marketing mix that was most influential). For example, most of my target consumers will claim television was the most influential, and we haven’t bought a television ad in a half-dozen years. Coupons are measurable, but usually “attitude and attribute” trackers are how we determine which half of advertising is working.
Typically online-video polls (through such vendors as Insight Interactive and Dynamic Logic) survey a test and a control sample. Simply put, those who have seen the ads and those who haven’t. They’re usually too long, and I have a hard time completing them myself.
How do we use the data? If the viewers who saw the ad like the brand (or better yet have increased “intention to buy”) more than the viewers that haven’t seen the ad, then the ad presumably was effective. A big difference between these ratings and we feel more confident that we’re driving sales. Since the investment in online-video ads is relatively paltry, then the ROI is likely to be positive.
Then, and only then, is the website and creator compensated beyond a pilot. As a result, the viewer can go about watching free content (and, of course, spending on the advertisers’ products or services). If ad-supported video content languishes, then creators will eventually fatigue (unless they’re OCD like me, and don’t seem to care that their hourly rate would be better at Taco Bell).
Bottom line: I encourage you to take polls. Don’t try to trick them, because they’re pretty savvy. But spend the time on them and consider the questions. Your incentive won’t be a free gift certificate, but you’ll know that you served your part to sustain the free-viewing model. Who wants the Cable TV model (fee for select programming) to hit online? Not me.
I took the YouTube poll. They won’t let me take it again.
?
Next time I take a survey and they ask, “Anything else you would like to add to improve our site?” I’m going to put, “I participated because Nalts told me to. You should hire him, he’s an internet whore!” I’ll leave a link to your youtube channel. I wonder if they’ll understand that?
:o)
you’re not making enough videos. I got thumbed down four times for my comments on your “old guy” video. You have too many new viewers who don’t understand me. I am not happy right now.
On the other hand, maybe the comments just sucked. I am even less happy now.
P.S. I have never seen an online video poll and if I do I’m not going to fill it out just to spite you.
I told you I’m not happy.
Eh, people don’t want me to take polls, because my teenage views and opinions mean absolutely nothing in America.
The last time I sat through a political phone poll it became obvious in short order that it wasn’t a poll at all. It was a campaign call disguised as a poll. With questions like “Where Candidate A is all flowers and sunshine and Candidate B is evil and mean and shoots puppies, would you vote for A or B?”
This is the same tactic that the telemarketing community has been using since the institution of the do not call list. Pollsters can call numbers on the list. I think we all have recieved the “Water Quality Poll” call.
I have developed a substantial distrust for pollsters of any stripe.
depending on the site/ad/content I used to take the polls, now I have to really like you/product or you have to pay me. There’s just too much out there, way too busy and I can go elsewhere. I know that’s a terrible comment on the state of things, I know that if they can’t get people to tell them what they like or dislike prices will go up, more restrictions will be set and there will be fewer choices, corporate owned. Still, I’ve come to the conclusion I can do without a lot of shit. But hey, there are almost 7 billion people in the world, ask them.
I’d like to hope that out of the millions of users on YT, enough take the polls (and are not like me) to get a good idea…
I don’t usually take the polls because I is under 18 and my grammar shows well it.
Hi Marilyn.
kk I took one today.
It had my watch Correy’s weird dream video and then asked me about software insurance.
I’m a teenagers, idc about that!
if it were test, I would fail it. But I took the survey. yay
Blah de blah blah blah, blah blah. Boring. Blah de blah, yada yada yada. Snooze. Blah blah blah, blah blah blah. De blah. Shitty mood.
I hate it when I end up taking a pole.
Sukatra needs a hugggggggggggg