If you haven’t jumped on the online video bandwagon yet, reading this article might give you a shock. Online video is one of the main marketing tools to use in this modern day and age, and you’re not doing yourself any favours by trying to sidestep it.



According to Dr. James McQuivey from Forrester Research, the value of a one minute video is overwhelming. When I say overwhelming I mean it is worth the same as 1.8 million words. It would take you ages to write the equivalent of what one minute of video means to your audience.

Watching online video is a global leisure and there are no signs of it fading out in the near future. Netflix alone contributes to a third of all Internet traffic in the US so it’s not shocking to hear that video will contribute to at least 86% of all Internet traffic in the next three years (Cisco Visual Networking Index).

In 2010 Cisco network technology experts reported estimated figures in a prediction of the rapid rise in global Internet traffic. What was evident in the prediction is that the single most contributing element to this rise will be online video. The estimates follow below, and were, in 2010, predicted to realise by the year 2014. The predictions were spot on, except a year late as we are already facing this rapid growth of online video.

• Global Internet protocol traffic will increase by four times.

• The biggest single component of that will be Internet video.

• Global Internet video traffic will increase by 7 times

• Internet video to the television display will increase by 38 times

• Video traffic delivered over the open Internet will increase faster than video over managed networks. 30% of Internet protocol video will be delivered via managed networks, with 70% delivered over the open internet

Read more about communicating with video HERE

2013 Cisco Predictions

• It would take an individual more than 5 million years to watch the amount of video that will cross global IP networks each month in 2017. Every second, nearly a million minutes of video content will cross the network by 2017.

• Globally, IP video traffic will be 73% of all IP traffic (both business and consumer) by 2017, up from 60% in 2012. This percentage does not include the amount of video exchanged through peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing. The sum of all forms of video (TV, video on demand [VoD], Internet, and P2P) will continue to be in the range of 80 and 90% of global consumer traffic by 2017.

• Internet video to TV doubled in 2012. It will continue to grow at a rapid pace, increasing fivefold by 2017. Internet video to TV will be 14% of consumer Internet video traffic in 2017, up from 9% in 2012.

• VoD traffic will nearly triple by 2017. The amount of VoD traffic in 2017 will be equivalent to 6 billion DVDs per month.

• Content Delivery Network (CDN) traffic will deliver almost two-thirds of all Internet video traffic by 2017. By 2017, 65% of all Internet video traffic will cross content delivery networks in 2017, up from 53% in 2012.

We know that these figures seem outrageous but these are the Cisco Visual Networking Index predictions.

Cisco predicts users to upload 3 trillion minutes of video each month. That is 1.2 million minutes of video uploaded each second. By 2016 users will be watching long-form online video 5.3 times more than short-form videos. So if you’re picturing millions of years’ worth of funny cat shorts, don’t get too excited. Average global Internet speeds are also expected to grow almost four fold as to relieve the stress that all of this activity will place on broadband connections.

Video Marketing is Effective Marketing

We live in an age that asks for simple and quick solutions and video seems to be the technology that delivers exactly this. People are visually orientated and video makes it easy to say what you want to say in a short amount of time. Online video makes all the difference when it comes to promoting your business, product or service – and it’s not going anywhere. If you haven’t thought about your video strategy, you better start; this is not an opportunity to be missed out on. Video can be low cost and is an effective way to communicate with your audience. Simply by looking at the predictions above it’s obvious that this is a difficult technology to ignore.

Videos have become an important part of any successful marketing strategy as it is an engaging platform. People are slowly but surely moving away from text based media and towards visual media. Video marketing means that, as a business, you can connect with your audience or potential customers, twenty-four-seven, each and every day.

If you’re not sure where to start, download our free Video Production Handbook.

Share your video thoughts and tips with me here, or on Twitter @SoundIdea.

Sound Idea Digital is a full service Video Production Company that specialise in health & safety videos, training videos, marketing videos, corporate videos, web videos, animation and motion graphics. We also produce industrial, mining, induction, and company launch videos. | www.soundideavideoproduction.co.za | info@soundidea.co.za