Greg Jarboe -

Regular readers of Tubular Insights know that we are no longer reporting news. Instead, we’re focusing on delivering strategic insights, critical data, tactical advice, and trends in the digital video marketing business. But, sometimes the latest insights, data, and trends are, well, newsworthy new news. This includes several shockers in Tubular’s State of Online Video Report for Q2 2017. So, what were the “man bites dog” findings in the Q2 report? Well, there were at least four:

US media companies are shaking things up by investing in Instagram and Twitter as well as investing in longer content on both YouTube and Facebook.

New content creators are still erupting and displacing some of the top 2016 Influencers on YouTube and Facebook, but the advantage of incumbency is stronger on YouTube.

In sponsored videos, media companies dominate on Facebook, while influencers dominate on YouTube, indicating the social video market is segmented, not fragmented.

Genres are shifting ground between platforms; for example, kids’ entertainment increased its share of voice (SOV) on Facebook, while Food increased its SOV on YouTube.

Any one of these findings should prompt video marketers to make a mid-course correction, but when you combine all four then it’s clear that it’s time to fundamentally re-think your video marketing strategy. Let’s dig into each finding and add some context.

The Online Video Creator Landscape Is Shifting

Tubular tracks 8.8 million influencers, 35,400 media companies, and 49,100 brands in the industry. This is the deepest tracking in the social video ecosystem. So, it picks up the earthquakes and landslides on the sea floor long before these cause Tsunami’s that everyone can see.

Among the landslides that the Q2 report detected was this one: Top 2016 media and entertainment creators are holding their ground in 2017, but top 2016 influencers are seeing a decline in total views. Conversely, influencer views overall are growing on Facebook suggesting that new leaders are still surfacing and displacing top 2016 Influencers. For example, check out Jake Boys, which saw its monthly views on Facebook leap from April to June.

https://www.facebook.com/JakeBoysVideos/

Meanwhile, top 2016 YouTube creators continue to grow across the board. So, here’s the shocker: While new leaders are still surfacing on YouTube and Facebook, YouTube’s incumbent leaders are more consistently at the top. This is newsworthy new news that will upset a lot of conventional wisdom.

Sponsored Video Trends Show Social Video Market Is Segmented, Not Fragmented

Tubular’s report also sent shock waves through any assumptions that it was all quiet on the sponsored video front. For example, sponsored views were up 258% on Facebook and 99% on YouTube in Q2 2017 over the same quarter last year. This signals a seismic shift from audience development to monetization on both social video platforms.

The report also reveals another significant fault line: In sponsored content, media companies dominate on Facebook, while influencers dominate on YouTube. In addition, the top genres of sponsored content were different on the two social media platforms. In addition, the Entertainment, Sports, and Food & Drink segments made up a large portion of total sponsored content views on Facebook in Q2 2017. In contrast, Gaming, General Interest, Entertainment, and Beauty were the most prominent sponsored content genres on YouTube.

These last two findings provide additional evidence that the social video market is segmented, not fragmented. I know, I’ve been saying this for a couple of years now, but you’d be surprised by how many so-called “industry observers” still talk about the digital video market being fragmented, which (incorrectly) assumes that video marketers can repurpose the same video on multiple video platforms. Technically, they could, but they really shouldn’t if they want to be effective or successful. Would you run the same ad in France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and the UK? I didn’t think so. Well, the social video market is as segmented as the European market was even before Brexit.

Media Companies Are Investing in Multiple Platforms and Longer Content

According to Tubular’s State of Online Video Report for Q2 2017, top US media companies are uploading videos to multiple social video platforms. For example, US media companies uploaded 431,000 videos to Facebook in the first half of 2017, a 96% increase over the same period a year ago. But, they also uploaded 275,000 videos to YouTube, an 8% increase, 93,000 videos to Instagram, a 127% increase, and 166,000 videos to Twitter, a 175% increase. In other words, they’re riding madly off in all directions. In the first half of the year, all different types of media and entertainment companies increased upload investments cross-platform.

And, as we reported last week, “US media companies are investing resources in creating and distributing longer content, both on YouTube and on Facebook. On average, YouTube videos uploaded by media companies are 2.5x the length of Facebook videos uploaded, which suggests that these companies have been testing and reiterating to find what format works best on the different platforms.”

Genres Are Shifting Ground between Platforms

Finally, genres are shifting ground between platforms. For example, Traditional Kids Entertainment and Animation creators saw a large boost in share of voice on Facebook, but traditional family and parenting creators saw their share of voice drop. On the other hand, traditionally popular genres on YouTube (Beauty, Gaming) are showing signs of losing footing to Food & Drinks and Sports.

And in case you didn’t get the memo, one of biggest content trends that hit both social video platforms was “fidget spinners.” Between Q1 and Q2 of 2017, fidget spinner videos created a Tsunami that drove a 39,000% increase in views on YouTube – to 2.1 billion views – as well as tidal wave of 632 million views on Facebook.

Tactical Advice for Video Marketers

Now, I should confess that I skipped last week’s webinar on the report’s findings. But, I downloaded it over the weekend and now I’m kicking myself for missing this important information for five whole days. So, let me end today’s column with some tactical advice for video marketers: Don’t miss the next webinar, which will share the findings of Tubular’s State of Online Video Report for Q3 2017. It should be held about three months from now. You really can’t afford to miss any newsworthy new news that’s camouflaged as the latest insights, data, and trends. Hey, this is important stuff you should know about, no matter what you call it.