Live Video Platforms: An Untapped Consumer Connect Medium for Brands

Digital marketing has emerged as a formidable challenger to traditional mediums globally and India is at the forefront of tapping the impact of this disruption. Indian companies are leveraging the potential of digital tools and platforms to share their message across the target audience. The most common form of marketing is SEO and SMO on Google, Facebook, and their allied platforms.

Making content viral has become the benchmark for success on these platforms and YouTubers’ reviews of products or services have turned into a reference point for potential purchasers before settling on a choice. Though various studies are indicating the trend that traditional digital platforms are facing incumbency as they deliver a non-interactive mode for audiences to consume content, the contemporary generation is found to be seeking more dynamic mediums where they can also be involved in content creation and not just as a passive audience.

Live Video Streaming platforms have thus emerged as a panacea for both content creators and consumers as they empower them via a platform that makes digital interaction interactive and engrossing. Platforms have spawned a fresh talent pool of influencers who showcase their talents and have been able to amass their own fanbase. This presents an excellent opportunity for brands to collaborate with these emerging artists via the platform to create exciting campaigns with out-of-the-box ideas that enables them to reach out to their consumers in an innovative manner.

The live video platform can be integrated within the main marketing campaign and can be leveraged to stimulate the interest of the masses on the ground level. Some positive qualitative outcomes of these campaigns are:

Transparency: A live video stream allows a brand to gain the trust of the audience as impromptu and unedited live videos are more realistic when compared a normal video upload on traditional platforms. A live video review of a product or service creates a sense of authenticity for the audience and allows brands to position themselves as transparent in approach and open to feedback.

Interaction with Brand Ambassadors: Live streaming is a perfect medium for celebrity and KOL brand ambassadors to interact with their fanbase. Live streaming also removes resource limitations since only a smartphone and data is needed; they can come online and instantly connect with their audience at any time of the This adaptability enables brands to reach out directly to a global audience where they are able to ask questions related to the product or service and receive an instant answer. This is a win-win situation for both the target audience and the brand with instant gratification.

Trust is a Two-way Street: During live streaming, brands can not only interact with their intended interest group but can also build trust among the user group. The genuine questions and answers will help brands understand customers’ requirement and offer either immediate resolution or gather information for innovation purposes. Brands who wish to gain unfiltered reviews from their target group can utilize this channel.

Announcements/Launch: A top management personnel can use this platform for both internal and external announcements, thus sharing new updates on a real-time basis. Similarly, a brand can use their designated live streamers to propagate the news about their new offerings via these platforms by choosing to share the announcement with a few and creating a chain of event or video logs about the news, thus making it viral among the selective audience or masses.

Campaigns: Brands can create video campaigns and ask users to participate in the same in the form of talent hunts, best reviews, behind the scenes footage, webinars, quiz contests or anything else, which may suffice the brands objective. The hashtags associated with these campaigns can become viral when they are simultaneously shared on various other platforms, thus enabling a wider reach without relying on mass media platforms for its content to be consumed by many. 

Brands can use video streaming platforms to measure the impact of their campaigns by using a whole set of social media app bouquet, thus generating the numbers that they may need to call their campaign a success. The number of impressions, shares, likes, etc can be mapped to see the impact it has had on the minds of the target audience. They can groom their own set of influencers on this platform who can act as brand ambassadors and help take the brands to the next level.

The extensive user adoption will see video streaming platforms emerging as the mainstay of digital campaigns in the future. The evolution of these platforms present an infinite scope of creativity and is only limited to the imagination of the brands and streamers. Live video streaming platforms are thus the truly democratic and empowering mediums that have the power to revolutionize the entire marketing domain and alter the way we communicate over a social and digital medium.

This article is written by Puneet Sharma, Brand Strategist, and social media strategist.