Whether through YouTube, Vimeo, streaming to FaceBook or embedding into a website, online videos are taking the world by storm. It is estimated that there were nearly 140 million unique online video viewers in February who spent close to 4 and a half hours viewing video online. The question remains, how to effectively make use of this media outlet? In the past, analytics for online video tended to be more difficult to measure than those of more traditional advertising campaigns. There has been marked improvement in the statistics and analytics available through online video hosting sites recently. As the popularity of online video continues to grow, these analytical tools will only become more important. The social media mavens at Mashable were able to get a sneak peek of some major changes that YouTube is making to their analytics. Currently these changes are in a preview launch for YouTube Marketing Partners, but will be available to everyone within the coming months.
Some new features to be on the lookout for:
Views Report | Quickly see number of views over specified date ranges
Demographics Report | Reveals age and gender of traffic to specific videos as well as your entire channel
Subscribers Report | Find out which video(s) are driving channel subscriptions
Playback Location | See where your video playback is taking place – website, embedded video, mobile device, etc
Traffic Sources | Find out exactly where your video and channel traffic is coming from, whether facebook, twitter or an organic search
These features make the use of online video even more exciting. Users will be able to effectively measure the reach of each video by number of views, traffic source, and demographics. This will make it much easier to create customized content for current viewers and customers as well as generate new leads.
For the full write up from Mashable on all the new features available to YouTube Partners, click here