Visual Commerce Is More Than Pretty Instagram Photos
Remember what a typical e-commerce product page looked like ten years ago? Content squeezed in boxes, long columns of text, chunky fonts, harsh colour contrasts, endless lines of URL links, and a few images. Now back to the present day. Most e-commerce sites we see today are a lot less cluttered, more minimalistic, and somehow more inviting. What changed? Visual commerce. But it takes more than just slapping a few Instagram photos on your site to say you’ve enabled visual commerce. Here’s what you might be missing.
E-commerce is a lot more visual today. After years of experimenting with different design trends and development tools (remember when everything was done in Flash?) we finally figured out what clicks with shoppers best — visual content. And not just any kind of crazy visuals, but large high-quality product images, compelling videos, and user-generated content from social media.
We’re getting used to e-commerce sites that welcome us with collages of Instagram photos that allow us to shop straight from the images. But is there more to visual commerce than just pretty pictures? Let’s step beyond Instagram and have a closer look at how video fits into visual commerce.
Images Bring Visitors, Videos Seal the Deal
The secret behind Instagram’s now mainstream status in social media (over 400 million monthly active users) and Pinterest’s phenomenal popularity (it’s the fourth most popular social networking site) is the focus on images. It’s one of the thing humans understand better than anything. Science says we’re highly visual creatures. That’s why we resonate so well with retailers and brands that advertise their products on visual social media platforms.
We could leave it at that, but images alone do not magically translate into sales. Instagram and Pinterest get consumers to visit your ecommerce site. But what happens once they land on your product pages? How does visual commerce continue from there?
“It is tempting to draw a buy button on a product and say you’ve enabled commerce.” — Tim Kendall, Pinterest
High-quality product images are a must, but that’s not all. Consumers need to understand what makes a product unique and how it works. To do that, they need content in a format that is more interactive.
Videos are essential for driving user engagement and getting visitors locked into content. You’ve probably heard that if an image is worth a thousand words, a minute of video is worth 1.8 million. Video is one of the most immersive types of content and the most widely available to consumers nowadays.
Videos are not only important for engaging visitors, but are also powerful conversion triggers. Shoppers are 37% more likely to click “add-to-cart” button on a product page featuring videos. That’s a powerful argument that shows video’s ability to “seal the deal” in online retail. More on the importance of video in visual e-commerce in the next section.
How Videos Benefit Visual Commerce
Visual commerce encompasses all formats of product presentation, and videos are at the top of the list. But what makes videos so much more effective than other types of visual content in ecommerce?
1. Videos Grab Attention And Captivate Visitors
Once prospective shoppers land on your site, the first imperative is to grab their attention. You want to keep them from bouncing off your site. That’s where videos come into play.
When you’re adding videos to your product pages, you’re offering visitors an invitation to stay longer on your pages and give them with which they can interact.
The play button is difficult to resist and clicking it requires a minimal effort from the visitor. In exchange they get an interactive and richer experience. Videos also give pages a deeper dimension that images (no matter how stylish) just cannot replicate.
2. Videos Give All The Information Shoppers Need To Know About a Product
Product images are great at showing the shape, color, size, and fit of the product. However, for many shoppers, that’s not convincing enough. Videos help tell the rest of the product story: how the product works, what are its best performance attributes, how to assemble it, how to maintain it, and how to use it in real life.
Just like consumer-made product images from Instagram help shoppers visualize the product in a realistic setting, videos add that authenticity that modern-day consumers crave. In order to truly resonate with shoppers, video content in ecommerce needs to offer a combination of brand videos alongside user-generated videos from social media. This ensures visitors are engaged and don’t get bored.
3. Videos Make Shoppers More Confident To Buy
The secret behind the demand surge for visual content is that it simply translates into a boost in sales. Shoppers are growing blind to branded content and advertorials, so enticing content such as videos helps keep them alert.
55% of consumers say they trust user-generated visual content over other types of marketing content. They trust videos more than other content. 52% of shoppers say that watching related videos makes them more confident in what they buy. 73% of consumers say that they are more likely to buy a product after watching videos about it.
In other words, videos works in converting shoppers better than other visual assets in ecommerce.
What’s next?
As more brands and online retailers move towards visual commerce, the demand for videos will only continue to grow. If you’re currently focusing only on one type of visuals on your online (e.g. Instagram photos), you’re missing the bigger picture. Visual commerce encompasses a wide range of content that should be on your list too.
Your next step is to devise a visual commerce strategy that combines multiple formats of visual content together. Make sure you include a healthy balance of photos and videos so as to create a truly engaging experience on your site.
