There’s no doubt, retail has been a challenging environment during the onset of Corona virus. One thing that’s for sure is that despite the changing landscape, brands are putting big bets on one major part of their business to help them weather the storm: Visual Content.

It works. There are innumerable statistics backing this up: 80% of all marketers now use some kind of visual content on social media. Video marketing is now more popular than blogging content. Top priorities for B2C marketing teams now focus on creating more engaging content (73% says that's number one) and, notably, understand what content works and what doesn't (58%). 

This brings us to an important question for retailers and similar companies: Since visual content is so effective, especially for product-based businesses, what's the best visual content to use? Are images or video more effective? Is it better to use images in one channel, and video in another? The answer can be complicated. Images and video are both visual content, but they act in different ways, and how consumers respond to them is constantly shifting. Instead of making a blanket recommendation, we want to dig a little deeper in this guide. 

Let's go over some of the most important things to know about using video vs. still images and when they are effective.

Use Narrative Videos to Explain Concepts

Video takes more resources to create, but is excellent for engagement. This simple summary is enough for many marketers. In fact, a Databox survey reported that 59.3% of marketers say that videos drive more ad clicks on platforms like Facebook, while only around 30% said images were more effective. They report stats like twice as many clicks for video, up to 30% more conversions for video content, and other very clear data points that support using video whenever possible. 

The reasons for this can vary, but it usually comes down to viewer attention and brand representation. Videos are just better at engagement. Viewers tend to scroll quickly past text and glance at photos when looking at posts. A video forces them to pause, if only for a couple seconds longer, to see what it's about and if they want to start watching. Even this brief pause leads to a better memory of the brand and a much greater chance to make a click or provide another type of social signal – likes, comments, etc. As a result, companies see tremendous efficacy from video formats across a wide range of channels. 

That being said, videos are best used to explain concepts in a more narrative format. Videos that simply rehash the text of an article (reciting listicle points, for example) don't do as well as videos that condense a concept down to a narrative summary that's easy to follow. 

• Provide As Much Utility As Possible: Use videos to explain processes, show off how products work, or prove that your products are enjoyable/easy to use. There's room for humor, but always give value for time – and remember that videos take up a lot of time in Internet seconds. 

• Use Text Overlays So Volume Doesn't Matter: The majority of online videos are watched without sound, particularly in the beginning. Make sure people still know what's going on. 

• Start With An Interesting Scene: A case study from Animoto found that videos that begin with an engaging scene can do significantly better than videos that start with a static image. People watch videos expecting to see action. 

• Don't Go Over A Few Minutes: There's a time and place for longer videos, but most videos can accomplish exactly what they need to within a few minutes or less. This also makes it more likely that people will watch the video, knowing that their time investment doesn't need to be very high. 

Use Images to Introduce Longer Text Content

It may sound like video is always better for retail marketing and engagement, but this isn't true. There are some scenarios where images work better, and marketing team limitations may not allow for creating videos with every post (which can eventually become as exhausting for viewers as for creators).

So, what types of images are proving effective? Images have proven to be the ideal companion content for text information. Publish the same text without an image and with an image, and the image version will almost universally get more engagement and ROI. Pair your images with relevant text for the greatest effect – use them where there's a post or information that you want people to pay attention too. When choosing to use images, remember: 

• Use Images At The Bottom Of The Sales Funnel: Since videos are great for immediate engagement, they tend to perform very well at the beginning of the sales funnel. Later on, at the bottom of the funnel, the buyer has already done research and invested time in looking at your brand. Here is where images can keep up the engagement, but videos may be less necessary. 

• Try To Make Images Complement Other Content: Use dynamic, interesting images that help showcase what the rest of the content is about. Create original graphics or photos whenever possible, as stock photos aren't as good at matching specific content. This in particular is easier for the retail industry, so capitalize on that with your brand's own photos. 

• Match Images With Other Content Calls-To-Action: Images tend to work well with a specific call to action, especially an action that takes more investment like downloading a PDF or visiting a website form to fill out. These calls to action aren't always easy to place in videos and get lost on their own, so they work well as part of image captions or other text following an image. 

• Break Up Long-Form Text With Images: Images are ideal for breaking up longer pieces of content like studies, newsletters, and so on. It's not practical very engaging to break up long-form content with multiple videos, but images suit the task very well. This is also a great place for infographics!

• Leverage A/B Testing To Gauge Consumer Response: if you have high-quality options for both images and video you may still be wondering which is best for your particular campaign and audience. This is a perfect time for A/B testing, where you run both types of ads or posts at once and see how your audience reacts to them. A/B testing is available on the majority of platforms and can be very effective when examining your options. The more brand-specific information you can get, the better content choices you can make!

On Social: Use What Provides the Most Value

Now that we've taken a general look video and images and where they succeed, you may be wondering about specific cases. For example, when you're making an average post on social media, should you primarily use images or video?

This question is trickier than it might appear. With all the engagement statistics for video, it's easy to recommend using video whenever possible. However, there are cases where video simply won't be as effective as an image on social media.

In this excellent study from AdEspresso, they looked at still images vs animated images to see which got the most clicks on social media. They found, to their surprise, that the still image worked far better at getting clicks on their call to action than the video content – about 33% better, in fact. When it comes to cost-per-lead, there were very significant savings to using the still image, which took people by surprise. 

So clearly there are situations on social media in which images outperform video. Those situations appear closely linked to whether an image or a video can provide the most value to a post. For example, an image that shows a very clear picture of a free sample or an example of what people get when they click can see more engagement than a video that (1) Takes more time to watch and (2) Doesn't immediately communicate what's being offered. This is an example of when it can be better to use a very descriptive image than a video or animation – and more cost effective for your budget!

On Blog Posts: Use Descriptive Images or Stick to Full Video

Usually, if a blog post includes text, it pairs well with a connected image or two. If a blog needs a video, it's often best to turn the text into a video script and simply have the entire blog post be the video. 

There are exceptions to this: Particular technical guides or explanations can benefit from including both a text and a video to facilitate understanding. But on average, website blogs still have great synergy with images. Make sure that these images are connected with the blog content and appear along with the post title, so people can immediately make the association. If you are using a video as your blog post (embedded from your video channel or otherwise), make sure the thumbnails you use are as descriptive as possible for the video as a whole. 

In Emails: Balance Images and Text, Link to Videos

With the advent of HTML5 – which content creators should be using ASAP for many different reasons – it's now possible to embed videos directly into an email so they can be played from that email. Not all email clients support this, but most major versions do and more will soon. Which raises yet another question: Should you use images or video in email?

We suggest an approach that uses images within the email itself, and video links that link out to a video platform (YouTube, etc.) when necessary. Images are very important for HTML emails, especially longer emails like business newsletters, because they help break up the text and draw attention to important parts of the email (as well as showcasing new products, etc.). 

The issue with email images is that it can be tempting to overdo them. You don't want an email to look like a circus of colors and pictures – this lowers actual engagement and can distract from what the email is trying to say. When in doubt, treat an email like a temporary webpage. Use images and headers to highlight the most important parts of your content and help show off products or explain concepts. 

Videos, meanwhile, aren't quite as good of a fit in emails. In addition to the lingering compatibility issues, email videos can be difficult to format and hard to view within the confines of an email window (compounded by mobile optimization considerations). However, videos are still effective for engagement! When applicable, link out to a video on your website or similar platform. Many brands find it effective to create an image link that's a thumbnail from the video so that readers understand just what they are clicking on. However, avoid including a video as part of your signature or as a constant presence in all emails you send. 

Conclusion

Although the pandemic has made for a tricky environment for retailers with online and brick & mortar marketplaces, it has kept many businesses highly aware of the content being used in order to maximize consumer impact. Pivoting to a new strategy is not always easy but the increase in brand creativity has show that still photo and video content remains an integral part of retail marketing.