March 10, 2021

How interactive video will help you create relevant content in fewer steps (with inspiring examples)

See how interactive video can help you create relevant content for a diverse audience.

We’re living in the future. “Video” is no longer just a way to get from A-B in a timeline. It’s an open world full of possibilities, Skyrim style. Content marketers are scrambling to create relevant content for all their segment groups, showing off all their different offerings and products. That, amplified by the pressure to create content for all the different channels in their marketing mix. It’s a lot.

Well, interactive video might just be a creative solution to getting you out of that mess – at least partly.

Here’s how interactive video will help you create relevant content – in fewer steps. And then we’ll finish off with a few amazing examples.

What is an interactive video?

“Interactivity” can be interpreted in many different ways. Perhaps you could say that a video is interactive if you can pause/play it.

Well, what we’re talking about is going way beyond that notion.

Interactive video can be or include:

Quizzes
Questions and answers
Branching videos (choices affect where you go)
Meet the team
Video shopping
Video shopping with an integrated cart
Creative playlist

And so much more.

Since “interactive” video basically just means: a video that includes interactive buttons/images/media (etc), the sky’s the limit for what you can create with the technology.

To be an interactive video, the interactive elements should be within the player window. An example would be a fashion runway, with interactive product images that viewers can click on to see more information, or to add the item to a cart within the video.

Why interactive video?

Let’s start with the statement that online video has quickly grown to become the #1 preferred medium for information consumption and communication on the internet. Go here to see the statistics we’ve gathered for you on online video use and consumption in 2021.

According to a study with data from CMO council / Pitney Bowes, the top two criteria that would make an online video valuable to consumers in their decision–making are: that they reflect the specific products that they’re interested in, and that they’re able to interact with the video to decide what to watch and when.

Interactive video helps you create more relevant content

Using interactive elements in your video, such as navigational options (“what category do you want to see?”, “which part of the video do you want to go to?”), or personal questions (“what’s important to you?”, “what’s your favourite color”?) – you’re able to reach the core of what your viewer is interested in. This in turn will lead to higher customer satisfaction, and be more supportive of their journey from website visit -> purchase.

Your viewers want to see personalised video content, to be in control of their own experience and to be presented with content that is relevant to them. With interactive video, you’re able to check off all the items on that list with, potentially, only one video.

How to create interactive videos

In order to create an interactive video, you need one of two things: customised help from a development team, or an editor that you can use to create your own interactive video. The potential problem with these options is that they can both be quite expensive. And if you’re just testing out the technology, you might not want to break the bank just yet.

Qbrick has been developing different solutions for interactive video since at least 2007.

Although the technology behind it looks very different today compared to back then, our focus has always been on helping our customers reach their goals by themselves, intuitively and at a reasonable price.

Our editor allows you to drag ’n drop interactive widgets on top of your video, and decide in detail what that widget does, how it looks, and where in the timeline it should show up in your video.

And if you feel stuck creatively or otherwise, you can get help from our amazing support team, or reach out to our in-house production team for creative tips or on-site help.

Examples

Check out some of these examples. Maybe you’ll get inspired to create something similar for your own business. Or maybe you’ll get a completely new idea. We’ll help you make that a reality.