OK it's another moan...

I must admit this bothers me somewhat, but I have to also remember that as a marketer, I have a different paradigm than many who will hit this page - and as Robert indicated:

"The only fair fight is the one you win" and if videos with no button is the winner statistically, well...

-DTM
III

Hah! Robert always explains it perfectly

Good question, Robert. Here's a slightly different perspective
on it.

Sometimes, we tend to OVER-simplify things.

What if... you got 120 sales with that auto-play audio,
BUT those whom you annoyed with it are actually potential
buyers of higher-ticket products?!

You might get 20% more buyers of your $19 front-end - but
miss out on 75% sales on your $500 follow-on product...
and this test wouldn't show that obviously.

That's a metric that could easily get lost when you do
'superficial' testing of one (or few) variables. The
permutations and combinations of a 'winner' in the real
sense are too complex to be measured by a simple test
like this one.

Also, why not just offer a TEXT version of a video
sales letter, the way infoproducts have a PDF transcript
of audio or video courses? I demand it for higher priced
programs, and don't buy the audio/video-ONLY programs
except when they are absolutely essential - because I
learn better through reading.

Others who are better auditory or kinesthetic learners
may have different choices - and Stephen Pierce taught
me very early in my online career that the successful
seller caters to as many different tastes as possible,
to maximize impact.

All success
Dr.Mani

I'm auditioning for Grumpy Old Women lol

Seriously I get the fact that vids obviously work very well, but giving someone the opportunity to either rewind, pause etc is surely gonna pick up that percentage that are either on dial up or like to read etc.

Hmm I'll let you all know when I find something else to whinge about lol

Kim

Pete,

What is this strange thing called "TEXT"?

Martin

Pete, I just agreed with you a few minutes ago in your other thread, especially about video sales pages with no controls. I hate not knowing how long the video is going to be, not being able to fast forward or rewind, and not knowing what the price is going to be until their script decides to enable the visibility of that part of the page. Instead, I just leave.

I know video works but not for every customer. In my case you're actually alienating the potential customer before the customer decides if it's something they might actually be interested in.

Vince

I can see the point from both sides.

I personally hate when I can't escape an uninvited video or one of those stupid "take this survey in order to get into this site" pop-ups, but hey, if it's making them money then who am I to complain??

Ayesha

99% of the time I have the sound off on my computer so the problem doesn't bother me

As a customer - I do prefer the good ol' sales letter compared to a sales video though

Either way you look at it those video sales pages I feel work... only my opinion...

I think it would be a bit odd looking if they gave people 2 options... watch my video or read the sales page. What you will find those is some of these offers have a video only sales page and have another clone of the product out with a long old school 5 mile long page...

When you are targeting people that are new to Internet Marketing or whatever dream or possibility or reality is being sold... I think those video sales pages work and the reason being is because it is a lot easier to get excitement, scarcity, and just plain feeling across. It is much harder to do with text as we often see for an example just by reading a forum...How often does the point someone is trying to get across totally different than what someone else thought they meant in text? Voice inflection is lost in text... Many copywriters will argue to death that video sucks blah blah...but there are places for both of them.

I used to fix up classic cars and sell them as a hobby... You know when I first started doing that people were all into it being original...the dashboard gauges, the shifter, color, even the motor being numbers matching...

You know what happened to that area of classic cars? It is about dead... People care now is it a big block/4 spd car and the color I want? I don't care if it was a a real big block car...is it the bright red with the striping I want?

So the moral of that story is...people change in waves...

So do I think for some products that video works better than a long sales letter? Yep...definitely... they both still have their place but video also allows people that aren't that good at copywriting but good at speaking to pull in sales.

I like to just click view source and see where "eventually" they may be trying to take me to.

Then click the "x" to see if they are offering it cheaper............
Then Click the "x" again to see if there is even a better deal...

Then just carry on working.

If it's straight to the point video, I don't really mind the odd few minutes, but anything that's long winded and drivel just gets the back button treatment.

You are not alone George, me too. You might be surprised that more and more people are getting annoyed with autoplay videos. I do get they are a marketing ploy to get higher conversions, but find they insult a watcher's intelligence by assuming we are stupid enough to keep on watching because of the missing off button.

You methinking wrongly.

I'm with Kim and the other 'text' folks on this one.

Okay, if I can skip through the video to get to the 'meat', that's fine. But if I have to sit through 30 minutes just to find out the price... no thanks.

I found the Twittollower video particularly annoying. I just wanted to get the price and get the URL to sign up. I had to wait for half an hour even though I was ready to sign up from the get-go.

Michael

I have plenty of better stuff to do thanks, not sure what your comment added to what has actually turned out to be a very interesting thread.

Roger you always have something interesting to say

Ok I'll take it on the chin that these types of vids outperform those with controls, and accept that I'm obviously not the "target" market

Cheers
Kim

Hi,

This question just keeps on coming around...

It's a filtering process and it's very effective.

Any savvy business person who is considering a purchase will not allow the seller to dictate and control the variables surrounding the pitch. A savvy buyer will manipulate the environment to put themselves in a position of power, and will thwart the seller's ability to do the same.

My favourite example is the managing director who only said two words to me repeatedly throughout my thirty-minute pitch, in response to anything I said - 'best price.' Unfortunately I was only 18 years old and only had one weapon - determination. I lost.

In this example (video) if someone is willing to allow the seller to insist that they sit there for an unspecified amount of time to achieve their aim (discovering the offer and price) - in other words, they must experience the full pitch (unless they mute) with no other option except leaving the page forever - and the prospect is willing to accept this arrangement - then the prospect has successfully categorised/filtered themselves on behalf of the seller as someone who is perhaps naive, inexperienced, of the consumer mindset, dazzled by the sales spiel, hooked etc.

In short, they are easy meat.

Logically, the product is likely to be of the type that would get a refund or bad feedback from someone who is less naive, more experienced etc.

Therefore the seller wants to totally avoid wasting the time of those more advanced prospects who would have buyer's remorse or possibly feel misled by the pitch - and this system effectively repulses those prospects from the off and ensures that only those who would continue to be suckered right through the marketing funnel are likely to end up in the funnel in the first place.

Those who are confused by this system should pat themselves on the back for objecting to finding themselves in a forced pitch, but should possibly also kick themselves for a variety of other things which it would probably be unwise for me to spell out.

Hi Kim,

It's worth mentioning (for clarity) that I wasn't particularly emphasizing that part of it - in fact I might be suggesting that for someone who wants as wide a pool of potential prospects as possible this is possibly not the best way - therefore the people who utilise this type of video might actually be aiming for a laser-focused target-market...

I think this is an important question for those who are irritated/confused by this system to ask themselves - their answer may be enlightening and helpful - these marketers may be doing a lot of people a favour.