How Brands Can Make The Most Of Haul & Unboxing Videos

Videos are becoming much more influential in the way we shop, with 64% of shoppers saying Youtube videos have influenced their purchasing decisions in some way, shape or form.

In our online research of a product, we stumble across the familiar scene of a well-lit & decently-produced video of someone discussing, opening, displaying, using and teaching viewers about a particular item. These videos are wildly popular, especially when they’re from personalities, also known as influencers, with tons of followers who trust & value their tastes & opinions.

Simply put, after a purchase of any number of products (typically a purchase of many products is a “haul”), users record and upload videos of them removing packaging, testing out and talking about the items, often times in great detail. So far in 2015, videos like this have racked up around 1.1 billion views.

Influencers come in a variety of shapes and forms. From your standard industry experts on movies, makeup, or electronics who devote their online time specifically to one topic to lifestyle bloggers and creators who seem to do it all, know it all and be it all in the eyes of their viewers. Both of these types are valuable in their own unique ways and it’s important to leverage one or the other for your own brand depending on what you can offer them.

The audience for these types of YouTubers varies widely, from a few thousands to well into the millions, so the reach some of these videos have depends completely on how well it’s promoted on their own networks.

Organic vs. Sponsored

When a popular YouTube creator purchases from your brand and goes on to discuss it in a video, it’s the perfect opportunity to use it as additional or supplemental content for your own channels simply because they mentioned your brand. This also gives you the springboard to reach to and begin to work directly with the influencer to create branded content catered specifically to talking about your product or service. Many times, these branded pieces of content benefit both your business and the influencer in different ways. Both sides are usually able to leverage the partnership for visibility, more business and more notoriety. Naturally, this works best for brands who already edge toward this type of creative content on their own, and coupling that with influencers offers a new perspective to its production.

For brands who want to largely stay out of the content creation arena and take advantage of what’s already out there while continuing to take advantage of more traditional forms of advertising, YouTube’s latest endeavour Awesome Stuff Week lets brands purchase ads within review, haul and unboxing videos done by some of the site’s most popular creators. The videos then become “shoppable”, allowing views to see an ad directly in the video for the product currently being discussed instead of having to go look for it, or leaving the onus on creators to link to or reply to comments about the item themselves. This gives the power to brands to make themselves front and centre of video reviews, especially if they’re positive. Even if your brand doesn’t have it’s own YouTube page (which you may want to consider), making yourself easily accessible in this arena is extremely important.