For marketplace sites such as auction sites, consignment shops, and travel and hospitality booking services, videos play a crucial role in building a consumer’s confidence. More than a gallery of static images, videos immerse consumers into the buying decision, zooming in on that second-hand sweater or sharing panoramic views of that beachfront rental.
So why are videos under-used in online marketplace sites?
One issue is that many consignment and travel companies — and other retail marketplaces — don’t provide their sellers with an end-to-end platform that controls how videos are uploaded and automatically optimizes videos for performance.
In this blog, we examine why marketplace sites need to support their sellers with video and how Cloudinary can streamline the process from upload to optimized streaming.
In an eMarketer survey of U.S. consumers, 75% said they watch short-form videos on their mobile devices. Consumers want to see a videos –There’s no better way for the online shopper to see the product in action.
Now, on the other side of the screen:
- Approximately 80% of surveyed marketers said video directly increases sales.
- What’s more, 69% of companies lacking video expect to leverage the tactic in 2024.
The benefits of video, and in the consignment and travel channels, videos can create unique experiences such as:
- A full walkthrough of a rental location on a rental share site.
- Visual descriptions on a property or product’s history and uses.
- Content that highlights every angle of a used product, giving consumers a thorough inspection.
Marketplace brands benefit from video but some headaches prevent them from providing a better service for their sellers. Automation can help.
On marketplace apps and sites, a “seller-generated video” is like a “user-generated video.” Similar to a social influencer who reviews a product online, sellers create more professionally produced promotional or informative videos. Unfortunately, both types of videos can come with questionable content, be filmed in a poor format, or arrive at a site blurry.
Companies like Poshmark, Etsy, and Airbnb need to be careful that the video uploaded is worthy of their brand standards. Without automation for UGV, this can take a digital team days to comb through each uploaded video.
Using a platform like Cloudinary, every step in the video delivery process is automatically managed, easing the undertaking for sellers and marketplace companies. Steps include:
- Collection. Cloudinary offers a pre-built widget for managing video uploads, or developers can create their own UI that integrates Cloudinary’s video API in the background.
- Moderation. Cloudinary offers automated video moderation where AI powers instant reviews of videos for sound and image quality, scans for viruses, and flags offensive or impermissible content.
- Storage. Marketplace platforms can host thousands — even millions — of seller-generated videos. AI-powered tagging automatically tags videos when storing them and adds contextually relevant metadata to each video.
- Transformation. With automation, the Cloudinary platform affords marketplace clients the ability to auto-edit longer videos into teaser videos, adjusting each for the parameters of various social channels. Videos are also automatically formatted to stream at the highest standard available on any device.
Sellers putting the time and money into high-quality videos want them seen and streamed at the highest quality possible. Cloudinary ensures sellers and marketplace sites get the most out of videos, ultimately driving revenue for both and increasing the performance of their pages.
Contact Cloudinary and see how automation enhances video for the marketplace space.
