CommerceVideos.com

B&H Photo/Video has managed to carve out a nice space for itself in the world of online electronics retailing by catering to a specific niche: higher end photographers and videographers seeking a deeper level of product expertise, solid value, and a convenient online shopping experience.   What makes B&H remarkable when it comes to video commerce, however, is that they extend their video expertise to actual video production; the company invested in an in-house video production team that shoots videos featured on http://www.video.bhphotovideo.com and product pages on the e-commerce site.  They also appear to have devoted significant in-house technical resources to support the program with custom player development and other functionality.  As with other consumer electronics retailers like CompUSA and Buy.com that have launched ‘video channel’ initiatives, B&H realized that video plays well when explaining the numerous features and benefits of gadgets and equipment that are often complex and also expensive.  Unlike CompUSA and Buy.com, however, the B&H approach is less entertainment centered and more education-oriented.  They’ve created the B&H video site as a way to feature their library of features & benefits video, with a host explaining the features on-camera.

I’ve got to give B&H props for how far along they are with video compared to most online retailers – below is just a short list of what they’ve managed to accomplish:

- Invested in in-house video producers, creating quality video content with polished post-production work evident through integrated product shots and host shots.

- Featuring access to B&H videos above the fold on the company’s HOME page – not insignificant

- Placing links to view videos/demos on their product pages

- Providing some basic syndication options for consumers

- They’ve even created their own custom player that features low/high bandwidth modes, full screen options, and simple standard player controls.  B&H also features email video sharing (static product image in the email), social bookmarking, and a simple navigation and video search that lets viewers quickly find the videos they’re looking for on-site.

- Additionally, B&H appears to be doing a great job with their video SEO.  A quick search on a few of the products featured on their video site featured first page Google results when the word “videos” was appended to the product name.  They use descriptive meta keywords & descriptions, offer a video download option, support mRSS feeds, create descriptive page titles, feature the video site under their own domain “bhphotovideo.com,” and also feature one video per page.  Doesn’t look like they’re using permalinks right now or featuring keyword-rich video transcripts, but on the whole they seem to have their act together when it comes to some of the more important video SEO best practices and based on a few searches this approach seems to be working for them.

- B&H has also come on board with video syndication, at least in a limited way.  They are putting their videos on YouTube, for example.

The biggest beef I have with the B&H video site initiative is that it doesn’t really seem to serve the larger e-commerce mission of the site.  In a recession and with video under pressure like any other marketing initiative, especially in the consumer electronics industry where there has been heavy pullback on consumer spending for many retailers, it’s no longer enough to create a video destination site for SEO purposes or a ‘video channel’ where consumers can ‘browse’ the video library.  In this regard and in some areas, B&H has a way to go.  For example:

- Links to the product page are featured to the right of the video player and aren’t really noticeable – I had to hunt to find the link.  The link also doesn’t state that clicking will take the user to a product page – it just provides the name of the product – the call to action could be clearer.

- B&H is probably missing an opportunity to create engagement with their videos by completely bypassing player interactivity.  There aren’t any clear calls to action shown in-video that would promote e-commerce – for example by linking to a product page, and definitely no contextual merchandising, in-video sharing, or hotspotting (though I question the value of hotspots anyway without clear calls to action).  I’m a big fan of using strong calls to action at appropriate ‘trigger’ points in-video to drive the desired behavior; creating the call to action outside the video forces the viewer to divert their attention from the video to engage.

- They don’t appear to have extended video to their email program, and it’s unclear as to how much of the program (if any) is available for affiliate marketing – no matter, without both, the video program appears limited beyond their site and video site.

- The social bookmarking options are limiting as well.  For example, the most prominent social networks (Facebook and MySpace) aren’t available for video sharing, nor is Twitter.

- The product page implementation is definitely not featuring video in any kind of prominent way.  The shopper has to hunt to even see that a video is available for a product.  The option is hidden below the hero image, and a strange looking icon appears next to ‘view demo’ (is that an eyeball?  a webcam?)  I doubt B&H is seeing the full benefit of product page lift given such a light treatment, which clearly is ignoring one of the most immediate opportunities to generate more revenue from video in the short term.

- I also encountered issues twice on two separate machines [running Firefox 3.0.10] where the video didn’t load on the first try when the view demo button was clicked on the product page and had to be reloaded.  It did reload the second time on both machines.

- I don’t really ‘get’ the idea of a podcast for product videos like the ones B&H is creating.  And the concept of a ‘playlist’ on the video site?  Do people really want to create a playlist of product videos?  Maybe – if they’re comparing two similar products I suppose.  It seems like a bit of a stretch.

- B&H also doesn’t appear to have an automated way of managing their video syndication to YouTube.  For example, click the link in the “more info” section at the upper right of this YouTube video featuring a product for sale on B&H’s site.  I get a 404 error but am guessing B&H is trying to link to their video site.

- I checked for other syndication other than YouTube for a couple of products, but wasn’t able to find other video sharing services where B&H was posting its content. While YouTube is by far the largest video sharing service out there, many others when put together add a significant chunk of reach, so it looks like B&H might be missing some opportunities there as well.

Still, overall these are minor details for a retailer that is clearly ahead of the pack when it comes to using video.  Their video production is top-notch.  The videos themselves clearly convey that B&H has strong product knowledge; the company’s support of video is evident in that they took the plunge to build out a video team and based on the fact they’re supporting video with in-house development resources.  B&H is overall a great example of what’s possible with video when a retailer really devotes itself to the medium.