Smartphones are the wave of the future. We can do nearly everything we can do on a computer on our smartphones now, and they have assisted tremendously in making our lives more efficient. Sales of these devices have increased many times over in the last ten years, and they now surpass computer purchases.

Even more staggering is the availability of applications now available to help with various tasks on smartphones. Smartphone applications are priced extremely reasonably, and they have generally enjoyed extremely high sales.

Research is showing that mobile videos are becoming more and more prevalent, especially now that data plans are increasing their rates to compensate for increased need. Nearly 50% of smartphone users currently watch mobile videos on their devices. As if that wasn’t convincing enough – forecasts have shown that within only five years, as much as 70% of smartphone use.

A full quarter of the time users spend on their devices now consists of playing games or using apps. Additionally, nearly 60% of users now access social media and other applications from their devices, and a whopping 80% of users regularly utilize at least one application.
It is perhaps unsurprising, in the face of these statistics, that video advertising has pulled to the front in advertising for apps and games. Video advertising is now one of the most popular forms of advertising on handheld devices. The main reason for video advertising being so successful appears to be that it is incredibly simple to watch videos on new devices, perhaps easier than reading small text or pictures. However, there are additional reasons that must not be ignored. Some of these are listed below:

1. People Pay Attention
There are two main reasons that video advertising works extremely well with handheld devices. With PC advertising, users have become suspicious of clicking links due to widespread viruses and scams. Most have installed software to block unwanted pages or advertisements, so the majority of advertising gets blocked – even if it is white hat advertising. There are ways to get around this downfall with mobile phones, and they work particularly well. For example, with mobile video, application creators can require viewing an advertisement to use an existing app that may otherwise cost money. The idea of paying-by-watching-advertising is not a new concept; with handheld devices, users are much more likely to watch the video through to the end because they want to gain access to the application. In addition to this, in most cases the advertising is able to gain a unilateral presence within the device, thereby increasing the chances users will pay attention to the information presented.

2. One Click Transactions
The less clicks a user has to do to purchase your application, the more likely they are to go through with the process, or purchase on impulse. It is incredibly effortless to set up animated explainer videos with a clickable button at the end. This means that once you present your call to action, users can pay and download with only one or two clicks. The fewer steps within a conversion process, the better.

3. Having Fun While Getting It Done
Users engaged with social media, games and other apps on handheld devices are looking for entertainment, first and foremost. Those looking for task related apps typically want to find a quick or effective way to get a task completed. As such, both are more likely to appreciate short animated videos, rather than lengthy pages of dreary text and monotonous details. Videos can lead users to an app to solve their issue, or an entertaining game. More importantly, they do so while evoking emotions – typically humor – in the user, which means they are more likely to feel a personal connection to the app.

In closing, technology requires technology to advertise itself – and mobile video is one of the best new ways to show your target app market that you too are keeping up with the trends. If your potential customer feels you have a good grasp of new technologies, customers will assume your app is able to do things better, faster, and more easily than those of the competition.