Last week, Vine introduced a “Loop Count” metric that shows users and marketers how many times people are watching, (or looping) their videos. Before the release of this new feature, brands and users of Vine had to rely on likes, comments and revines (which not longer exist) to determine the reach of their videos. Now with loop count, the number of people watching any Vine is updated — in realtime.
Vine began tracking loop counts on April 3rd of this year, so for videos posted before then, a “+” is placed next to the loop count to signify that that particular video may be missing loops from the displayed total.
The development of loop count will be extremely beneficial for brands currently using Vine as a marketing tool, and potentially will encourage more brands to use the service. Michael Kelly, senior/media consumer communications manager at American Licorice Company, which owns Red Vines (a regular user of Vine) says: “With digital/mobile spend being under intense scrutiny, the ability to measure the performance of content is key. Therefore, loop count is necessary and important for Vine’s future as a marketing tool: having an understanding of which content is keeping viewers engaged can a help to inform the creative direction or style of the Vines made in the future.”
That being said, loop count does have its problems. Loops can be counted even if the video is not actually being watched; for example, if a Vine video is embedded in an online article, the loop count will continue to increase as long as the tab is open (Clickz). Also, loop count neglects to account for numerous views by a single person – potentially skewing the size of a brand’s audience on Vine.
Along with loop count, Vine has added other new features, including widened videos that span across the entire mobile screen, and milestone alerts when a user’s video receive a certain number of likes.
Because loop count is only a week old, its impact on the amount of brands using Vine as a marketing tool is yet to be seen. With the addition of this new feature, is your brand more likely to use Vine?
