If a picture is worth a thousand words, what’s the value of a three-minute video like the Irish Experience Tour you’ll find on Monaker Group Inc.’s (OTCQB: MKGI) NextTrip website? Quite a lot, say the analysts at Globe Small Cap Research, who, in a summary of their research findings, write ‘Monaker’s core strength is its proprietary video-centered technology’. Globe Small Cap has found that Monaker ‘is expanding its video-centric capabilities at an important time in the development of the Internet. Video is booming across the Internet and having significant impacts on marketers and advertisers that rely on the Internet to communicate brand and product messages.’
Indeed it is. The video clips and still pictures that appear on Monaker Group’s websites are the hors d’oeuvres of anticipation before the pièce de résistance of the vacation itself. In this digital age, no story can be properly told without motion pictures. The marketing message transmitted by video is more engaging and requires less effort from the recipient. We’ve known this since the era of Charlie Chaplin and the Keystone Cops. That is why many people have become acquainted with the great classics of literature, such as Tolstoy’s War and Peace or Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, only through their film portrayals.
The Globe Small Cap report discusses how clever marketers like Monaker have responded to the increasing sophistication of the internet, noting that there has been a convergence of the purely informational announcement and advertising copy into what is known today as content marketing. The report explains that ‘content marketing is the approach of combining an advertisement for goods or services with internet content that is of interest to the would-be purchaser. A content marketing approach allows advertisers to target clearly defined audiences in order to drive actions of prospective customers. Marketers that use the “hook” of the content in order to draw the user in and then interject an advertisement and a call to action in order to elicit a purchasing response. This is done so effectively, that the lines between advertising and content have been forever blurred.’
Content marketing is a shift of emphasis within an advertisement. Ads have always played the important role of providing information to the public about products and services. Now, in content marketing, more weight is given to selling the product. The next stage in the evolution of the advertising to content marketing progression is the addition of video. In its earliest days, video use was mainly for entertainment. Now, there’s a realization that, like pictures and verbal forms, it is simply another medium of communication.
Video is captivating. The Globe Small Cap report, citing eMarketing, states that ‘during mid-2015, online video overtook social media relative to the amount of time spent per day online’. Research by HighQ confirms this: ‘…approximately 55% of Americans watch online videos every day with the average American adult spending one hour and 16 minutes each day watching video on digital devices. Growth relative to this area has been staggering as consumers spent only 21 minutes per day watching online videos in 2011.’
Monaker’s portfolio of assets and alliances form a somewhat ‘vertical’ complimentary structure. Through Maupintour, holidaymakers can visit popular haunts or travel the back roads. Maupintour is the longest established high-end travel company in the United States. In October 2015, the company acquired AlwaysOnVacation, an online alternative lodging marketplace. Alternative lodging is accommodation, such as home rentals, that can act as a substitute for rooms in hotels. AlwaysOnVacation, founded in 2006, came with its 65,000 properties in 120 countries and over six million monthly visitors. In April 2016, Monaker entered into a partnership with Recruiter.com, an online global recruiting and career service, which will make Monaker’s customized travel and lifestyle offerings available to the recruiting agency’s ‘three million current members and followers’.
NextTrip is the next stage in Monaker’s safari to place convenience at vacationers’ fingertips. Launched in February 2016, this booking engine integrates all of the company’s acquired technologies with very select channel partners. This makes NextTrip the first booking solution to include conventional lodging, alternative lodging, and unused timeshare and resort inventory all in one place. The technology allows consumers to search and book from the timeshare inventory in real-time without any timeshare solicitations.
For more information, visit www.monakergroup.com
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