How To Calculate Video Completion Rate?

Video Completion Rate (VCR) is a unique measure for evaluating the effectiveness of a video campaign. You must know how to calculate video completion rate to understand and optmize the campaign. Here, I explained the video completion rate and how to calculate the completion rate. Finally, i shared optimization strategies to improve the video completion rate.

Table Of Contents :

1. What is Video Completion Rate? 
2. What is a good Video Completion Rate? 
3. How to calculate Video Completion Rate? 
4. How to increase the Video Completion Rate? 
5. Conclusion

What is Video Completion Rate?

Video Completion Rate is the metric that reflects the percentage of users who watched the video ad fully. 

You may know that every user who sees the video ad does not watch the video fully. The below possibilities are available when a user sees the video ad, 

1. They may see the video ad and skip the video ad preview
2. They may start to watch the ad and skip after watching 25% of the ad
3. They may skip after watching 50% of the ad
4. They may skip after watching 75% of the ad
5. They may watch the video ad fully without skipping. 

 Every programmatic ad campaign has the ability to measure the above performances. We have highlighted the metric in bold to measure the above scenarios. 

1. They may see the video ad and skip the video ad preview [Impression]
2. They may start to watch the ad and skip after watching 25% of the ad [25% Complete Events]
3. They may skip after watching 50% of the ad [50% Complete Events]
4. They may skip after watching 75% of the ad [75% Complete Events]

They may watch the video ad fully without skipping. [Complete Events]

What is the Video Completion Rate Benchmarks?

Normally, a 70% to 80% Video Completion Rate is good for a video ad campaign. 

In the next section, you will learn how to calculate video completion rate. A higher completion rate means a higher percentage of the users who see the advertisement has watched the video fully. A lower completion rate means most of the users who see the advertisement have not watched the video ad fully.

How to Calculate Video Completion Rate? 

The simple formula to calculate the video completion rate is below, 

Video Completion Rate (%) = (Complete Events/Impressions) * 100

If a video ad campaign served 1000 impressions and 700 times users have watched the ad means, the completion rate will be 70%. 

Video Completion Rate (%) = (700/1000) * 100 = 70%

Video Completion Rate Calculator

Please input the impressions and complete views to calculate the Video Completion Rate [VCR]

How to improve the Video Completion Rate?

In the previous section, you learned how to calculate video completion rate. A higher video completion rate is good for the video ad campaign. But, many key factors should align to get a higher VCR. Here we will provide some suggestions to increase the video completion rate for the video ad campaign. 

1. Video Length 

Video length is the main factor for receiving a higher video completion rate. For the long-duration video ad, it is more difficult to get a higher VCR. Because most of the users do not watch long-duration video ads fully. In this situation, we need to reduce the video ad length to improve the VCR. 20 Seconds or Less than 20 Seconds of video length is good for getting a higher VCR. 

2. Target Specific Audience 

If any content available in the video ad is useful to the user then they watch the video ad fully. For example, if a user is interested in tax saving topics they may watch the clear tax company’s video advertisement fully. Instead, the cricket-interested audience won’t watch this ad fully. So, targeting the right audience is very important for receiving higher VCR for the video ad campaign.

If any of your video ad campaigns are not getting higher VCR then check and find the poor performing targetings. Then, choose the audience from different data providers or Pause the poor performing targetings. 

3. Declare the goal 

Most of the ad platforms have the ability to set the expected VCR goal for the video ad campaign. So, use a dynamic bidding method and declare the expected VCR goal. For example, if you are expecting 65% VCR then set the expected completion rate goal as 65%. Also, choose the correct bid price to achieve the goal. 

4. Conduct A/B TEST

Even though your bid price is high, targeting is very specific, and the content available in the video is very important for encouraging the user to watch the video ad fully. Otherwise, the user skips the video ad after watching it for a few seconds. To find the best video ad, you can test two or more video ads with a small budget and test which video ad is performing well in real-time. Once you identify the best performing video ad, then you can allocate more budget and run the video ad. 

5. Inventory Optimization 

If your video ad campaign is not performing well then run an inventory level report and identify the poor performing inventory source. Once you identify the poor performing inventory then pause those inventory sources from the ad campaign. If you are not interested in pausing any inventory source then run a site or app level report and pause the poor performing sites or apps. 

6. Budget Allocation 

Budget allocation is also a very important step for receiving higher VCR. Allocate more budget towards the best performing ad groups to increase the VCR. Also, allocate more budget towards Desktop channels. Because Desktop devices are mostly receiving higher VCR. Sometimes, mobile devices perform well. At that time, reallocate the budget towards mobile. 

Conclusion

In this article, you learned how to calculate video completion rate. Video ads can create a bigger impact on branding than other ad formats. Video ads with great visual effects and information attract users to the business. When running a video ad campaign, VCR is the key metric to analyze the video ad campaign performance. A higher video completion rate is good for the video campaign. If your video ad campaign is not performing well then do the above optimizations to increase the performance.

Read More : How Does Video Content Impact On Completion Rate?

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