Short-Form Video
Those of you who follow my AI articles know how much I enjoy finding innovative AI founders solving complex Artificial Intelligence (AI) use cases that are simplifying routine tasks to make humans lives happier, and unlocking creative juices.
One of the market segments that I have been scanning for some time is short-form video formats that are so simple to use that anyone can be a film producer and produce iconic images, worthy of an Oscar. We live in the Entertainment Economy and whether its Understanding Media by Marshall McLuhan, Nicholas Negroponte's, Being Digital, or Michael Wolf’s, The Entertainment Economy: How Mega-Media Forces Are Transforming Our Lives, all of these books outline a vision of the future is recognizing the importance that the entertainment and media industry has on impacting everything around us. Humans simply love watching videos, and increasingly creating short-form videos.
The Market Context
In our increasingly digital world, consumers or customers are increasingly looking for more succinct video, short-form content that gets the message succinctly across. The global short video platforms market size according to Grandview Research was valued at USD 1.52 billion in 2022 and is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 10.2% during the forecast period. The increased global internet penetration, increased production of videos and online content, the proliferation of smartphones and the increasing availability of wireless broadband technology, and emergence of 4G/5G mobile networks, are some of the major market dynamics driving the market growth.
In addition to these factors, ninety three percent of marketers view short-form video as an essential component of their marketing plan, while over eighty-six percent of organizations utilize it as a strong marketing tool. With the earlier generations of short-form video content coming from YouTube or Vimeo for user generated content, then social media generated content becoming more pervasive with platforms like Instagram Reel, and Tiktok short form video content has taken off. These videos can vary in length from sixty seconds in Tiktok to videos five to ten minutes on length in YouTube.
We are now in a market sweet spot that over seventy percent of users will prefer to watch a business video with a duration of under one minute, people share videos twice as any other online content.
Zoomerang’s Roots
Meet Zoomerang, and its Armenian co-founders, David Grigoryan, Arman Manukyan, Hayk Grigoryan, who have for the past five years been building a short-form video platform to enable business users or consumers to create visually stunning video, without technical expertise or access to expensive computing resources.
Zoomerang is a template marketplace designed for individuals and small and medium-sized businesses. It was established in 2018 in Armenia by 2 brothers and a classmate who had tech knowledge and a desire to make something that would help in the modern world. They aimed to develop an innovative video editing application that allows users to create and share distinctive and original short-form videos easily. The initial goal was to facilitate video creation on all platforms by making it as simple as a few taps. After five years of intensive R&D and early soft-launches, Zoomerang has successfully achieved this goal and now have over 35M users globally.
The motivation behind the creation of Zoomerang originated from David’s personal experiences facing obstacles in gaining recognition for creative works. Despite having a PhD in computer science and being encouraged to pursue programming, it was the founder’s passion for music that ultimately led to the development of Zoomerang. Devoting all his energy to expressing himself through music, he consistently encountered disappointment when his uploaded files on social media failed to achieve the eyeballs he was hoping for. As someone with limited editing experience, he struggled to find an application that could provide a comprehensive solution to enhance the quality of his videos. It was during this time that his brother, Hayk Grigoryan and his classmate Arman Manukyan joined him in conceiving the idea for Zoomerang.
Their vision goes beyond just providing simplified video editing tools and templates, rather they are striving to create market place, with a comprehensive ecosystem that combines innovative AI technology with a vibrant community of content creators. They are striving to inspire and enable their users to push the boundaries of creativity, and be able to experiment with innovative ideas, and produce videos that resonate with their audience.
"Our vision for Zoomerang was clear from the start—to empower individuals in crafting captivating short-form video content through our innovative video-template marketplace. Today, we proudly stand as the editing application with the largest template marketplace, offering over 10,000,000 templates,” says David Grigoryan, co-founder of Zoomerang. “Now, fueled by our fascination with AI advancements, we are on a mission to create an all-in-one platform where users can seamlessly experiment with AI-generated content and unlock the latest AI technologies within the mobile sphere.”
In speaking with David, I wanted to appreciate the market problem they are solving and it really is helping users to be able to simply and creatively showcase their creative talents, and not be encumbered by clunky toolkits.
One of the major thorns or issues that creators face is a lack of experience to use complex editing tools or have very limited access to powerful computers required for professional editing. Moreover, the editing process is very time-consuming and doesn't guarantee success.
With platforms like TikTok offering an endless stream of content, users can easily scroll past videos without giving them a fair opportunity to capture attention. As a result, it has become increasingly difficult for creators to stand out and gain market traction.
Zoomerang is addressing these challenges by offering both web and mobile application access to quality and low-cost editing solutions and have built the largest video template marketplace, with over 10,000,000 templates to assist creators to design engaging content. In addition, they have integrated AI to enable creators to save time that would have otherwise been spent searching for trends and manually editing their ideas. The AI overlays will empower short-form video developers to focus more on the artistic aspects of short-form video creation.
Zoomerang has developed one of the most advanced AI toolkits for any video editing application focused specifically on short-form video creators’ needs. With a early software launch the company has already experienced over a 400% surge in Android app downloads (600,000 installs), marking the start-up’s best performance since its launch. Global downloads have already surpassed the mark of 35,000,000. Check out the full list of AI-powered features available within the Zoomerang application here.
Major Benefits
- Enhanced Accessibility: Zoomerang's AI-powered toolkit enhances the accessibility of video creation for users bypassing the need for advanced editing skills or expensive technology. Comprising 13 sophisticated AI features, Zoomerang automates nearly the entire technical editing process of video creation. This robust arsenal, guided by human creativity, can generate images, music, and soon even video files. Zoomerang’s AI-powered arsenal allows to generate photo/video materials, captivating content captions and transform text copies into dynamic audio files or generate audio files tailored to specific video needs. (Check out the full list of features with their projected launch dates here.) Recently, Zoomerang has also become one of the first applications to fully integrate two Stable Diffusion-powered AI features, Deforum and Image-to-Image batch processing, capable of transforming video files into any creative concept in mere seconds (find more about the features here). Despite the availability of both features for computer users, individuals with limited or no experience in programming face significant challenges when using these technologies. With Zoomerang, people can access both features through their mobile devices with just a few simple button presses, making this accomplishment a remarkable feat.
- Time and Resource Efficiency: Zoomerang's AI technology streamlines the video editing process, saving users significant time and resources. The AI-powered features automate tasks such as caption generation, photo/video material generation, and audio file customization, enabling users to produce polished videos in a fraction of the time it would traditionally take. This efficiency allows users to focus on their creative vision and content strategy, maximizing their productivity and output. It takes only 5 minutes on average to create a video through Zoomerang.
- Creative Flexibility and Inspiration: The selection process for integrating specific AI features into our collection is driven by careful consideration of current trends and the latest advancements in generative AI. We prioritize features that align with the evolving needs and preferences of creators, ensuring that our AI toolkit remains at the forefront of innovation. A prime example of our commitment to this ideology was the integration of 2 Stable Diffusion-powered AI features I mentioned above. These features, in particular, have been creating waves on the internet for the past few months, captivating millions of viewers on platforms like TikTok and YouTube. A prime example is a 20-second video that has generated 251 million views, utilizing Deforum.
Lessons Learned
Co-founder, David says, There is so much I have learned during my experience with Zoomerang, it would be the significance of understanding and addressing the needs of your community. Whether it's someone full of ideas but unsure of how to bring them to life or established businesses trying to succeed in a tough market, we aim to understand their challenges and give relevant solutions. Before making any decision, we always ask ourselves, "Is this something our community really needs?" Drawing from my own experiences from 5 years ago, I can relate to the struggles and dreams of the people we serve … However, as time goes on, circumstances change, and so do people's needs. To ensure Zoomerang's success, we have prioritized analyzing industry trends and identifying what might interest our creative community before the internet forces those trends upon them. I've also come to appreciate the importance of adapting and embracing technology. Change is inevitable, especially in the fast-paced world of technology. To stay relevant, we must keep up with the latest advancements and find ways to make them work for us. That’s exactly what we did with our recent AI launches and the results that followed immediately speak volumes, says David Grigoryan, co-founder, Zoomerang.
Conclusion
One major truth driving increased consumption of media is that we are developing a generation that simply just prefer to live in video or metaverse environments than live in the real world. Recent research from Bain & Co., found that over fifty perecent half of people between the ages of 13 and 34 would rather socialize with their peers in a video-game setting than in the real world. This will drive up gaming’s revenue, helping it to grow to almost 11% of overall media and entertainment spending by 2026, nearly double where it stands today. And by 2030, McKinsey estimates that more than 50% of live events could be held in the metaverse.
In other words, every business must build increased digital literacy skills to engage in short-from video to be relevant. According to Accenture, 6 in 7 consumers globally want an all-in-one platform to simplify their entertainment experiences with video streaming, fantasy sports, social media, e-commerce, and more.
To be able to deliver these consumer expectations, organizations must consistently innovate and drive their digital strategy to become more agile as enterprises.
This means thinking beyond just marketing function, but all functions in an enterprise will need to develop stronger creative skills, using short-form videos to communicate with customers and increasingly also internally.
Personalization is the name of the retention game with organizations vying to deliver relevant content and advertising via machine learning (ML) techniques that dig deep into customer behavior and demographics.
Zoomerang has an acute eye on this big and rapidly growing market and are determined to provide diverse users with cost effective, templated short video production capabilities, and integrating AI for democratizing short-form video for the masses. From my discussions with the founders, they not only have the will - they have the brilliance to make an indelible impact.
Research Notes:
Competitors
- Kaiber.ai
- Canva.com
- Picsart.com
Largest Global Manufacturers of Short-Form Video
- ByteDance
- NaverTV
- Netflix
- Sharechat
- Short-Form Video
- YouTube
