We know video viewership is growing by leaps and bounds. We have heard the stat that video streams will make up 95% of Internet traffic by 2015. And video usage is projected to outperform Facebook and Twitter by 2017. Mobile video will grow 16-fold from 2012 to 2017, and account for 66% of all mobile data traffic during that year.

Brands are jumping on this bandwagon and producing video that they hope their fans will love. However, “while there’s been lots of talk about brands acting as publishers, we’re increasingly finding that fans drive more value by creating videos about the brands and products that they love.”

What? That means that brands are spending significant time, money and effort on producing video content but the raw fan videos are more popular? Sometimes, yes. And that is not a bad thing. Nor does it mean that the high-quality videos that brands are producing are going to waste. Many times these fan-produced videos are positive spoofs of a brand’s original commercial. Or just a display of their love for the brand product.

Here are the four ways fans are introducing their own versions of brand videos on YouTube (according to AdWeek):

  • Upload commercials that resonate with them.
  • Creating videos of the unboxing of products that they love.
  • Creating how-to videos for the products they love and want to share how to use them.
  • Uploading videos related to the brand that capitalize on a pop culture movement.

How can brands capitalize on this movement?

  • Embrace these fan-created videos. Relinquish control of your brand when it comes to these videos and even help share the ones that you think best represent your brand.
  • Keep creating create video content that fans want to share, comment on and recreate their own versions.
  • Pay attention to what your fans are sharing and saying. Learn what they love and give them more great content to work with and love even more.
  • Give your fans elements to create their own versions of your videos and make those elements easy to download and share.

The most important things for brands to realize from all of this:

  • Video content is important for connecting with audiences.
  • Video needs to be a part of any online content strategy.
  • Video provides a human connection to brands.