Shannon Delmarle — February 7, 2019 — February 7, 2019
Free-Photos / Pixabay
Hey, you! Yeah, you! The one that’s been living under the rock! Did you know that video is a great way to increase visitors, convert leads, nurture the qualified, and even help promote your awesome business? Okay, okay, it’s 2019. I’m pretty sure that almost everyone knows that. But in all seriousness, almost 50 percent of internet users look for videos related to a product or service before visiting a store, according to HubSpot’s Ultimate List of Marketing Statistics for 2018. So here’s the question: Why haven’t you dipped your toe in the water and experimented with video marketing yet?
There seem to be a lot of misconceptions about what it takes to create great video content—but great video doesn’t have to break the bank and not every video needs award-level production value. In this blog post, I talk about the business case for why your organization should be leveraging video and share different ways you can use video in your marketing efforts.
Let’s begin with the “why”:
- Video can be used to explain difficult or complex products and services. Not every person that ventures to your website or social profile is going to understand what exactly your organization does. With visuals, music, and voiceovers, video can communicate in-depth concepts—like what your organization is all about. It’s no wonder Vidyard reports that businesses in the high tech and professional services industries are publishing the most new videos on a monthly basis. These industries tend to have a longer Buyer’s Journey and services/products that can be a bit complex to understand. Let the video do the hard work and keep your visitors engaged. Use 30-, 60-, or 120-second videos to explain your processes or empathize with the pain points of your clients. People love easy-to-digest content made in a spectacular way that leaves them feeling like they have found a solution or are more educated.
- Video can be used to promote your latest and greatest. I’m not just talking about using video to show off your latest service line or newest product release (although it does a fabulous job for both of those), but I’m also talking about promoting new ideas into the world. There’s a reason so many companies and individuals strive to go viral in order to bring awareness to their brand and showcase their products/service, and video is one of the methods that enables us to easily share and receive information. It’s also been reported by HubSpot that 43 percent of people want to see more video content from marketers. So hit that record button!
- Video can be used for branding. Whether you want to showcase the inner workings of your company’s day-to-day or you’re interested in producing a profile video for your personal brand, what better way to demonstrate your brand? Back in the day, businesses relied on traditional marketing tactics like TV and radio ads, but small ventures had a hard time competing with bigger brands—they lacked the budget to broadcast nationally. That has all changed with technology and access to video-hosting platforms such as YouTube, Vidyard, and Vimeo which has opened the doors for more competition, no matter what size the company. Lastly, people trust people, not companies, so the more transparent you are with your target audience, the more likely they’ll be to trust the services or products you are selling, using video is a window that allows viewers to look inside at a company and who they employ.
- Video can be used to nurture. We are in the age of content development, and the message that’s been driven into our marketing brains is that content is king! But video has not been a front runner compared to e-books, white papers, and blog posts. Here’s the reality: The need for more dynamic types of content is strong because everyone digests content differently. Using video in your drip campaigns is a unique way to keep your leads and customers engaged. It should also be said that video publishing platforms like Vidyard allow you to track, measure, and analyze the performance of your videos so you are able to see who has watched your video, how much of it they watched, how many times the video was shared, and even where someone stopped watching your video. You can then adjust your future video efforts based on the data, which makes for an even stronger nurturing campaign.
Hopefully, at this point, you have come to the conclusion that video is, in fact, a powerful strategy for helping your business. Now, let’s take a quick dive into a few ways that businesses are creating these different types of videos …
- A video marketing agency with a focus on video content development
- Using an in-house video production team
- Using smartphone cameras
- Using a nice video camera and equipment
- Using a software program to record movements on a computer screen and adding a voice-over later
- Leveraging existing content, interviews, and b-roll and editing the clips into one cohesive video
- Hiring a video marketing company and creating an animated explainer video using graphics and animations
Whether you go professional or try practicing with different types of video on your own, the main takeaway is that, with all those eyeballs searching for solutions and video being a main influence on purchasing and brand power, it should no longer be a question of if you use video in your marketing efforts, but when. So gather the team in the creativity conference room and start throwing those ideas around on different ways you can be using video in your marketing initiatives.
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