Video marketing is critical to the success of any brand – this idea has always existed. But one thing has changed though, and it’s the amount of leverage a brand can get from every channel and platform.
You can no longer consider it to be just another marketing technique. It should form the core of your overall social media marketing strategy.
No doubt video has taken social media by storm. Did you know that social media platforms form four out of the top six platforms on which video content is consumed by your target audience? Also, one of Facebook’s top executives sees video as the only content on the platform in five years or less.
How does this relate to us? Well if video creation isn’t a part of your strategy right now, the chances are that you are about to miss the gravy train. But, you don’t have to be worried. Videos that are simple and convey a simple message seem to be the preference of your audience.
That said, creating videos has never been cheaper – there are now smartphones that allow you to produce high-quality 4K videos.
Why You Need to Prioritise Video Marketing
Strategies involving video marketing seem to be the future of marketing. Consumers now prefer videos from brands to any other content type.
Merely putting a video on your landing page can skyrocket your conversion rate, and can explain the benefits of your offer in a better way.
But aside from the fact that video has transformed shopping for consumers and marketing for businesses, the way salespeople convert their potential clients and how service teams carry out customer support has changed. In short, video is critical to the overall success and adaptability of your business.
Salespeople can leverage the power of videos at any stage of the consumer buying process and deliver amazing results. Salespeople can also use backend analytics to warm up and prioritise leads that have become unresponsive.
For service teams, the possibilities are limitless – support video calls, meet-the-team videos, customer stories, and knowledge-based videos are some of the ways video can help create a more personalised, thorough customer support experience.
Finally, we’ve noticed that consumers are demanding raw and authentic video content. Customers and consumers have proven to prefer “amateur” videos to high definition videos that look “too professional.” What is the implication of this for your business? Well, businesses, regardless of their size or team budget, can leverage the power of videos.
Now, let’s take a closer look at creating a success-focused video marketing strategy.
Step 1: Know your Audience
Analyse your current customers. What problem are you trying to solve? Where online do they hang out? This should form the core of who your target is and how you will convey your message to them. If you have no idea of who your audience is, try using the “ideal customer” as a yardstick for profiling them. Make sure they genuinely need your service or product and ensure you solve their problem in a unique way within your niche.
Also, this is a perfect time to study your competition. Do they already have an engaged audience? If so, can you work out a unique way of interacting with the same audience?
It’s time to do some research. Use Google to get some insights, check out surveys, and interact with the right people on forums and discussion boards. Ask your potential customers questions about why they need your offer.
After narrowing down on your audience, find out where they hang out online. That’s the platform on which you want to put your video content. For instance, If Facebook is where they like to hang out, there are lots of tools to help you target them correctly. If your audience likes to hang out highly on visual platforms such as YouTube or Instagram, you want to do further research to know the style of video content that will generate the best results on these platforms.
Step 2: Identify the Goal of Your Video
You need to deliver your message concisely. Set only one goal for each video you create. Of course, you will still create tons of videos down the road and post a few videos weekly, so you still have enough time to convey your message to your viewers.
When setting your goal, the first thing you want to consider is the purpose of your video. Is it for branding, to make an announcement or promote a product, and so on? Once that is taken care of, you can now decide on what content will help you deliver your message effectively.
Normally, you want to split your months into categories. You want to ensure you create one branding video each week that exposes your business to your audience and can be used for remarketing. Also, you will want to include promotions or special sales. You can include a teaser video here, a video to close the sale and a final video before the promotion ends. Next, if you have any offline event of special campaign videos, you can include them in your monthly plan. Finally, throw in at least one funny video per week with a specific purpose if increasing engagement.
Step 3: Figure out The Language for Your Brand
Every company is different. Before you make any video, start by asking yourself what impression you want the viewer to have about your brand after seeing your offer. Write down the answers to those questions and then refer to them again while making the video. Next, another question that needs to be added to your agenda is: will the audience remember our brand specifically?
The latter question is best answered by using a unique style and tone for your communication. For instance, MailChimp provides some playful and trendy tones. What this means is that you can create your video in such a way that every part of the video is fun and provides value.
Step 4: Craft your Content
While it may be tempting to want to make this the first step, there are lots of other things that need to be completed before reaching this point. When it comes to content, make it as clear and high quality as possible.
Footage: try to picture your audience in your mind, and the platform on which you will post your video and then analyse the library of footage at your disposal. Imagine you are watching the footage with no sound or text. Does it still pull some emotional triggers? Can they figure out the message? Also, how do you see the environment and people in the footage? You want to ensure your audience can easily relate to it.
Text: you need to find a hook. The most important part of every video is the first three seconds. The beginning of your copy must have the viewer wanting more. There is no need to load in too much content here. If you are running out of ideas, a great way to start is by asking a question that addresses a pressing need of your audience.
Most successful video scripts are usually short. You can work with a script timer while you write the script. A script of 350 words will produce a video of about 2 minutes. Having words on paper and reading them out are two different things. That’s why we recommend that you read out your script before filming commences. The point here is to get the flow of the script and identify the trigger points.
Most importantly, every video must include a call-to-action at the end. The main purpose of making video ads is to lead the viewer to take a specific action. Be specific on what action you want them to take and where you want to take them at the closing part of the video. The standard is adding your tagline, logo, and a specific URL for your campaign.
Step 4: Write a Captivating Caption
Research shows that when social media users watch videos, the first thing they do is to read any text in the video and then jump straight to read the caption, even before the video finishes playing. Video caption on social media platforms is critical to the success of your post. Facebook recommends that you use a video title that makes it easy for users to find your video in the search. You can even spice things up with the use of emojis.
Step 5: Start the Campaign
With the recent changes to Facebook’s policies, it’s important to focus on campaigns instead of organic content. Research has also revealed that video ads on Facebook have 4x more reach and 2.5x more clicks than ads that only include images.
Invest time and resources into learning how to run winning ad campaigns. Your best bet when starting will be Facebook, and they provide you with great conversion optimisation tools. With conversion optimisation, you will be increasing the chances that your ads get seen by the right people and convert people into sales or leads.
Step 6: Test, Analyse, and Keep Testing
Finally, it’s a game of numbers. While this may not be the most interesting part of a marketing campaign, it’s as important as any other.
Ensure you track every aspect, including clicks, reach and sales for every ad and try setting up A/B testing for your caption or any other element of your video and then repeat the campaign. By testing your videos against each other, you can easily determine which one generates the best engagement and ROI from ad spend. As you roll out more content, it will be easy to track every other parameter as well as know what works best for your audience.
On a Final Note
This is only the beginning as more and more businesses continue to embrace videos. Instead of opting for an image ad that will likely deliver lower engagements and ROI, why not put up a video ad that will capture people’s attention and might even get some shares. That said, creating something that users want to watch and tell their friends about is the dream of every business.
Get In Touch With Us Today
If you want to know how your business can benefit from Video Production and Marketing, then get in touch with the Bright Owl team today. You can also take advantage of some of our Video Marketing packages to give your small businesses a head-start with both digital and print media.
Our professional marketing consultants will ask you crucial questions about your business, current marketing tasks, target audience, and industry to see how we can help move your business forward.
