According to research, 63% of businesses are already using videos to support their marketing efforts. Using videos for your business makes sense considering the prevailing tendency for individuals to possess notably short attention spans when it comes to consuming written content. Videos, along with other visually engaging infographics, hold a greater potential to captivate and retain the attention of your target audience for an extended duration.
If you are keen on delving deeper into the realm of video marketing, exploring its various types, discovering the most effective video marketing strategies, and comprehending the manifold benefits it offers, this comprehensive guide is tailor-made for you.
What is Video Marketing
Video marketing simply refers to using videos to deliver a message to your audiences. The video could be used to educate and explain your business model, services, or products. You could also use videos to share testimonials of past clients.
What are the benefits of conducting video marketing
Videos are becoming a popular mode of marketing for most businesses due to the availability of tools and technology to create quality videos. Target audiences are also able to watch and share these videos with the help of their smartphones and other mobile devices.
Research shows that users spend an average of 19 hours a week watching online videos. Here is why video marketing is so powerful now and in the future.
Videos Encourage Engagement
People are more likely to interact with video content than any other type. This is evident with a platform like Tik Tok. Statistics show that, on average, users spend about 95 minutes on Tik Tok daily. In addition, Tik Tok users tend to open the application about 8 times a day.
As people browse their social platforms, they save interesting videos and even share them with friends.
Videos are Great for SEO, Conversions, and Sales
Videos are one of the ways Google determines a page’s quality and consequently determines rankings. In essence, videos hook your audiences thus increasing their dwell time or how long they spend on your website. The more visitors spend on your website; Google interprets that your content is helpful, thus ranking your pages higher.
With more rankings, you’re assured of more traffic, qualified leads, and even sales – which is why you’re in business in the first place!
Mobile Users Prefer Video Content
According to video marketing statistics, about 77% of online users use a mobile device to watch videos online. Most people using mobile devices watch videos online and look for services and products they need to buy online. Putting your business in front of all these people could mean better conversions, more sales, and more revenues.
Educate and Build Trust with your Followers using Videos
Create a more personalised customer support experience for your visitors and followers using videos. You can share customer stories, how-to videos, meet-the-team videos, and onboarding videos for hiring companies.
How to create a video marketing strategy
A video marketing strategy is a plan to help a business create video content to support other marketing efforts. A proper video marketing strategy involves organising, creating time, and planning before creating a video.
Follow these steps to create a video marketing strategy for your business.
Step 1: Identify your target audiences and goals
You want to get started on the right path; the only way to do so is to understand your audiences clearly. Who are your target demographics? Which platforms do they use most? What type of content would they be interested in? Once you have answers to these questions, you should align them with your business goals.
Do you want to make more sales, or are you just looking to create more brand awareness? Or do you want to educate your audiences with informational videos?
Step 2: Maintain Consistency without Compromising Creativity
Once your followers get used to your content, they expect consistency. Familiarity is what keeps them coming back for more. You want to ensure that you maintain the following:
- Your brand tone
- Colours
- Introductions and conclusions
- Background music
- Video quality and angles
Step 3: Video Production can be In-house or Outsourced
You need to choose between producing your videos in-house or outsourcing to professionals and freelancers. Before deciding which one to go for, consider your budget and the quality of production you need.
Both in-house and outsourced have their fair share of advantages and disadvantages. Choose one that adequately meets your needs.
Step 4: Use the Correct Formatting
You need to optimise your videos for the platforms you want to share them. If you want to share videos on Tik Tok, Facebook, or Instagram, utilise a portrait format (vertical). While most people tend to take videos in a horizontal format, these only work for media channels such as television, Youtube, or desktop computers.
Step 5: Track Performance
Now that you’ve followed all the above steps, it’s time to track the results. The best metrics to keep tabs on include the following:
- Social shares
- Number of views
- Engagement rate (likes, comments)
Here are some video ideas...
Your business can utilise different types of videos for different purposes. Each video determines its length, voice, and format, depending on its purpose. Try using the following types of videos to inspire your video marketing strategy.
Product Review Videos
Product videos are a perfect example of how businesses can teach potential and existing customers the benefits of a product and how to use it. Review videos are much more engaging and helpful to your followers than static images, which don’t explain how they can use a product or even how to troubleshoot a device.
Testimonials
Tell customer stories in a video instead of written content. Potential customers are more likely to trust a customer explaining how they have benefitted from your products or services in a video. Most businesses will write fake reviews with fake customers, but it’s unlikely that a customer will appear on video if they haven’t interacted with your business.
Business stories
Writing a few paragraphs explaining how you started your business or the inspiration behind it is easy. However, a simple video will make all the difference, and customers will trust you more because they can put a face behind the business. Customers want to know that the business is run by real people, which is a crucial consideration today when AI is quite prominent.
It's not too late...video marketing still work in 2023!
The benefits of incorporating video marketing into your business strategy are numerous and compelling. It not only helps capture attention, engage audiences, and enhance brand awareness, but it also facilitates storytelling, emotional connection, and versatility in content delivery. As such, businesses that overlook the power of video marketing may risk falling behind in today’s highly competitive and visually-driven digital landscape.
