The Ultimate Guide To Video Marketing

So, you have conquered all your inhibitions and uncertainties and finally worked up the courage to start a new business. Now, you need the perfect guidance on how to market your products or services while building online visibility of your venture on the various social media avenues. Let us spill the beans that will resonate with what you expect to achieve. It is estimated that 80% of all the traffic will embody the ideals of video marketing by 2021. You might take a moment to ponder about it, which will only lead you to realize that the world has contributed much to the advancement of video contents and made it even more enjoyable and relatable than ever before.

It must be taken into consideration that as the market becomes saturated, you may struggle to get engagement from videos. Also, since you do not have any prior knowledge about this field, you are bound to make errors. But do not worry, here we will discover the benefits of video marketing in brief and then explore how you can invest in it while being on a low budget. Afterwhich, we will provide you with insights on how to use social media effectively. It will help you in being ahead of the competition by wielding the latest or trending techniques while focusing on the right areas to render a continuous flow of returns from your video content.

1. Importance of video marketing

Think about what, as you surf through a website, captures your attention. Is it the same bland and generic textual information or certain attractive video content which displays everything in an engaging and entertaining format? It is most probably the latter because movements of any sort will generally pique your interest. It would be right to claim that you are 27% more likely to click on a video advertisement rather than a static banner which lacks a touch of dynamic. After all, one minute of video is worth 1.8 million words.

Here are some more reasons to convince you that video marketing weighs more on the strategic and creative side rather than a casual whim on your to-do list:

• Forges a bond of trust with the consumers:

It's quite evident that you will understand any concept better if it's in a perfectly fashioned narrative format. By blending the magic of the audio and visual medium, the video provides a poignant and memorable story which eventually influences the consumer's feelings and behaviour. It's necessary to understand the emotional outcomes of the intended audience that will cater to fuel their passion and later aid in building an innate and genuine bonding with your company. In this case, the video campaign for Dove by Ogilvy and Mather Chicago is a great example. They explained the internal narrative that the people around the world face on a daily occasion and pushed the boundary of connecting with consumers to a whole new level.

• Ranks higher on Search Engine Results Pages:

The organic listing of the webpages is a result of the search engine's algorithm which analyzes and ranks websites by on-site time, that is, the seconds/minutes that people spend browsing on a page. And yes, users tend to stay for a longer duration of time if the page has embedded video content. It will increase your chance by 53% to be visible on the SERP's.

2. Practical solutions for small business with a small budget to invest in video marketing

Do you know that 92% of the marketers believe that video is a crucial part of the marketing campaign since 54% of the consumers would be more interested in viewing dynamic and easy to digest contents? Is it possible that you are now wondering about your financial stance that might curb your involvement in video marketing? Well, we come bearing good news in this situation because you do not need much to get started. You too can make amazing videos for your company with a professional camera or a decent smartphone. Does this sound fun and rewarding?

Let us look at some key points which need to be borne in mind before unleashing your creativity.

• Create an awareness:

At this stage, your main aim is to reach an increased scale of potential consumers and gain their trust and respect. To achieve this, it is of utmost importance that people have understood the purpose of the product or service. Instead of trying to achieve professionalism and perfectionism in the video, make sure to have a far more engaging content which directly forms a personal link with your audience. You may shoot your live video or may even opt to create an animated video for this objective.

• Research on the Target Audience:

A common mistake which might hinder your business outreach is to assume that you should be solely working on creating and posting videos whilst the audience will forage their path to reach your content. We hate to break it to you but, that was just the tip of an iceberg. You need to possess a detailed buyer's persona, which will eventually aid in slicing out a unique group of individuals from the general audience who will be interested in buying your products and will watch your videos to gain more knowledge about it.

3. Reliable insights to use social media like TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, Youtube, Twitter and Snapchat for an effective video marketing strategy

It is quite interesting to note that 71% of marketers believe that video conversion rates work better than any other content formats and 83% of businesses assert that it provides them with a great return on investment (ROI). Owing to the fact that video is high-performing marketing content, you need to harness the power of all the potential social media platforms instead of limiting your marketing strategy for YouTube alone. We have curated brief snippets of the six big social media video channels - TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and Snapchat to equip you with an understanding of how each one of them is tailored to follow a particular niche of the video content.

• TikTok

TikTok soared to victory with its popularity penetrating every age groups, from teenagers to grandmothers, everyone wading in to join the dance challenges in hopes of gaining an overnight viral success. To perform well with your creative video content in this platform, make sure to keep up with the trend culture.

• Instagram

With the recent ban of TikTok, Instagram stepped in with their new feature called "Reels", which resembles the former in almost every aspect. Along with Instagram stories and IGTV video, Instagram is the major player to promote your brand's identity. There is a need for the video posts to have the essence of fascination, thoughtfulness and encouraging.

• Facebook:

The first 3 seconds of the video is crucial because you need to grab the attention of your viewer for those 3 seconds since the Autoplay algorithm will count it as a "view". The content should portray something fun and emotional.

• YouTube

It still accounts for being the world's largest video search engine. Most people, around 20-25% of them tend to skip the video in less than 10 secs, so the first 3-10 secs should entice the imagination of the viewer.

• Twitter

Would it be wrong to call Twitter as the "black horse" of the social video content medium? Maybe no, because while every other social media platform stays on the limelight, its Twitter which brings in innovative pathways for a brand to share their video and gain popularity. It calls for quick, genuine, and entertaining video contents.

• Snapchat

Snapchat provides various contents which convey a sense of authenticity and originality. Perhaps you may show the bloopers of the already prepared video content to gain the confidence of the viewer by engaging them in humour.

The video marketing world is continuously evolving with each passing day. You need to be aware of the current trends and equip your video content marketing strategy appropriately. It is essential to incorporate call-to-actions so that it leads your audience from their purchase journey into the role of a promoter. At this juncture, you are quite familiar with the idea of creating and hosting your video but wait, there is still something missing. You need to measure and analyse the success of your content using appropriate metrics. It will serve as a report on what elements of the campaign is attaining more demand and what is not.

To estimate an optimal content and timing for your campaign, do keep these five areas handy:

Engagement Rate - How much time did an individual spend watching your video content? Did they watch it for the entire duration of time or skipped in between?

View Count - The view count is measured differently across various social media channels. It gives a rate for how many times your video has been watched.

Play Rate - It gives the count for how many times individuals clicked play to view your content.

Social sharing - People will share the content they are interested in. It will aid in comprehending whether your content seems striking to the audience. You can achieve this by acquiring knowledge about how many times the video has been shared.

Feedback - If individuals are taking out time to comment on your video, consider yourself lucky. Acknowledge their efforts by considering both positive and negative feedback and improve the contents accordingly.

It is of paramount importance that you think beyond the context of product and profit. You must emphasise on the philosophical story behind your product and create valuable information which reflects the ideals of your audience. People are yearning for personality and connection from businesses and brands. They demand contents which are inspired by real-life instances and offer relevant messages. It provides them with a meaningful and positive influence that will make them stick around.

So, what are you waiting for? Are you in need of a premium video marketing service which is available at an affordable rate? To ensure that your marketing mix is up-to-date and effective, consider counting on Haarway. Haarway, being one of the best companies, has a team of experienced and competent experts who will delve into the realm of video marketing to chalk out solutions by understanding your requisites. They will stay committed to the strategy and with sincere patience, transform your dreams into reality. Now, get ready with your equipment, devise a plan, experiment with your video marketing strategy, drive engagements from social media junctures and enjoy the process.