How Video Will Help Dominate Your Marketing | Social Media Coach

Do you want you and your brand to stay relevant?

Did you realize that almost 70% of all internet traffic in 2017 will be video?

How can you start preparing for these changes?

Words tell the story. Images illustrate it.

But video brings it to life.

Video, an online marketing platform that has seen a sharp rise in use and effectiveness, is an often overlooked means for driving relevant traffic to your site – and generating interest in your campaign. An effective video initiative can also bolster your other marketing strategies.

With consumers viewing more than 8 billion videos per day on Facebook and YouTube, it’s increasingly critical that businesses include video in their marketing strategy.

In a recent survey conducted by Animoto, they asked more than 1,000 U.S. consumers how they interact with and feel about businesses that use video in their marketing. Customers prefer video — in fact, one in four consumers actually lose interest in a company if it doesn’t use video.

VIDEO HELPS PEOPLE FEEL THE LOVE

Video is critical to helping people connect with, remember, and care about your brand. Consider these statistics:

Experiments show that video-based multimedia material create better learning performance and more positive emotion—even in text-centric learners. (Chih-Ming Chen)
Videos are usually presented as stories, and stories are 22x more memorable than facts alone. (Jennifer Aaker, Stanford)
Positive emotions created by watching a video can actually impact your viewers’ buying decisions. (Scheibehenne)
The human brain processes visuals 60,000x faster than text. (HubSpot)

YOUR COMPETITION’S ALREADY ON IT

The secret sauce that is video marketing isn’t so secret anymore. In fact:

52% of marketing professionals name video as the type of content with the best ROI.
76% of marketers plan to use video to boost their brand awareness campaigns.
96% of B2B companies are planning to use video in their content marketing over the next year.

Can you really afford to be left behind?

VIDEO WILL HELP DOMINATE YOUR MARKETING

Here are just a few examples:

Adding a video to your website can increase the chance of a front page Google result by up to 53x.6
Using videos in email marketing has been shown to double click-through rates.
71% of marketers say that video conversion rates consistently outperform other marketing content.
Audiences are 10x more likely to engage with video content—embed, share, or comment—more than text-only blogs or related social posts.

PRE-RECORDED VIDEO IDEAS

Beginner

Create short “Thank you” videos from your team to new customers or customers that you upsell.
Screencast a demo of your product or service.
Create an animated GIF of how to perform a function of your tool. (Want help? Learn how to make an animated GIF in this post.)
Film 15-second testimonials from real customers and evangelists.

Intermediate

Film extended customer testimonials and user cases (roughly around 3 – 10 minutes).
Create longer product demonstrations and whiteboard-style videos with recognisable members of the company.
Do a short introduction of the company and its mission and vision.

Advanced

Create a full product demo.
Turn blog posts into short, how-to videos.
Film longer interviews with key members of the company.
Shoot live presentations performed by company members and add in their slides in post-production.
Create videos for each of your core calls-to-action (one for “call us,” one for “sign up for a free trial,” one for “tell your friends and get free credits,” etc.).

LIVE VIDEO IDEAS

Facebook Live is the future according to CEO Mark Zuckerberg

It’s a fun, powerful way to connect with your followers and create new ones along the way. With Facebook Live you can use your phone to share a moment instantly with the people you care about.

This means your friends, family or fans can be there with you, and you can respond to their comments and see their reactions.

Beginner

Use Facebook Live, Periscope, Vine or Meerkat to broadcast from cool industry events you, your manager, or CEO are attending.
Use Google Hangout or Skype as a way to thank customers on a special occasion (one year working together, etc.).
YouTube Connect is coming which is their version of LIVE VIDEO.

Intermediate

Hold a live Q&A / Ask Me Anything Hangout.
Live stream a conversation with a thought leader or influencer who is relevant to your audience.
Live stream relevant in-office events (Not some St. Patrick’s Day shenanigans that is getting a little out of hand!).

Advanced

Show a live demo with your sales reps and include an open Q&A.
Film a live presentation with open Q&A.
Stream a “day at the office” with a C-level / senior manager.

Video is no longer an “up-and-coming” marketing tactic — it’s here, and it’s a powerful way to communicate your brand story, explain your value proposition, and build relationships with your customers and prospects.

And the statistics show it’s working quite well. Did you know, for example, that including video on a landing page can increase conversion rates by 80%? Or that 92% of mobile video consumers share videos with others?

FACEBOOK VS. YOUTUBE

Think about it for a second. If you’re creating video content for YouTube, and not putting those videos onto Facebook as well, your brand or business is losing distribution – not to mention relevancy. No questions asked.

And I don’t mean cross channel promotion by pasting a link to YouTube on your Facebook page as a status update. I mean uploading the video natively to Facebook, so that it lives in your Facebook page’s video content. Why? Because right now , Facebook’s Newsfeed algorithm is placing an enormous amount of weight on videos, otherwise known as “reach.”

When you upload videos natively, instead of linking out, you have a much higher chance of your video being seen by your community (and new fans, too). Google and Facebook are competitors, so if you think Facebook wants to have YouTube links perform well in their Newsfeed algorithm, you better think again.

LIVE CUSTOMER CARE (Mercedes Benz StarView)

When you take your car for repair or servicing to Mercedes, the technician looking after your car does a quick health check and uses a GoPro to share his findings and commentary along the way. This video is then sent to the car owner via email. This helps the customer feel involved in an otherwise murky decision process.

USER-GENERATED VIDEO (GoPro)

Even more powerful is when a user voluntarily submits a video of themselves using and recommending your product. GoPro has managed to pull this feat off (although, it does help that they are a video product to begin with). Videos of successful customers are extremely valuable assets to use during nurturing when you want to move people down the sales funnel.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Did you know that consumer internet video traffic will go from 64% in 2014 to over 80% by 2019? That’s not very far away.

But don’t panic. There’s still plenty of time left in the year to get in on the video marketing game. You just have to get started!

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About Blair

Blair Evan Ball is a Social Media Coach and founder of Prepare1, a company that works with businesses, individuals and non-profits. He is a former executive with a Fortune 50 company, and his national division did $1Billion+ in sales annually.

Blair has written three e-books: Facebook for Business Made Easy, Facebook Pages for Business Made Easy, and WordPress Blog Setup Made Easy.

Blair also educates, trains entrepreneurs and business professionals how to amplify their brand, increase revenues, and raise more funds.

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