Why Video Marketing Is A Smart Idea For Your Business
There is something powerful in the way video marketing is becoming a very popular way to increase engagement, and it has more effect than an online blog post or publication.
Why?
More and more platforms and social platforms are adding a video to really tell their story right in front of their customers in large masses.
It’s simply a better way for people to communicate, and small and large businesses alike are using branded engaging video’s to get their point across, and drive more sales.
It’s all about telling your story, and here are why and how you can use video, and build a large audience in no time!
Video Is Becoming Very Popular
Audiences the engaged with online video, in 2014, had an astounding 43% boost, and another staggering figure, 3 out of 5 was on a mobile phone or device. Youtube is sitting on top with roughly 800+million views per month, and king of video castle so to speak.
Netflix though is another popular video/movie platform where lots of viewers spend their time. And for small businesses and online marketers, the targeting capabilities are what really matter, after creating a decent video to market. Youtube is a good choice, has several advertising options, and can target your customer market really well.
Another interesting fact is, online video is becoming so popular that people are telling their cable companies “Good-Bye” and picking up Netflix, which is far cheaper, with the same value. People are now migrating to digital sources and watching less TV (down by 17% ) by people between 13-40, which is a large market for the cable companies to lose.
Why Video Engages People Better
Well according to this 2013 UK study, it flat out does. It engages a lot better than a publication or a blog post, and video gets shared 39% more, 36% more people comment and get a conversation going, and overall 56% of the masses prefer video over a blog post.
When you’re making a video be engaging, you only have around 10 seconds, before they lose interest, so get to the point. I tend to call it a “10-second elevator pitch”, and go as high as 20 seconds to wrap it up.
Why?
Shorter online video’s get shared more if they good and to the point, and especially if viewers are on their mobile devices. Last tip on video engagement: bring a personality to your video pitch, it helps a lot.
Marketers Increase Video Advertising Budget
It’s really no surprise to see video marketing increase as much as 64% in the budgets of online marketers. Video marketing has a big impact on your brand, and spending money on a video to increase your brand visibility, is a smart idea. I even used a small GoPro camera of myself and shot a video at my desk about myself, my business is my brand, and I got nothing but positive feedback.
1. Your sound quality matters
One thing a video has to have is the sound working right or clear enough to hear well. People can get around a not so good video, but if the sound is too low, nothing gets heard and your video is rendered useless. Distorted sound is another video killer, so make sure the sound is recorded high enough with crystal clear sound. Spend some money on a Lavalier microphone. An inexpensive model, like the Audio-Technica ATR-3350 — $25.00 on Amazon.
2. Proper Lighting
Lighting doesn’t need to be complicated, but it needs to be there. Lighting will make even a low-quality camera produce much better video, and people just enjoy watching videos that are well-lit, not shady or in a dark room.
Recommended: LimoStudio Photo Video Studio Light Kit on Amazon only $150.
3. Pick the right camera
Finally, let’s talk about the type of camera you use.
- Your laptop or computer: If you have a camera on your laptop or desktop computer, you can record with this. However, if your computer is more than three years old, you should buy a separate camera for it as the quality of exterior laptop camera’s is better than the older equipped on board camera’s
- Your smartphone: You need a decent phone to do this, and most people use the I-phone to shoot a smartphone video on the fly. Quality isn’t bad either. Not recommended if you strive for better quality in your video.
- GoPro Camera: This is a type of camera is really flexible for outdoor use and well as taking at the desk video’s, just make sure you have good lighting. You can equip these hi-definition camera’s with a tripod and a remote. The Nice thing about GoPro is the editing software, it’s included and works well for zooming in, adjusting the volume in the video and some decent editing effects if desired.
- A digital single-lens reflex (DSLR) camera: And for a professional camera that takes your production to new heights, use a DSLR camera ( Nikon or Canon are good). These are the best and make your video look very professional with the clearest image. ($400-$5,000)
DSLR cameras start around $400 (and go up pretty quick from there to $5,000), such as the Canon EOS Rebel T5. I would also recommend upgrading to a 50mm lens for a more professional look with greater depth-of-field capabilities.
It all depends on what you need and how you want the quality to look.
Some Promotional Ideas
- Run a press releases to contact bloggers, editors, journalists in order to generate free media coverage for your videos in the media, a good press release also drives a ton of traffic and increases your brand awareness dramatically.
- Get your videos listed with the major search engines, including Google, Yahoo! and Bing, then work on the SEO strategies to get them ranked higher.
- Run a PPC campaign on Google, Yahoo!, Bing, and Facebook. And set up an In-display video campaign on Youtube.
- Run a Twitter promotional tweet campaign.
- Advertise on Twitter’s new “Periscope” Video platform (when available).