For this month’s column, I’m pleased to share the following article from Rebekah Steen, lead fulfillment specialist with Advocate Digital Media.
YouTube has the potential to reach the largest percentage of the population out of any marketing medium.
The latest YouTube statistics reveal that more than 1 billion unique users visit YouTube and more than 6 billion hours of video are watched every month.
The great thing about using video advertising is that, compared to television, it is very affordable and lets you reach a significant percentage of your target audience.
However, the two best things about video advertising are measurability and effectiveness.
The old way of advertising only included estimated reach and frequency statistics but it was impossible to prove whether consumers were engaged. Now with advanced analytics, you can see who is watching your message and if they were engaged with your video.
You can also run A/B testing to see if one video does better and gets more engagement. Local video advertising is extremely effective because consumers are motivated to buy after watching a video.
A ReelSEO study showed that 71 percent of the respondents confirmed that video converts better than other content.
We can all agree that video sets your company apart and is an effective tool for reaching your consumers.
But how do you make it work for your company?
Here are seven tips to get you started.
1. Distribute and promote your video through every channel available. These include email marketing, social media channels, online ad campaigns, YouTube and your own website.
2. Make sure you are including information in your video on how your customer can find you. If you have a brick and mortar location, you might even want to include a map.
3. Don’t forget to give your video a call to action. Tell them what to do next. Do you want them to call you? Or maybe click through to your website? Or just to stop by? Make sure you give clear instructions on what the consumer should do after watching your video.
4. Make the message personal. Add a testimonial or recommendation from a customer or have the message come from yourself of an actual employee.
5. Combine video and still images of your company location, employees, products or anything you believe will add interest and add variety to generate more engaged consumers.
6. Make your video short. It shouldn’t be longer than 30 seconds. Studies have proven that we have an attention span of about 30 seconds so keep you video to this time frame. To help with this you can do a series of videos that continues a thought or idea.
7. Remember that everybody likes to laugh so a little humor never hurts. Humor makes your company more approachable and builds a relationship with your consumer.
Your business needs video – it sets you apart from your competition and makes you stand out online. Video allows you to tell your consumer what makes you different from your competitor.
Video helps you start a conversation and keeps you as part of the conversation. Here at Advocate Digital Media, we can create a video that makes you the conversation and target it to who you want to reach online.
Your consumers are watching hours of video each day. Don’t you think you should meet them where they are?
Rebekah Steen is a lead fulfillment specialist with Advocate Digital Media, a sister company to The Victoria Advocate that focuses on digital marketing. she can be reached at rsteen@advocatedigital.com.