While YouTube has emerged as a marketing juggernaut for security dealers, many are also discovering that the free video-sharing service has scores of other uses – all of which are also free for the taking. Employee recruiting, client communications, product/service how-to’s and dissemination of news are all increasing in popularity on YouTube, as security dealers and transform the medium into a Swiss Army Knife of business communications.
“If you’ve never visited YouTube, you have missed out on the hottest thing on the Internet today,” says Michael Miller, author of ‘YouTube for Business,’ an excellent guide.
Unquestioningly, one of the major reasons security dealers and others are flocking to YouTube is its unbridled popularity. Just a blip on the Web a half-dozen years ago, the video-sharing service has rocketed to one of the most visited sites on the Internet.
Unprecedented Reach
YouTube currently boasts “more than a billion users,” according to former Google CEO Larry Page, who is now the CEO of Alphabet, which is described as “a collection of companies…the largest of which, of course, is Google.” Google bought YouTube for $1.65 billion in Nov. 2006, and it now operates as one of Google’s subsidiaries.
Three hundred hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute. Plus, the online video-sharing service has been localized in 75 countries and made available in 61 languages. Moreover, half of all YouTube views now take place on mobile devices, according to the company. More than a million user-created channels in dozens of countries are generating ad revenue from the service.
Indeed, among consumers ages 13-24, online video is now more popular than traditional TV, according to a recent study by Hunter Qualitative Research. The group studied – also known as Millennials – spends 11.3 hours/week watching free online video, as compared to 8.3 hours week watching traditional TV.
Besides its unquestionable popularity with young people, YouTube’s ease of entry and low cost makes it hard for security dealers to resist. Virtually anyone with basic PC skills can upload a video to YouTube at no cost in a matter of minutes.
Since YouTube’s videos are generally watched on a relatively small viewing screen, there is no reason for security dealers to endure painful budgets for video production costs; in fact, the subtleties of high-end video production are generally lost on YouTube, according to Miller.
Cost Savings
Security dealers can save significant coin using YouTube by shifting hosting responsibilities for their online videos to the service. Ordinarily, a security dealer needs to pay bandwidth transmission charges any time a Website visitor views a video hosted on the dealer’s website.
When that same video is uploaded to YouTube’s servers, a business never pays a bandwidth transmission cost – no matter how many times that video is viewed.
All told, it is a frothy mix of remarkable popularity, ease-of-entry and virtually non-existent costs that have the wheels of innovation spinning for security dealers as they continually find new uses for YouTube that go beyond traditional video marketing.
10 Ways to Leverage YouTube
Here are the top ten uses security dealers have forged leveraging YouTube:
1. Marketing: This is without doubt he most popular business use of YouTube, and it can be wildly successful. Security dealers with shoestring promotional budgets have become overnight stars on the service, often with zany and off-the-wall marketing pitches.
Besides using humor, security dealers can also use YouTube for marketing purposes to give video tours of their facilities, or to feature video interviews with key staff members to reassure current and prospective customers that they are going to be doing business with a highly professional, highly people-friendly staff – and to position the firm as a thought leader.
Hundreds of security dealers leverage YouTube for these purposes. An example is ADT dealer Nationwide Security (www.youtube.com/watch?v=8IVZw_gFVU0); or last year’s top-ranked SDI Fast50 company NorthStar Home (www.youtube.com/watch?v=gzPg4LyZ4fw).
2. Recruiting: Given that many security dealers already have videos touting their businesses as inviting places to work, posting those same productions on YouTube is a no-brainer. “Don’t limit yourself to a single, long puff video,” Miller says. “Produce separate videos for individual departments, as well as to illustrate company values, employee benefits, facilities and the like.”
3. Company FAQs: Any security dealer can leap well beyond the image of a faceless, industry player with on-the-fly videos, which feature charming customer service people answering frequently asked questions. Sure, many businesses already have written FAQs on their websites. But there is something to be said for going the extra mile and offering the personal touch that is inherent in the video medium.
4. News clips: The beauty of posting your company’s news to YouTube is that the information is not sliced, diced or in any other way whittled down to a mere shadow of its former glory. Plus, by leveraging a Facebook or Instagram site, a company can cross-promote the two online presences by posting company news on Facebook with a link to the supporting video on YouTube.
5. Focus groups: Many sophisticated users of YouTube are using the service as a free testing ground for commercials they plan to run on cable and broadcast TV, and elsewhere on the web. Specifically, they use YouTube’s free analytical tool, YouTube Analytics (www.youtube.com/analytics) to test the marketing punch of their commercials. The tool’s metrics include the overall popularity of a video, who is viewing the video, where those viewers are coming from on the web, and what keywords they are using to find it.
6. Customer communications: When an email or friendly phone call simply does not cut it, many businesses are posting YouTube videos to connect with business partners concerning project updates, personalized descriptions of new products or services and the like. Such communications can be easily made private on YouTube by selecting the “private” option under its “broadcast options” variable. This ensures only selected viewers can see the video.
7. Employee-to-employee communications: As far as Google is concerned, videomail is poised to become the email of this decade. Makes sense. Why not zip off a response to a thorny problem or challenge using video if it is easier than doing so in another medium? At the very least, videomail is a trend worth experimenting with and monitoring – either on YouTube or via Google Apps.
8. Product/service how-to videos: These videos can of course serve a dual purpose for a business, offering detailed instructions for novice customers, while serving as a promotional spot for others who find the video.
9. Employee training: Any security dealer with multiple locations across town, across the country, or even across the world can immediately see the benefit of posting training videos on YouTube, and having the appropriate employees access it.
Again, by using YouTube’s “private broadcast” option, a business can ensure the training videos stay internal. “Many companies find that YouTube is a fast and effective way to disseminate all kinds of employee information,” Miller says. “Done right, it gets information out there in near-real-time, with all the benefit of face-to-face communication.”
10. Savings on business travel: All the videos sent to employees and clients are enabling many security dealers to rack up substantial savings on business travel. Granted, there are plenty of instances where true face-to-face interaction is irreplaceable; however, in many situations, a video overture is a bulls-eye compromise between basic email and an all-expenses paid business trip for one or more employees to multiple cities.
Joe Dysart is an Internet speaker and business consultant based in Manhattan. Contact him via email at joe@joedysart.com; on the web at www.joedysart.com; or please call (646) 233-4089.