The Importance of Video Marketing for Your Business

As a business owner, have you been told your business needs video in your marketing strategy? Have you wondered why? Here are the key steps to including video in your business marketing strategy.

Using video marketing can play an important part in brand awareness… a way to engage your audience and clearly communicate a message in an easily absorbed way. So let’s start with what is video marketing.

Video is a powerful form of marketing that has a high engagement rate. They say that a picture says a thousand words, multiple that by another thousand, and you’re getting closer to how much information you can convey by using video as part of your digital marketing strategy.

Video marketing is something that you can use in multiple digital channels. It can engage new prospective clients as well as existing contacts. Research shows that people want to see videos from brands with which they interact. Of course, this affects your potential audience too, where social platforms like Instagram and YouTube offer similar content, giving your brand the chance to be served to a new market.

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How you can use videos for your business

Showcase your product or solution on offer with a video. According to Australian Business News, 43% of companies recorded fewer product support calls after implementing video marketing. This shows the benefit of using video to support your customers and frees up anyone in a support role to assist in other areas of growing your business.

Give your audience a ‘sneak peek’ into a day in the life of your staff. Audiences love seeing other people in images and even more so in video format. Videos created to show what it’s like in your team can also act as a recruitment tool, demonstrating the benefits of joining the business. It also puts a face and personality to team members so your audience can relate to them as individuals, which in turn builds trust in the brand.

Educational and ‘how-to’ videos can help your audience understand the benefits of using your products. Forbes has shared that 66% of consumers prefer watching a video to reading about a product.

Customer testimonial videos are a great way to build trust in your brand through social proof.?That is, your customers and prospects can see how and why others have benefitted from choosing your business and will encourage others to do the same. 73% of buyers are influenced by a brand’s social media presence, according to Australian Business News.

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Where to share your videos?

Facebook feed

This social platform is the one you’re likely most familiar with and is perhaps a good place to introduce video as part of your strategy. For example, when creating a Facebook post on your page, you can simply add a video file in place of an image to show on your feed.

Instagram - IGTV

Instagram’s extended format video tool, IGTV, has been a response to the success of YouTube and is a popular platform to share videos between 1 and 60 minutes in length. In addition, Instagram recently introduced a feature to allow the first part of the video to show and play in your feed, and the user can click to watch the remainder of the video.

Instagram - Reels

Reels are short-form compilation creations that can be ‘Remixed’ by users as they create a version in conjunction with your original content. This tool has been hugely popular in influencer circles, especially with how easy it is to use.

Instagram/Facebook - Stories

Stories themselves are no longer the newest feature; however, ‘going live’ has meant that popularity for stories has remained. Additionally, it’s now easier to create stories for business marketing with the function in Facebook Business Suite, allowing you to create, share to both Facebook and Instagram, and even being able to schedule these clips ahead of time.

YouTube

You can upload videos and host them all in a single channel on YouTube so that if you also have a video on your website or other digital platforms, and people want to see more, they can click through to your channel. Additionally, YouTube has made it easier to have paid ads be seen by your audience, where you’re even able to target markets based on their Google searches!

TikTok

Suppose you’re ready to step out of your comfort zone. In that case, Tik Tok, while still immensely popular with the younger generations for its entertainment value, is having success when used in a business marketing capacity.

Your videos don’t have to be professionally created to have a significant impact on your business. Yes, perhaps if you want a video featured on your website homepage, you may invest in using a professional.?However, for your social media feed, you can start by using your smartphone. The amateur aspects of smartphone created video content can support your goals by showing your brand as approachable and genuine, which may help in increasing engagement. After all, if YouTube creators with millions of followers and Instagram’s top influencers can succeed without much more than a smartphone, why can’t your business?

This is an article for Business Blindspots Tasmania. To ensure you receive regular updates from expert business advisers across a range of areas, follow our?LinkedIn Group.