Three Things That Successful Channel Marketers Know About Using Video Effectively

The digital evolution has changed the way the world does business. That’s undeniable. As consumer-facing companies are having to place the customer at the heart of their operations, enterprises that market directly to other organisations will need to do the same.

Why?

It’s simple. Because any successful marketing boils down to convincing humans to take a desired action that ultimately converts into a sale. Here, video can be one of the most persuasive and effective tools available to communicate directly with buyers.

...video can be one of the most persuasive and effective tools available to communicate directly with buyers.

For marketers who are new to the potential of video marketing but daunted by the enormity of it all, our advice is simple: before attempting to create great content, focus on getting started. Getting started now is the only way to avoid getting left behind later, which is why it’s imperative to leverage the important lessons that early adopter channel marketers already have under their belts from adding video to their content mix.

1. It’s all about the experience - and video content isn’t just for buyers.

Marketers know that no matter how good they are at their jobs, if they don’t have the sales team to close the deal and the post-sales support to see it through, they’re wasting their time. Video can be used to bring everyone closer together, working toward the same goal to deliver a frictionless prospect-to-buyer experience.

Video can be used to:

• Equip sales teams with the knowledge they need to kill it at their jobs. Replace hefty training manuals with succinct, digestible visual guides
• Supplement theoretical knowledge of technology features, functionalities and USPs with a visual component that turns a concept into an experience.
• Win client pitches, by showing (instead of telling!) how the solution/service will make a difference in real life.
• Add value throughout the customer lifecycle by enhancing the product/service knowledge of post-sales support teams. 
• Help manage and communicate changes throughout an organisation, introducing new leaders, technologies, products, and services easily. 

2. Video is part of a bigger picture, it’s not the only picture.

Because video marketing can reach customers at different points in the buyer’s journey, it’s important to make sure that you’re not creating video content for the sake of creating video content. That’s never going to achieve anything or resonate with anyone.

Think about these stats for a minute:

This means it is critical to have a clearly defined marketing strategy in which video plays both a leading and supporting role in closing sales and nurturing relationships throughout the vendor supply channel. Such a strategy targets audiences on multiple digital touchpoints and includes, among other things, SEO, blog articles, and social media. All of these efforts can be amplified with the addition of a video marketing campaign at each stage of the buyer’s journey because video works on every platform to supplement the company’s web presence as a whole.

...it is critical to have a clearly defined marketing strategy in which video plays both a leading and supporting role in closing sales and nurturing relationships throughout the vendor supply channel.

To truly embed video into the heart of their marketing strategy, successful marketers are examining each component or process of their target audience’s way of doing business, and asking themselves how they can use video to answer questions, solve problems, streamline experiences and turn ideas into actions - not only for their customers, but for their customer’s customers. 

3. Video is content that makes an impact on people.

Today, 70% of people make their buying decision before they’ve even talked to a sales representative. This puts marketing in the unique position of being able to heavily influence a buyer’s decision, setting the tone for the company’s relationship with that buyer. Here, it’s the details that matter. Every business audience or target persona has little moments in their day. When they have to learn how to do something new, figure out how something works, or how to address a problem or a challenge.

These pain points and trigger moments are where video shines, regardless of industry or vertical. Successful marketers are those who have managed to identify and plot out every single one of those daily trigger moments for their target audience(s) and are in the process of creating content to fit those moments throughout the buyer journey.

Doing this establishes relevance with the audience, and creating short-form video content to explain or explore each of these trigger topics is what brings to life a strategy that is hyper-targeted and highly relatable for each (human) person in your audience. Best of all, your audience will love that you’ve addressed (or anticipated) their questions or challenges in a manner that is accessible and succinct, which ultimately reduces the time they have to spend trawling through pages of content and search results.

Long story short, today’s successful Channel marketer has learned that:

1. Video isn’t just for buyers, it has a role to play for every person involved in the vendor supply chain.
2. Video must be used to amplify marketing strategy, to meet the specific objectives - whether brand awareness, product/service education, brand credibility, all of which will ultimately lead to sales.
3. The most successful types of video content speak to a pain point or a trigger moment - videos that help people to learn something new, solve a problem, or do something differently - content that helps people by making an impact in their lives.

...can your organisation afford to carry on plugging at the same text-driven platforms without change?

With 95% of the message retained after watching a video, the question is can your organisation afford to carry on plugging at the same text-driven platforms without change? Everything is gearing toward video content, social and digital platforms are engineering their algorithms and features to push video to the fore, which means that there’s only one time to jump aboard the growing video content trend, and that time is right now.