Have you noticed that video is currently one of the most popular types of content? You can see it everywhere. The reports from 2019 show that 87% of marketing professionals use video as a marketing tool.
Source: Oberlo
If you aren't using video in your marketing efforts, it can backtrack your business and limit your opportunities. So, are you?
You might have noticed already that there is more to implementing video content than it seems. Like any other marketing aspect, it needs careful planning and strategic placement. That is why we have prepared some tips on how to create a video marketing strategy. Let's get started!
1. Define your target audience
The basis of every marketing strategy is defining the target audience. Without this information, you won't be able to create targeted content.
Video marketing demands that you know who you will be targeting with this content. It will help you come up with video ideas that fit their needs, wishes, and preferences.
Source: Cylinder-mtm
Research your target audience by inquiring about their:
- Age
- Gender
- Location
- Educational background
- Purchasing habits and preferences (if applicable)
- Type of content they like
Get this information through your social media accounts by checking the user's necessary information, the brands they follow, and the content they share. You can also use the data you collected through your website. Track the patterns of the users who subscribed to your newsletter to define their habits in short create buyer persona for your target audience and use videos accordingly.
2. Check out the competition
Your competitors can be the best teachers on what you should and shouldn't do in your video marketing strategy.
Go to Google or YouTube and type in your niche. Narrow down the search results as much as you can. If your target audience is local people, pay attention to your local competitors to learn what they like and dislike.
User's comments and feedback will give you an insight into their thoughts. Maybe some of their suggestions can give you an idea of interesting video content that you can create.
“When customers share their story, they’re not just sharing pain points. They’re actually teaching you how to make your product, service, and business better,” ~ Kristin Smaby
Besides, checking out the competition will help you to avoid repeating overused content ideas. Originality is what attracts attention.
3. Customize the video content
Each marketing channel should be taken into consideration when it comes to video marketing strategy. What this means is that you should customize each video based on the platform for which it is intended.
Using the same video for your homepage, blog, Facebook account, Instagram account, YouTube channel, and so on, won't give you the results you want. YouTube might be the most popular video platform, but every other platform also deserves dedication when it comes to video creation.
Source: GoodWorkLabs
For example, Instagram clips should be short, entertaining, and maybe even witty. On the other hand, you can use your YouTube channel to post more elaborative videos that offer valuable information to the users (e.g., explainer videos).
4. Outline your video marketing plan
Staying organized through the whole process is crucial. When you know who your target audience is and what distribution channels you plan to use, it is time to form a strategy.
Prepare the answers to the following questions:
- Where do you plan to post your video content?
- How often do you plan to publish?
- When do you plan to shoot the videos?
- Do you plan to feature someone in your videos?
- Do you need to contact some people for collaboration?
- How long will your videos last (approximately)?
- Who will be responsible for video marketing?
Planning will save you some valuable time. Having everything figured out in advance will eliminate the stress and keep you focused on what's essential – exciting video content.
5. Diversify your video content
A report from HubSpot research, more than 50% of consumers want to see videos from brands compared to any other type of content.
Source: HubSpot
Keep the audience engaged by providing them with various types of videos. When it comes to video content, your choices are endless. As it was mentioned earlier, you need to adapt the video to the intended platform. It allows you to experiment with different video types.
Some of the types of content you can use are:
- Product explainer videos
- Interviews
- Humorous videos
- Educational videos
- Customer testimonials
- How-to videos
- Tips and tricks videos
- Recorded webinars
- Case study videos
- Behind-the-scenes videos
- About us video
Source: YouTube
This diversity is what attracts the audience to video content. You can provide them with everything from important facts enhanced with powerful visuals to educational videos on how to use your products.
6. Prepare the dialogue
The information you provide to your users through video content should be concise and understandable. Improvising the dialogue may seem like the best solution for giving a natural flow to the video. However, if you want to sound professional, you should create content for the video in advance.
Even if you plan to make short and funny videos for your Instagram profile or you want to make a quick announcement, you should still think about what you plan to say.
Outline the dialogue so that nothing important gets lost along the way. There are some great writing services such as Trust My Paper that can help you shape your thoughts properly and adapt them to video content.
Of course, when you create a video with people in it, there must be some improvisation, but having a general plan will help you create a video that you want.
7. Be careful with editing
Editing can either make your content amazing or completely ruin it. That is why you need to be extra cautious when it comes to video editing.
Source:MyThemeShop (Check out some useful video editing tools)
It is something you need to think through from the very beginning. Are you skillful enough to edit the videos on your own? Do you have someone on your team who is skilled enough to do the editing?
In case there is no one you can rely on to edit the videos to perfection, you should find a video editor.
Collaborate with freelancers to avoid unnecessary costs. One of the benefits of working with freelancers is that you can reach out to them only when you need their services.
For example, you can get the freelancer to prepare several videos in advance, and then you can post them when the time comes.
8. Have an SEO video strategy
SEO is not specifically reserved for your website, blog posts, and social media posts. Video content also needs to be optimized.
Just like with any other type of content, you need to apply SEO strategy to your videos. That is how you will ensure that the audience will come across them during their search. Optimizing the videos can also attract some new users and increase the number of your subscribers. So, how does the video optimization work?
Here are a few practical steps to a video SEO:
- The titles should be short and informative
- Include a link to your website into the video description
- Use keywords in your video description
- Optimize the videos for mobile-viewing
- Implement link-building
Salma Jafri, a content marketing expert, Udemy course instructor who creates video blogs for Entrepreneurs, says that creating more videos on YouTube can also help with your SEO.
“Since Google owns YouTube, it is able to rank your videos on YouTube in a matter of minutes, not hours or days. And in the first 24 hours your videos are promoted more giving it a fighting chance to rank,” ~ Salma.
9. Keep track of the metrics
Your efforts won't have a purpose if you don't follow up with the results. The numbers show that 88% of video marketers are satisfied with the ROI of their video marketing efforts on social media. To achieve that satisfaction, you need to follow your video marketing progress.
Source: Oberlo
Keeping track of the performance of your videos will help you create your video marketing plan for the future.
Pay attention to the type of content that got the most views and most comments. Also, look closely at what your audience likes and dislikes about the videos. Besides that collect data on click-through rate from email and social media, the conversion rate from the website, and total views.
The feedback and the data will help you to understand your audience better as well as to identify the strong and weak points of your video marketing strategy.
Over to you
Some may think that video marketing demands expensive equipment and tons of investment. The truth is that it mostly asks for creativity and persistence.
The results you can get from video marketing will be worth every second and cent you put into this project. The key is to allow yourself to display your authenticity, but to use those videos strategically, just like the tips mentioned above have taught you.
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