5 essential ideas for your first marketing video
If you are looking for inspiration for your first corporate video, here are 5 simple ideas and examples to help you get started with promoting your small (or even not so small) business on YouTube.
Why use video for promoting your business?
Here are the most obvious reasons. If many of your competitors do use the video to promote their companies and services, you certainly would not want to fall behind. If you are in a niche market and your competition is not yet active with video marketing, this may be your chance to become the leader in your niche.
If you are still not convinced that video marketing is worth investing your time into, just consider these numbers:
- Forrester Research demonstrated that 80% of a Web site visitors would watch a video, while only 20% would read the entire sales copy.
- YouTube is #2 search destination, which tells us that many people looking for information prefer watching over reading.
- Video is 53 times more likely to rank within the top of the search engine results than text.
- 46% of Internet users take an action after watching a video ad online.
- Web visitors are 64% more likely to buy a product accompanied by a video.
- These numbers are consistent across various demographics. Thus, it works for all of us regardless of age or our social group.
Sources: Forbes.com, Videobrewery.com, Fathomdelivers.com
Sounds too good to be true?
A word of caution. The above numbers by itself cannot guarantee you the video marketing success. As with many things in life, it matters not only what you do but how you do it.
Before you start making promotional videos, you really need to think and research what is that your prospective customers like to watch. Instead of approaching your videos as traditional advertisement, try adopting a customer-centric thinking when researching the possible video subjects.
Below are just a few examples of relatively simple videos that can get you started with promoting your business without looking like advertisement.
Video marketing idea 1 – “About Us” video
One of the most obvious ideas is to make a quick video to introduce your business or services. “About Us” videos are usually aren’t focused on selling a particular product, but rather on creating an awareness and educating your prospective customers about your company. The main idea behind this kind of videos is to let the customer see the “real you”, to gain trust, and, ideally, to establish the emotional connection with your prospects.
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Of course, there is no shortage of “About Us” videos on YouTube but, sadly, most of them are nothing more than advertisement in disguise and hardly get any attention. With little creativity you can turn this around. Here’s a great example of a video that creatively introduces a business though telling a story. Smart, huh?
If this looks too complicated (it does look like a small movie after all), here’s another example that uses comic elements to catch attention.
Video marketing idea 2 – “How-To” tutorial video
Now, I know what you’re thinking. How is that different from a typical boring product video? Here’s how:
The “how-to” video does not necessarily need to involve your product directly. Just focus on a problem that is relevant to your customer.
Here’s a wine maker showing how to open a bottle of wine without a cork opener.
Here’s another one that talks about a common problem and (surprise, surprise) offers a solution:
Finally, you can educate your clients about a broad product category:
Video marketing idea 3 – “Behind The Scenes” video
Tell people what inspired you to create your product or company. Show them how you did it and be passionate about it!
Or perhaps your product or service is driven by a greater cause? Don’t be shy to tell others about it. This video talks about a new cellular phone modular design aimed to reduce electronics waste. Alternatively you can talk about the mission, your business philosophy or principles. The idea is – if your clients share the same belief they are more likely to buy from you even if your product isn’t the cheapest. But please be honest!
Video marketing idea 4 – client testimonials
This idea may not be as exciting as creating videos about inspiration or making the world a better place but testimonials are essential if you are aiming to convert your Web visitors into paying clients.
I do have to say that many testimonial videos I watched while writing this post seemed rather manufactured. In other words, it didn’t quite believe it, as they sounded scripted and insincere. Making believable video testimonials is a big subject but, yet again, telling a compelling personal story can make a huge difference.
Video marketing idea 5 – product demos & explainers
Yet again, if you’ re selling a product or a service, this is one of the most essential videos to get your customers familiar with what you have to offer. You can go a traditional route and simply record a vanilla demo video like the one below:
or if you have a bit of a budget to spend, make a cute animation to help your video stand out of the crowd.
Where to start?
In my next post I will talk about some basic tools and tricks to help you create a simple DIY video on a limited budget.
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