The social media scene has exploded! According to We Are Social, a creative agency, the average Internet user spent more than 2 hours on social media per day in 2020. As a result, social media has become an invaluable tool for marketers. The challenge, though, is to find innovative ways to create content that will continue to engage and entertain. This is where video can be so effective.
Consumers love videos! It’s easy to understand why: the top viral videos are fun and entertaining. According to Hootsuite, an Internet user spends on average 11 minutes and 24 seconds every day on YouTube. However, it’s actually much more than that. In today’s day and age, we’re bombarded with an overload of text-rich resources. Compared to text, video is simply much easier to assimilate.
While our digital world has opened many doors to marketing teams, it has become faceless. We remain social creatures with an inherent need to connect. If done correctly, video can make our digital world more personal again. It offers us the opportunity to listen to people in real-life situations and to show your audience what your business is doing behind the scenes, making for a more authentic experience. In short, video can help to personalize your brand and make it more transparent.
Thanks to the versatility of videos, marketers are also starting to love video. It’s simple to post across various platforms. It has grown from just having YouTube as an available platform to include Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok and LinkedIn. The exposure is infinite! You can gain countless new followers, helping you to grow your business and drive sales.
In this blog post, we’ll explore why every brand should include videos in their marketing strategy. We’ll share ideas for which types of videos you can create and discuss some of the most common mistakes brands make when using video.
Your Quick Guide to Using Video on Social Media Better Than Your Competitors:
The Benefits of Incorporating Video
While video is not a new tool, it’s quickly increasing in popularity. The following is by no means an exhaustive list of all the advantages of using video in your social media marketing campaign.
It’s Cost-effective
One of the main misconceptions regarding video is that it’s expensive. The truth is that virtually anyone can create a video. You need time (even with only 60 minutes to spare, you can create a good video) and a mobile device. As a matter of fact, in many instances the most straightforward ideas will work better, as long as they are authentic.
Even if it’s more time-consuming than writing a tweet, the return on investment in many instances is much stronger than other popular formats. What’s more, with your video you can reach a much bigger group of people across various platforms which will also, ultimately, boost your return on investment.
If budget is an obstacle, you can consider opting for user-generated content. In simpler terms, you can reshare videos that your customers or followers have created about your products or services. This way you can increase your video content without having to increase your workload and it’s also an opportunity to connect with your customers.
You can also adapt your videos and use it for a different purpose. Longer videos can be tweaked to concentrate on a specific message or possibly transcribed and turned into a blog post. This way you can have content that will last you for months.
It’s More Engaging
Nowadays, to be successful, you need to expand your focus beyond just selling your services or products. Your target audience also wants to know what your values are. They want to know the story behind the brand and the faces behind the products. This is difficult to achieve if you rely only on photos or text.
It Generates More Exposure
Not only do consumers have a soft spot for videos, but it also usually performs better with the majority of algorithms. Algorithms tend to favor content that users have engaged with longer. As a result, it will push it to a bigger audience helping your brand to get more exposure.
You can also take it one step further and watermark your video with your logo. This will help you to instill trust, build your brand identity, boost brand recognition and, ultimately, make the most of the extra exposure that you’re getting.
It Improves Conversion
As people typically find video content more engaging than a big chunk of text, it will help to keep your audience on your social media site for longer. The trick is to get the length of the video right. It should be just long enough to keep the attention of your audience, yet leave them looking for more. Instagram and Twitter are better suited for shorter videos, while longer clips are more geared towards YouTube and Facebook.
It Helps You to Reach a Younger Audience
Generation Z has grown up with the Internet from a very young age. Video is their go-to medium to learn or be entertained. If you want to reach this audience specifically, you’ll have to use video.
Different Types of Social Media Videos
In addition to being able to post your videos on multiple platforms, there’s also a host of different videos that you can create. Let’s look at a few types of videos to get you started.
Interviews
Videos can be very effective for answering questions about your products. This can also double up as an opportunity for your customers to get to know some of your team members. Alternatively, you can also invite an influencer or industry expert to answer a few questions. As Facebook and YouTube are better suited for longer videos, these will be good platforms to share your interviews.
Product Reveals or Announcements
One of the reasons why customers follow businesses on social media is to be the first to know when a new product is added to the range. To reveal such exciting news, you need a medium that can build the anticipation. As mentioned earlier, video is a great way to boost engagement.
Product Demonstrations
So, it’s not every day that you have a new product to unveil, but you can still use video effectively to get people talking about your products. People want to see a product in action before they buy it. In fact, if your target audience can see your product in action without having to visit your store in person, they’ll be more inclined to buy it.
This is something videos can do much better than photographs. A video can add context and portray your products in a dynamic way.
You can either concentrate on a specific feature or benefit of your product or create an overview of the product to illustrate its versatility. If your team is already swamped with other work, consider using a brand ambassador by offering them a free product.
Customer Testimonials
Word-of-mouth advertising remains one of the most effective means. By using video, you can actually put a real face behind the happy customer which helps to make the testimonial more trustworthy.
Event Videos
You can either share live coverage of an event in real time or create a video to encourage people to attend your event by showing them what they can look forward to.
Tutorials
Consumers value content that adds value to their lives. What’s more, video is much more effective than simple text with static pictures if you need to teach your consumers how to use your product.
Common Pitfalls of Using Video
While video can deliver great results, you need to know how to use it effectively. Get it wrong and your image will suffer.
Working Without a Strategy
You need to know which type of content matters most to your audience. Just like with any other medium, you need to consider your long-term goals in order to use video to its full potential.
Also, as there’s such a big selection of social media channels that cater to video content, you need to ensure that the goal of the video matches the channel. You’ll also need to familiarize yourself with the dimensions, specs and sizes of the different platforms.
No Call-to-action Prompts
Similarly to designing your website, when creating your videos you need to remember to include a call to action at the end. In other words, what do you want your audience to do next? Should they visit your website? Perhaps you want them to subscribe to your YouTube channel? All you need is a simple direction. In fact, the most effective calls to action aren’t elaborate. After all, your audience wouldn’t have watched your entire video if they weren’t interested, right?
Neglecting to Include Headlines
While search engines view videos as high-quality content, you still need to come up with headlines that will evoke immediate interest, powerful descriptions and relevant hashtags. These elements will help your videos to show up in searches.
And, it’s not only the search engines’ attention that you want to capture. The best videos capture the attention of its viewers straight away. By creating a very specific headline that resonates with your target audience, your video will capture attention immediately.
Low-quality
While hiring a professional videographer to record your videos might not be necessary, you need to ensure that you can offer a high-resolution video. At the end of the day, it’s all about the user experience. If your video has a lot of background noise, users will simply hop on over to the next video that has caught their attention.
Autoplay
Being startled by background music blaring all of a sudden will have the opposite effect. So, it’s good practice rather to switch autoplay off or keep it on silent. This is even more important if you plan on sharing it on your landing page as well.
Conclusion
All businesses can leverage the power of video. Customers crave a more personal interaction with the brands that they choose to support. With video, it’s much easier. You can use it to introduce your team, show your products or services in action and answer FAQs in person.
Marketing has shifted from using every opportunity to sell a product to offering valuable information. If you only share content that tries to push a sale every time, your target audience will stop paying attention to your content. Video gives your customers the chance to get to know your brand and products better first and learn practical tips without having to spend any money. After all, everyone loves a good story and videos are perfectly geared for storytelling.
