When one thinks about video marketing strategy, they assume it’s just a small part of marketing and not that important as compared to other marketing strategies.
While the idea of video marketing isn’t new, it has now become much more important as compared to 10 years ago.
It is no longer just one piece of your overall marketing plan, it has now become key to a much larger outreach and central to your overall marketing initiatives.
In the past decade alone, video marketing has one way of the other entered every platform and channel, especially a marketer’s social marketing strategy.
The biggest reason for video marketing influence is that there are screens everywhere, be it in your pocket with a smartphone, on your car dashboard or even on your bed with TVs, Laptops or tablets. Even your watch has now become “smart” and with a digital screen.
You cannot avoid video or digital platforms and thus from a marketing perspective, videos have quickly become people’s number one way to connect.
Further, with the added feature of automatic video-playback on most social media mobile feeds, video marketing strategy is one of the most sought after marketing technique as there are over 2.08 billion global smartphone users (in 2016) and estimation of over 829 million smartphone users in India alone by the year 2022.
This will garner one of the highest ROIs for any brand’s digital marketing strategy.
Here are nine steps to creating a powerful video marketing strategy which will help you as an entrepreneur:
1) Understand the purpose
No video marketing strategy would be a success if you are shooting in the dark and don’t know what exactly is the purpose behind making that video.
Your video marketing is going to struggle even more if the sole objective of your video is to “sell more” and nothing else.
Yes, that is your ultimate goal as an entrepreneur but that doesn’t mean you only incorporate self-promotion and forget your customer’s POV.
Such videos would only look like spam and the majority of your audience will just skip it and it will go unnoticed.
Thus, one of the primary goals of your video marketing strategy should be to keep your audience in mind and to educate, entertain, and inspire them.
Remember, besides just being viewed, your content also needs to be remembered and shared so more people know about you and your work.
2) Know your target audience
Video marketing just like any other marketing platform requires you to know your audience and its success starts with knowing how to find that target audience.
As a startup with a limited budget, you can’t afford to waste any time or money and make a video which will not make any impact as you didn’t focus on your target audience.
Thus, while conducting market research for your startup, do proper research and focus on video marketing strategies that are focused on people who would like to use your product and why.
3) Understand what makes them share, like, and buy
Besides knowing who your target audience is, it is equally important to know what your target audience wants and how exactly do they function.
You need to fully understand them and know what makes them tick.
For your product and video marketing strategy to be successful, you need to fully understand what will make your target audience not only watch your video and buy your product but also share that video with others and encourage them to buy your product as well.
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4) Topics and formats
Understand what is trending and what is in demand with regards to your target audience and to know what topic and format to include in your video.
Further, search for what kind of format works best for your audience – is it videos that are instructional in nature or a video which motivates the audience.
Each target audience is different and looks at different things, for example, a housewife would be more interested in “how-to’s” videos on recipes than motivational videos which teaches them how to deal with your boss or colleagues.
They are more likely to share these videos with other such housewives who appreciate similar content.
Related article: Share your videos with your followers using Facebook Watch Party
Thus, understand what topics, stories or narratives work bests with your audience with the goal to provide something that your viewers will appreciate and would want to share.
It is also important to remember that while you use the above strategy, don’t waiver away from your own brand and provide something which is related to you and not completely off topic.
5) Know where and how to promote your videos
When it comes to startup and marketing strategy, recording a video and publishing it on YouTube or Instagram isn’t enough as you have to strategically promote it and know where it would work best.
For example, if you are promoting travel, you need to target Instagram and YouTube influencers who travel and promote similar content and your video should provide why exactly people need to travel to the said location.
For example, a couple of years ago The Bahamas tourism department worked with a few influencers to create videos that promoted a unique experience that one cannot get visiting any other place. In the Exumas, you get the unique experience of swimming with pigs and thus created their videos based on this experience to attract tourists.
To further gain traction, they also partnered with Expedia and promoted a variety of experiences across the Bahamas – including swimming with pigs to the audience who seemed interested in visiting the Bahamas.
This partnership had a massive effect on people and resulted in a massive influx in shares, likes, and views that continue to grow till date.
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6) Decide who will develop your video content
When it comes to creating videos, you have several options with regards to who should develop and promote your videos.
There are several options when it comes to developing videos and executing marketing strategies – you or your team can develop the videos themselves or you can work with an agency or you can work with bloggers or influencers to create and promote videos.
As a startup, you can create and promote these videos on your own, or hire a mid-level influencer with a good amount of followers to not only promote your video but even create it if required.
7) Know the most critical component of video marketing
Many video marketing strategies fail as they fall into the trap of creating multiple one-off videos. They think if they put big money into a video project, it will be a big success and get them more customers.
This only drives up costs and diminish the videos’ overall value. It is thus important to create videos that are simply a piece of the larger whole and not one-off.
You should thus detail the primary distribution point for the said video that is it for TV, Facebook, YouTube or Instagram and optimize it accordingly.
This determination allows videos to be optimized to their platform in the creation stage itself and helps you develop your video marketing strategy accordingly.
8) Creating a strong Call-to-Action
When creating a video, it is also important to add a strong call-to-action or CTA to it so as to direct your viewers to the next video or landing page.
Never undermine CTA as it works as a reminder to the next step and compels viewers to further engagement. Also, make sure that there are CTA buttons at the end of the video or in the attached text which is clearly visible to the user to further engage with the brand.
9) Exploring other platforms and adding transcripts
Last but not least it is important to explore all video platforms and not be stuck to just one format.
While YouTube might be the biggest video sharing platform, apps like Instagram and TikTok is also gaining a lot of traction and has a huge potential with regards to the Indian market.
Further, there are other known video sharing platforms such as Break, DailyMotion, and Vimeo which can help your video get additional untapped exposure.
In the end, don’t forget to add transcripts where you can.
What many people don’t realise is that many video platforms such as YouTube give you the option of uploading a transcript.
You should fully exploit the option as it will help you get more audience who might not be fluent in English but still can read and understand it.
Further, the transcript will most likely have all the major keywords being spoken in the video, it will provide the required SEO push for your video which you might not get otherwise.
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