How to press play on powerful branding with a video content marketing strategy

We all know that a picture is apparently worth a thousand words.

So, if that’s true – how much is a video worth?

According to the experts at Forrester, the answer could be anywhere up to 1.8 million words per minute!

While numbers like that can be pretty hard to believe, the truth is that there’s plenty of reasons why you should think about adding a video content marketing strategy to your brand development plan. After all:

• YouTube indicates that video consumption improves by 100% per year.
• Video could claim about 80% of all web traffic by 2019.
• Social media videos receive 1,200% more shares than images and text combined.

Besides generating plenty of valuable attention for your brand, video marketing can also make it easier to convert your customers into loyal advocates. In fact, studies show that having a video on your site can increase the amount of time spent on your landing page by 105% while leading to twice as many conversions as a site with no video.

Additionally, video holds more sway over your audience when it comes to engagement. More than 40% of people will be more likely to share content that contains video, while 56% are compelled to “like” videos more often than standard content.

Of course, just like any other form of content marketing, video requires a precise plan if your brand wants to make the most of it.

So, how do you design the best video content marketing strategy for your brand?

The video buzz: What is video content marketing?

Before we give you a complete video content marketing strategy template to use with your next recording session, let’s start by answering an important question: “What is video content marketing, and why should it matter to your brand?”

Essentially, if content marketing is the creation of materials like eBooks, blog posts, and infographics designed to generate interest in a brand without being “overly promotional”, video content marketing is simply the strategy of using video materials to establish and maintain awareness.

Recently, marketers have started to feel more drawn towards visual content, instead of traditional options like blog posts and articles. In fact, around 71% of marketers feel that their videos outperform their other marketing content most of the time.

As one of the most compelling, and fastest-growing forms of marketing out there, video content marketing stands out as just one of the many things that companies should be doing to generate attention for their business today. Here are just some of the reasons why you should be talking to a video content marketing agency:

1. Video content marketing is inherently social

The social media world is thriving – now more than ever – and people on these social channels simply love video content. In fact, TechCrunch suggest that Facebook users alone watch more than 100 million hours of video each day.

If that wasn’t enough, 92% of the people who consume videos on their mobile share that content with other people and about 60% of viewers will engage with a video post before they engage with a text post. If you want to start a conversation about your brand, then video could be the easiest way to communicate with as many people as possible, as successfully as possible.

2. Video marketing encourages brand recall

If you want to be a success in today’s saturated marketplace, then you need to make sure that customers remember your name. Of course, that isn’t always a simple process.

The good news is that according to HubSpot, about 80% of all customers remember videos they’ve seen in the last month or so. While they might not remember every detail, they do recall the important things – like who the brand responsible for the video was.

The key to building your online presence with video content marketing is making sure that you make your campaign as consistent with your existing brand voice and personality as possible. In other words, you’ll need to keep your logos, fonts, voice, and colours the same as they are whenever you connect with your customers elsewhere. Make sure that your followers still know that they’re interacting with you – regardless of the medium you’re using.

3. Video content marketing can be good for SEO

Ultimately, if you want to improve organic rankings for your website, then you’ll need a combination of written and video content. Just because you need text to improve the value of your site in the eyes of search engines, doesn’t necessarily mean you can’t attract more traffic to your content with video posts. In fact, around 65% of decision-makers in the B2B business world visit a marketer’s website after seeing a branded video.

There are plenty of ways that you can build your video content marketing strategy, using visuals in everything from your landing pages to your regular content schedule. The more content you add, the more value you deliver to your customers, and the higher your SEO rank becomes.

4. Video is great for any device

About 48% of millennials only view video on their mobile devices. That means that if you’re hoping to target a younger audience, you should probably be thinking about working with a video content marketing agency.

Video content works incredibly well regardless of where you want to connect with your target audience. If you have a responsive website design, and you’re hosting your videos on the right platforms across social media, you should have no problem connecting with your customers at the right time. What’s more, because customers can listen to vlogs and podcasts on the go, without having to give you their full attention, you might find that you get more engagement than you would with a typical blog post.

5. Video content marketing amplifies your message

Finally, inbound marketing solutions like video content, are one of the many ways brands today can start to develop real relationships with their audiences, through carefully crafted messaging, and strong personalities. With a video, you have an incredible opportunity to demonstrate your company persona to your customers with real human faces and attributes.

Although design and branding, along with a carefully customised voice can do wonders for your overall brand identity, it’s much easier for customers to connect with a company when they’ve seen people from that business face-to-face.

Building a video content marketing strategy template

In the marketing world, “content” is one of the many strategies that businesses can use to demonstrate value to their customers. With the right content, you can prove to your target audience that you’re worth their time, their trust, and even their investment.

Of course, a video content marketing strategy, just like any other form of content plan, is most effective when you have a plan in mind to determine what you’re going to share, who you’re going to target, and where you’re going to place your videos.

While a video content marketing agency could be the best resource for those who want to make the most out of their videos and vlogs, we’ve put together this simple video content marketing strategy template to help get you started on the path to online stardom.

Step 1: Decide what you’re going to share

Perhaps the most important element of any video content marketing strategy must be the “content”, the stories that you share to engage and enlighten your customers.

For the best results, you’ll need to find the ideal balance between what your customers want to hear, and what you want to say. This means defining your content core, which outlines everything you’re going to produce for the foreseeable future, all the way from blogs to podcasts.

To find your content core, start by asking yourself what your audience really cares about. You can learn what your customers want to hear from you by building user personas, or:

• Listening to the conversation: Check out industry forums, question pages, and social media groups to find out what people are saying about your brand or industry. Alternatively, you can simply look online for conversations around topics you’re interested in writing about. This will help to make sure you approach stories from the right angle.
• Speaking to your customers: If you’ve been in the market for a while now, you can start your video content marketing strategy by speaking to the customers who already know, like, and trust you enough to buy your products. Set aside some time to call them, email them, or set up a poll on social media asking them what kind of content they’d like to see from you.
• Reviewing the competition: If you want to get ahead in the marketplace, then you need to start by learning what your competitors are doing. Ask yourself if the people who could steal your customers have their own YouTube channels. If they do, what are they doing right, and what are they doing wrong? Does their content align with their brand image? Are they ignoring a specific gap in the market?

Step 2: Plan the structure of your videos

Once you’ve figured out what kind of content you’re going to share (and why), the next step of your video content marketing strategy template, should involve figuring out how you’re going to get the right messages out to your audience.

Important, this isn’t about where you’re going to promote your videos (that part comes later), instead, you need to think about how your videos are going to look, feel, and sound. Generally, this means considering various things, including:

• Your brand personality: You should already have a basic idea of what your brand personality is, thanks to some careful manifesto creation, and some long-term brand building strategies. However, you might need a quick refresher before you hit record. Think about your tone of voice: are you serious or comedic, playful or helpful? A good exercise here is to identify your brand with lines of text that say “We are (something), but we are not (something). For example, “We are helpful, but we are not condescending”.
• Your structure: The structure of your video is the “format”, the way you’re going to convey your message through interviews, one-person monologues, animation, or any other strategy. Try to pick a structure that works seamlessly with your personality, and successfully engages your target audience.
• Visual feel: You should already know from your logo just how important visual branding can be. Since video is an inherently visual medium, it’s important to think about how things are going to look from your customer’s perspective. Are you going to use graphics and animation to tell a story? How are you going to edit your pieces, and cut them together to create a seamless experience?
• Sound effects and music: Remember, audio is just as important to your content as images. Without audio, it can become much harder for your customers to grasp the context of your content. Even the right music or score could be enough to portray the right emotions to your audience.

Step 3: Choose your platforms for distribution

Okay, so you know what kind of content you’re going to create, and what your videos are going to look like. Now, all you need to do is figure out how you’re going to share the pieces that you create with your target audience.

One of the easiest, and most effective ways to improve the reach of your videos is by writing blog posts for each piece of content you create. This might sound like you’re simply introducing more effort into your video content marketing strategy, but by creating blogs to accompany your videos, you accomplish several things:

• You give your audience more than one type of content to choose from: That means that they have more options available when they’re deciding how to engage with your brand.
• You can include a simple and clickable call to action that tells your audience what they need to do next when they’ve learned something from your video. This could mean signing up for your email list or purchasing a product.
• You use keywords that improve your chances of ranking on search engines. SEO can ensure that people from beyond your existing network have a better chance of finding and consuming your videos.

Besides using your blog as a distribution channel for your videos, and a strategy for enhancing brand awareness, you can also tap into various other promotional options which are perfect for the visual medium, including:

• Sharing your videos on YouTube.
• Embedding your videos in social media posts.
• Including your videos in messages to your audience through email.

Step 4: Refine, name and publish your video series

There’s a good chance that your video content marketing strategy template will contain a range of additional information intended to make life easier for your company. For instance, you might outline who is responsible for publishing the content, and what kind of editing software you want to use. You might even create a schedule to ensure better consistency in your campaign.

Once you’ve got all those personal issues nailed down, the only thing left to do will be naming and publishing your video series.

Remember, it’s generally useful to accompany your video with additional written information. YouTube offers a feature where you can add a description below each video with links, and extra information about the company. Use this space to your advantage with links back to your website, and information on why your users should watch your content.

Examples of video content marketing

Sometimes, no matter how useful your video content marketing strategy is, you’ll still find yourself struggling to get the inspiration you need to create content that resonates with your audience.

To ignite your video marketing muse, here are just a few simple examples of successful video content published by companies around the world today, along with a quick insight into why each video is so effective.

1. The Royal College of Psychiatrists

Sometimes, all you need is a great video content marketing agency to get to the bottom of your production problems. Recently, the creative minds here at Fabrik designed a recruitment video for the Royal College of Psychiatrists, intended to inform people from around the UK why they should think about a career in psychiatry.

An explainer video is one of the most popular options around when it comes to creating useful content for your audience. They can help you to explain the value of your product or service, or simply introduce customers to your brand. However, just because these videos need to be informative, doesn’t mean that they should be bland, dry, or boring.

The best way to make sure that your videos connect with your customers is to use emotional marketing – something we’ve focused on in our piece for the Royal College of Psychiatrists. If you can build a connection with your audience based on feelings, you’re more likely to convince them to act.

2. Dallas Zoo and Bob Hagh

Sometimes, opportunities for video marketing content present themselves in the most unusual ways. For instance, Primate Supervisor for the Dallas Zoo, Ashley Orr, captured a video of a gorilla dancing and splashing around in a children’s pool.

Video producer Bob Hagh saw the video and noticed that the moves of the gorilla bore a strong resemblance to the famous scene from the movie “Flash Dance”, performed to the tune of “Maniac”. To improve the share-ability of the video, Bob dubbed the gorilla with the same musical track.

This piece of content is effective because it’s not only humorous and engaging, but it also reminds the customer of something they’ve seen before. By combining nostalgia with their content, the Dallas Zoo was able to create the perfect viral video.

3. Poo-Pourri

Finally, a brand known for its creation of a unique bathroom spray, Poo-Pourri are known for their incredible collection of viral videos. There are plenty of popular options out there to choose from, but one of the more shareable options (which generated over 13 million views) is the video below.

Poo-Pourri has done something incredible with their video content marketing strategy, by taking a topic that’s generally considered to be “taboo”, and making it fun. This is a brand that’s willing to address concerns that we don’t want to talk about on our behalf and remove some of the discomfort around bathroom habits.

The video is effective because it’s relatable, fun, and just enough to get you laughing about a topic that we’re all familiar with (even if we’d rather not admit it).

Tips for your video content marketing strategy

It’s fair to say that video content marketing is by far one of the best options out there for brands who want to expand awareness and reach while simultaneously giving weight to their brand identity.

The question is, how can you create video content that really makes an impact? You’ve already got your video content marketing strategy in mind, now you need to think about what you can do to make your pieces stand out from all the brands recording content just like you.

1. Focus on stories instead of sales

One of the reasons video content is so effective is that it’s a form of inbound marketing. This means it focuses on bringing your audience to you. However, if you want your content to have the right impact, then you need to use it to build relationships with your audience by showcasing your unique values and attitude.

People don’t want to be “sold to” – at least not in an obvious way. Instead, you need to make sure that your video has value for the viewer. Use your content to tell stories that show the value of your brand, rather than simply telling people what you have to offer.

2. Use your time wisely

Attention spans in the online world are woefully short. That’s part of what makes video content marketing so appealing.

Since the average attention span is around 8.5 seconds, you’ll need to make sure that you capture your audience’s attention quickly if you want to stop them from clicking away and watching something else.

During the opening seconds, provide clarity on what your video is about, and make sure that your customer knows that what they’re about to watch is worth their time.

3. Use a great thumbnail

One of the most important parts of your video content marketing strategy is knowing how to share the pieces you create. While a great title will do wonders for your shareability, you’ll also need to use a fantastic thumbnail to get viewers excited about your video before it starts playing.

Putting a little effort into your thumbnail design could be enough to drastically improve your play-rates. With that in mind, avoid any blurry shots or boring content. Alternatively, you could always turn to a video content marketing agency for help.

The value of a video content marketing agency

In the past, investing in a great video content marketing strategy meant spending huge amounts of money on professional recording equipment and technical expertise. Even then, once the recording was over, you only had one platform through which to share it with your audience: television.

Now, the video world has changed. The rise of smartphones and the popularity of social media, YouTube, and other online video services means that video content marketing has become one of the best ways to really communicate with your audience.

By the year 2021, Cisco predicts that around 82% of internet traffic will be video-based, so if you’re not already investing in your own video strategy, now might be the time to get started. With the right content, you can instantly engage, excite, and entice your audience – ensuring a stronger following of loyal fans.

Video marketing doesn’t have to be as tough as it seems.

Is it time to press play on your content campaign?

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