Creating a video marketing strategy is not as simple as you might think! It takes time, effort, and lots of experimentation. There are many different components involved in creating your video advertising campaign.
There are several steps that must be taken to create an effective video advertisement. These include choosing a genre, developing a script, finding the right people to help promote your product or service, investing in filming equipment, editing software, and lastly, promoting your videos.
While some of these steps seem very straightforward, they can be tricky to implement effectively. That is why it is so important to experiment with different parts of the process before finalizing anything.
Narrow down your content topics
After deciding what kind of content you will produce, now is the time to figure out how to promote it. What channels can you use to spread your message?
You should start by narrowing down the topic or area of your content that you want to focus on. This way, your audience doesn’t have to look outside of your channel or area of expertise for answers they seek.
Your target market may not know much about social media marketing, so producing tips and tricks there won’t do them any good. On the other hand, if they are looking for information on this tool, then creating content using this tool is more likely to get engagement and comments.
Likewise, you can pick and choose which areas of online business are beyond your budget at this stage. You don’t need top of the line equipment to begin doing video marketing.
A smart phone with adequate camera quality is enough to create helpful videos. If you’re buying products, you don’t need a huge expensive camera either.
Develop your website or blog
After you have determined how you want to organize your content, what types of videos you will create, and where you will publish these videos, it is time to start developing your website or blogging platform!
Choosing a hosting site for your website or blog is an important first step. There are many free web hosts that can help you get started, but make sure they are reliable and secure before signing up.
You do not want to waste your hard-earned money to be hacked or stolen from. Most good quality hosts offer security features such as malware protection, firewall services, and backup tools.
After you find the right host for your website, you will need to pick either Windows or Linux software to go along with your site. Windows software includes easy to use front ends like WordPress, while Linux has more advanced editing programs available.
Some people prefer one over the other, so it really depends on the person creating the websites! If you are already familiar with one then why not keep using that one? Or if you know both well, then you can choose which one to invest in later.
Create a video marketing plan
Creating a solid video marketing strategy does not happen overnight. It takes time to find your voice as an entrepreneur, but you can get some initial help by creating a draft version of your business’s video channel.
You can use something like YouTube or another streaming service to test out your business’s face value. Find someone close to you who knows you well and ask them for feedback!
Once you have their input, it is time to work on your business’s main videos. These should be focused and educational, while also being entertaining enough to keep people watching.
Your main videos do not need narration, but they should contain content that appeals to your target audience.
Plan your marketing campaign
A good first step in building a video marketing strategy is to determine what type of content you want to create. Are you planning to do storytelling videos or promotional videos?
You will also need to decide if you want to use YouTube as your main channel, Facebook as a secondary channel, or both. The number and length of videos you make depends on the kind of product you are trying to sell and how much money you have to spend to promote them.
Your budget should include fees for creating the videos (filming equipment and software cost typically less than advertising costs), advertisements to put onto the videos, and salaries for people who work for you either full time or part time.
Building a business online takes a lot of effort and research, so make sure to look into all of the different ways you can market your company before investing in expensive campaigns.
Produce great content
One of the most important things you can do as a video marketing strategist is produce quality content. Content should be full-length videos or articles with 700 – 1,500 words.
Content that is shorter than one hour is difficult to watch and read through, making it less likely to get watched or read.
Content that’s too long could also be hard to monitor, keeping your audience at bay. An ideal length for content is around an hour and twenty minutes.
Your first draft might be longer, but aim to edit down the word count by looking for ways to cut unnecessary clutter.
For example, if your article includes pictures, you don’t need to include their captions in the article. You can often simply slide them out and add them to another image file. The same goes for references and citations.
You can easily take away those bits of junk from your text and save some bytes. To keep your writing natural and authentic, try using free online tools to check how well-written your current drafts are.
Making time to write new material every day will help you stay consistent and provide enough content for people to find you via search engines and social media.
Distribute your content through different media
Media is one of the most important parts of any successful video marketing strategy. There’s nothing wrong with spending money to make flashy videos that get lots of views, but you need to know how to use other types of media to help promote your business as well.
You can distribute your content via YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, blogs, and more.
By distributing your content in several places, it becomes much harder for people to ignore it, thus enhancing its exposure and helping it to perform better.
Your audience will also find your content more easily since they’ll be looking at it from various sources.
Create engaging videos
A well-crafted video is much more than just a pretty picture or an audio track. It’s actually a very effective way to get your message across, and it can be quite powerful when done right.
When you put together a YouTube channel, for example, you’re creating an environment where you can easily inspire others through education and entertainment. You are giving people a resource they can come to for tips and tricks to do things, and you earn kudos for providing quality content.
And although money isn’t always the goal of every business owner, producing high-quality videos that appeal to someone else’s audience can generate some income.
Your word choice and tone of voice matter, so choose wisely and stay natural. And don’t worry about what camera to use or whether there is enough light – those things are irrelevant once you have recorded your speech!
You’ll probably want to record yourself talking, but maybe doing something related to your field as well (for example, if you’re a cook, make a cooking tip). Then edit all of this into one seamless piece.
There are many free software programs that can help you create your videos quickly and efficiently, making it easy to launch onto YouTube or other platforms.
Target your audience
One of the biggest reasons people don’t use video as an advertising tool is because they view it as expensive or difficult to create. It isn’t! Creating a quality business video doesn’t require very long, nor does it require any special equipment beyond what you already have.
Your phone will do just fine! Many small businesses start filming conversations with their phones before graduating to higher quality cameras.
By being more creative about how you use technology to communicate, you’ll find that creating videos is much easier than most people think. You can even make your own fake commercials this way!
Start by picking an area of expertise or topic that you are passionate about and then develop a habit of recording short clips every day. Then, take those recordings seriously – no yawns or eye rolls allowed!
Once you have these down, you’ll be able to produce engaging content easily.
