5 Effective Marketing Video Tips for Your Small Business

You’re almost there. You have your blog up and running and you’re publishing content consistently. You have the copywriting handled. You might have even set up your email list software. These are all essential components of a marketing effort. But it’s still missing one thing: Video.

While other forms of content sharing are still important, video has become the most often used marketing medium by both large and small businesses. It’s no surprise considering the fact that consumers connect more with visuals than any other medium. But creating successful marketing videos isn’t easy — especially if you have no experience presenting something on video. This article will give you 5 fundamental marketing video tips that will help you make videos that persuade your customers to buy.

Marketing Video Tips

Start with a Plan

First and foremost, you must create a plan. Yes, I know it’s tempting to just jump right in without spending a bunch of time mapping out your strategy. But that’s a mistake. It is essential that provide yourself with some direction before you start filming. That way, you don’t waste time creating content that doesn’t resonate with your intended audience.

You need to first identify what your audience is. It makes sense to create a buyer persona, which is a tool that helps you narrow down the prospects to which you want to market your product or service. This will make it easier for you to customize your content to the right people. By knowing who your audience is and what they want to see, you can better target your videos and marketing efforts.

Use Closed Captioning

One of the most overlooked aspects of video marketing is the use of closed captioning. This is a service that displays the text of what is being said in each video. You have probably seen this on various movies and TV shows on Netflix and other such services.

But why would you need close captioning in videos designed to market your brand? The answer is simple. Most of your videos will be posted on social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Each of these platforms will display your videos without audio initially. It is only when the user clicks on the video that the sound plays.

If someone is scrolling through their feed and sees your video, they won’t know what it’s about unless they decide to click on it. And it’s not very likely they will click on it unless they are already interested in your brand. But if you include closed captioning, they can read the text of the content even if the audio isn’t playing. This way, your audience can read the text and will be more likely to click and watch the entire video because they understand which topics you’re discussing.

Repurpose Other Content

One of the tricks that many business owners miss is re-purposing content you have already created. You don’t need to immediately start producing brand new content because you might already have a library of subjects you have already covered.

For instance, if you have been maintaining a blog for a while, you now have several different scripts for several different videos you can create. Converting your blog posts into videos has multiple benefits. Not only does it make it easier to create content, but it also helps you reach people that you might not have reached with only your blog posts. There are many people who do not spend much time reading a blog, but they will watch a video. This could expose your brand to an even wider audience.

Nail the Intro

The introduction is the most important part of each video you will film. It is literally what will determine whether your prospect watches until the end, or goes surfing for kitten videos. Indeed, 65% of people who watch the first three seconds of a video will continue to watch for at least ten more seconds. That’s right, you have only three seconds to capture your viewer’s interest.

In a day when almost all ads on social media are skip-able, you must make sure your viewer does not hit that “skip ad” button. That’s why you have to make sure that you’re enticing them to stay from the very first words that you speak.

One of the ways to grab their attention is to begin with a question that might make them curious to find out what the answer is later in the video. Make sure the question is something that others in your audience would want to know the answer to. Then, promise to answer it by the end of the video.

Another way to keep someone’s attention is to speak to a pain point that you know your prospect is experiencing. Put the pain up front, and then promise to offer a solution by the end of the video, and you’ll have their attention.

Go Live

Live streaming has become all the rage now in the world of online marketing. In fact, speaking directly to your audience is the best way to connect with them and show that you are relatable. It gives you a channel to instantly allow communication between your company and its customers.

Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube all have live streaming options. There might even be software that can allow you to Live stream on multiple services at once. You can make these sessions as long or short as you want as long as your viewers are interested in the conversation.

One of the best ways to use live streaming is to host a Q&A session. This means that you record a live video in which members of your audience ask you questions through the chat feature. But you must make sure you are delivering value to the people asking you questions. And guess what; if you don’t know the answer to the question, you can promise to address it later. This way, you can create even more content by writing a post or recording another video answering the question.

Marketing Video Tips Wrap Up

Connecting to your audience is the most important aspect of marketing. People buy from those they know, like and trust. Videos can help you become more relatable to your audience and provide them with a human face behind your operation. Using the marketing video tips in this article will make it easier to forge bonds between yourself and your audience.

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This article, "5 Effective Marketing Video Tips for Your Small Business" was first published on Small Business Trends