If you’ve ever lost a few hours watching Instagram Reels of celebs, cat videos on YouTube or people dancing on TikTok, you’ll know how engaging video can be. So are you using it in your digital marketing? If you aren’t you could be missing out.
Why is video a good addition to your marketing strategy?
Video is easy to digest: On social media, especially, you often only have people’s attention for a few seconds. Videos are easier for people to consume and digest than written blog posts, and you can convey more information in a short video than people might read.
Some audiences consume a lot of content via video: Younger audiences gravitate towards visual social media like TikTok, Instagram and YouTube. In fact, TikTok is becoming a search engine of choice for many Gen Z consumers. In New Zealand there are around 1.65million TikTok users, with the highest percentage in the 18-24 age group. So, if your product or service is aimed at a younger market, then you might reach more of your audience than with more traditional posts. Video also works well for specific niches like hair and beauty, food and travel.
Video can help you stand out: It feels like every person and their pet is on social media these days and it can be hard to stand out. Eye-catching videos jump out in a feed full of text and static image posts. Videos also get shown in special places on some social media channels, like Instagram Reels, so you may get seen in different places. Videos can also add interest to your website – for example use a video to tell your brand story on your About Page rather than writing it down.
Creating videos that feature actual products, services or members of your team helps to create authenticity for your brand: You’ve probably heard the words authentic and real talked about when it comes to modern branding. With so much content online, featuring authentic team members or actual products can help you stand out and build trust and a relationship between your brand and customers.
What sort of videos can you make?
Explainers: these are videos that explain something about your business, product, or service. You could also create them to explain a particular process such as ordering if it’s a bit complicated.
Meet the team: these videos introduce yourself or your team members to your customers. You can keep it strictly work-related or inject a bit of personality too and talk about their home life or hobbies.
Video demos or reviews: these videos can be done by your business or you could work with an influencer to create them.
Livestreams or events: If you regularly run events or your team is happy to be filmed over the course of several hours then you could create a video from those either live in real-time, or to be edited and shown later.
How to start video marketing (even if you aren’t keen in front of the camera)
Creating videos for your online marketing is quite simple and cost-effective if you are happy to do quite a bit of the work yourself. A decent phone camera is good enough to start with and there are plenty of editing programs and apps available online as well as tools within social media apps themselves.
But a lot of people aren’t keen on being in front of the camera. So here are a few tips to make the video creation process more fun.
Get comfortable: If you aren’t keen about the way you look on screen then make the surroundings work better for you. Here are some ways to do that. A bit of decent lighting and the right camera (or phone camera) angle go a long way. Choose clothes that you feel happy in and think about filming just after you’ve had a haircut and are feeling good. And don’t forget you can probably give yourself a little glow-up when you are editing – just don’t take it too far. You might not think it but many of your audience will like it more if you look natural and normal or even if you stumble a bit – it all adds to your authenticity.
Make a plan: Just like any piece of marketing, videos will work better if you have a plan. Create an outline of the video in advance and prepare a short script if you will be doing a lot of talking. A plan means you won’t forget important things like your call to action and your video will flow better.
Practice makes perfect: If you aren’t used to being on camera, practice in front of the mirror or with someone else first. You could also try recording yourself on camera a few times before filming your actual video so you get used to the camera.
Keep it short and sweet: Most videos, especially for social media don’t need to be that long. Shorter videos mean you need to be on screen for less time and there’s less chance of you getting flustered or running out of things to say.
If you really aren’t keen on being on screen yourself, try these two tips.
Ask someone else to do the video for you: Got a team member who is already a TikTok dancing pro? Ask them if they’d like to be your video marketing star or see if a group of staff would be willing to do it so the focus isn’t just on one person. For product videos you could work with influencers. Simply send some loyal customers or online influencers your product in return for a review. Working with influencers doesn’t have to be difficult or expensive by the way. If you are a smaller business consider connecting with some micro-influences – people who post in a niche and who have a smaller but very engaged and loyal following.
Create videos without people: Although being able to see people in videos can create trust, it’s not always essential. If you really aren’t happy on screen and can’t find a human substitute, think about using a creation tool to make an avatar or cartoon to star in the video or use lots of interesting text styles and images.
Adding video to your marketing strategy is a must if you want to reach a wide audience. We hope these tips encourage you to give it a go in front of the camera. For more help nailing your digital marketing, take one of our short courses like our TikTok Marketing or Content Creation.
