The reason that video is so powerful is two-fold. First, it allows you to tell a story very quickly and in a way that consumers have been trained to enjoy – through a culture of movie and TV-watching. Second, it gives you the ability to connect to the viewer’s emotions, which helps users connect with your brand in a meaningful way. You can this information to create videos with very specific intent, targeting specific audiences and getting specific reactions, in mere seconds.
Personas and Consumer Journey
To capitalize on a marketing video’s ability to connect with the consumer, you have to ensure that you are crafting the right message for your target audience. This is why it’s very important to spend time gathering consumer insights prior to launching your video. Unlike text, which can be easily edited if it’s not drawing attention, video must be remade and relaunched to adjust the message — so it’s best to get it right the first time. If budgets allow, it is recommended to create different versions of the same video for A/B Testing to help figure out which messaging works best. A/B Testing is a tool that can be utilized over a short period of time to help determine which version of an video ad is more successful. Once a front runner emerges, most advertisers shift the weight of their advertising spend to one of the two tested versions.
Evoking emotion from your target audience should always be your goal, but be aware of what emotion you want to evoke. For most businesses, awe and admiration will be important for building your brand reputation. But if your customers are blindly loyal to a challenger brand, you might need to use humorous logic or even intense FOMO (fear of missing out) emotions to stir them out of their comfort zone and get them to listen up. Reaching the right audience depends on producing the right content.
Measuring Success
The next thing you need to do to use a video marketing strategy wisely is to create a measurable Key Performance Indicator (KPI) for your campaign. You can’t reach your goals if you don’t know what they are. As with other marketing strategies, it’s important to do some A/B Testing to learn what works best for your audience.
Cost-Appropriate Video Production
You can create videos in-house or have a video marketing agency create them for you. In-house video allows you better control over the video and makes it easier to feature personal touches, such as messages from actual employees. On the flip-side, In-house video production can also cost you more in time, lost work productivity, and money as you learn the best video creation techniques. An agency with experienced creators will give you a professional looking video right away as well as access to an encyclopedic knowledge of what techniques work and which do not, shortcutting the learning curve that your staff or internal team may need to learn on their own. In the long run, it can be more expensive to staff an internal team and better in the long run to work with an outside agency who does one thing REALLY well. Making video.
At the end of the day, there are a hundred things to keep in mind when creating a marketing video. Consider what story you are telling about your business with your marketing video. What does that story say about you and your brand? Be sure to show, instead of tell, your viewers, what your message is all about. That is the power of video, after all.
