In a world where cut-throat competition is the name of the game, business owners must find ways to advertise and promote their products or services to the most number of people at the lowest possible cost. In olden times this may mean newspaper advertisements, brochures, TV commercials, billboards, fliers, etc. But the boom of the internet has revolutionized the way businesses have advertised. One of the revolutionary ways to advertise that have been brought about by the internet technology is video marketing.
What is video marketing? Video marketing is a kind of marketing strategy where businesses or companies use videos that are uploaded in the internet to cater to a target specific audience with the end goal of promoting and advertising the company, the product or service and the convert these promotion or awareness to sales of the product or service.
If you have heard of video marketing, you may ask why your business or company should try video marketing. There are at least 5 reasons why you should use video marketing. Video marketing is as enticing to the consumer, if not more so, than the traditional methods of advertisement because it combines both the visual and audio appeal of the television to the interactivity and easy access of the internet. Second, video marketing is also a lot less expensive than the more traditional forms of marketing, as disseminating videos cost nothing as compared to continued TV time, newspaper space or billboard space. Third, since videos need to be accessed and searched before they are played, you can be sure that only those that are interested in your product will watch your videos making your videos more target specific than other forms of advertisements. Fourth, since you use videos, your message, which is the company and the product or service, gets delivered faster and easier. Lastly, using videos gives you more colorful and creative ideas to capture your audience’s interest.
Now that you know why you should use video marketing, here are some tips on how to maximize your videos so as to attain your goal of product awareness and product sales. The most obvious and probably the most challenging thing to overcome with video marketing is to make your videos as catchy and interesting to your consumers as possible. Be sure to put the information the audience is looking for at the start of the video so as to keep the audience interested. It is also important to remember that in making videos you must waste as less time of the audience as possible. Make the video short without compromising the information. Configure the video so as the viewer needs to click only once to load, activate and play the video.
One of the purposes of your video is to reach as much people as possible. Therefore, it is necessary that you optimize your video not only for video search engines but also for content search engines. To do this you must create relevant names for the video and use key words that the video search engine can index.
Very interesting post - Video marketing is probably one of the the most cost -effective and dynamic ways to enhance a web site. The key is to find a decent video production company that you can rely on to give good advice - personally we specialise in motion graphics (moving logos etc) so don’t do longer form videos for marketing. We do see plenty of clients who’ve received poor advice though from inexperienced video production companies though - the result is a video that frankly would do more harm thatn good if it were distributed.
Video production isn’t as expensive as one might think and there’s an interesting article on video production at this site. Our advice is find people with a track record in Broadcast video production - this is a mark of quality assurance … however avoid the larger companies with large offices and overheads (remember you’re paying for those overheads). Also try to avoid ‘project managers’ or ‘producers’ who have no real function other than to persuade you to spend more money than strictly necessary. The most effective video production companies we work with are small, ex-broadcast, ’boutique’ enterprises that can streamline the whole process in a highly creative way (and that’s what you’re paying them for).
A good video company should also be able to advise on delivery and distribution - by web, email, or using the usual suspects like Utube. Something that’s often overlooked though is mobile phone video….. it’s really on the up and has a massive target audience for a carefully crafted viral video taht friends want to pass amongst themselves.. just make it entertaining and funny and you’re there….. subtle free marketing with free distribution.
Good luck!
Comment by Teidi Sands — June 2, 2008 @ 3:26 am