Try These Video Marketing Tips for Small Business

Embrace video marketing for your small business. Overcome doubts about equipment, skills, or self-image. If I can do it, so…

By Ivana Taylor

Published on June 25, 2018

Statistics About Video Marketing For Small Business

The trend toward video marketing for small business keeps moving forward. Take a look at some of these statistics from smallbiztrends.com:

According to Cisco’s Visual Networking Index (PDF), by 2019, the global consumer Internet video traffic will account for 80 percent of all consumer Internet traffic, and this doesn’t even include video exchanged through peer-to-peer (P2P). (Click to Tweet)

This data is backed by the increasing number of views video social networks are experiencing. During the 2015 Q3 call, Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced the social network is generating 8 billion video views daily, and while Snapchat has 15 times fewer users, it generates almost as many video views at 7+ billion. (Click to Tweet)

It’s clear. Video isn’t going away, it’s only going to become more ubiquitous. The good news in all of this is that it’s also become more natural, more organic.

The combination of social media and video is giving companies more access to their customers. Mobile platforms are providing more access because of the flexibility they provide in capturing and streaming live events as they happen no matter where they are taking place.

This means that your customers don’t need fancy, high-dollar productions. Let me restate that — your customers don’t WANT high-end productions. [pullquote align=”normal” cite=”Ivana Taylor”]What your customers want is a glimpse into who you are as a person, as a brand. They want the feeling of knowing you and being in relationship with you. [/pullquote] This means that regardless of how you feel about video — there is a way to make it uniquely your own without spending a lot of time or money. In fact – the biggest obstacle is — YOU.

The Difference Between Video Marketing and Video Advertising

One thing that might be getting in the way is the faulty idea that video marketing and video advertising are the same thing. They are actually quite different.

Here’s a simple explanation of each from The Difference Between Video Marketing and Video Advertising:

Video Marketing: The use of video as content in websites, landing pages, social media and email to inform, educate and engage.

Video Advertising: Running video commercials online across all screens, using advanced audience & geo-targeting to reach precise markets

Video advertising gives you the potential to reach a huge audience people of all ages, many of them difficult to reach through traditional advertising channels. YouTube advertising has the potential to reach over 800 million visitors worldwide.

The key distinction is in the “intention” of the video. Video marketing is more content, education, information and engagement focused. While video advertising is focused on the more traditional brand building and call to action that we are all familiar with. With millennial eye-balls moving away from traditional television and over to social channels and on-demand video viewing, the use of video marketing and advertising to reach your ideal customer will only go up.

And while a lot of that content is sure to be cat videos and blooper reels, it also presents a golden opportunity for your businesses to capitalizeon the video marketing boom. Even if you know nothing about video, it’s not too late to get familiar with this strategy.

Feeling excited about the possibilities? Why Video Is Winning The Internet And Why Your Business Needs It?has a list of wonderful pro tips for creating some DIY videos for your small business.

When you consider that email open rates and conversion rates have been absolutely dismal –?video marketing has GOT to get on your strategy radar before the end of the year.

[Tweet “simply using the word ?video? in an email subject line boosts open rates by up to 13%”]

[Tweet “embedding a video into an email can result in a conversion rate that’s 21% higher than emails containing only static images”]

You Need a Video Marketing Strategy — What is THAT?

According to an Adcend2 survey cited inIs Video Content Right For You?, the most challenging obstacle to video marketing success according to nearly 48% of companies was lack of a video strategy.

Here are a few tips from 62 Easy, Valuable Tips to Rock Your Video Content:

Who is your audience?

I know, you are tired of hearing this, but understanding exactly who your audience is will assure that the video content you worked so hard to create will be seen by your ideal audience and that they will ultimately CHOOSE YOU.

What do they want to see?

Focus on the questions they want answered or the top 5-7 problems you know they are dealing with.

What do you want to accomplish?

Are you building awareness or are you looking for customers? You may want customers, but you may not have established your brand in a way that makes potential customers comfortable with who you are. If that’s the case, creating videos that prove your expertise or quickly and easily solve customer problems will be a step in the right direction.

Focus on creating an emotional response:

While your product or service may have some awesome features, what emotion do you want your customers to feel? Frustration? Relief? Think about what emotions you want to trigger in your customer and then create video that triggers those emotions.

Don’t overcomplicate this part of the process, focus on your ideal customer, what’s important to them and then educate them, entertain them and help them find the right solution to their problem.

Ignoring Video Marketing is Like Ignoring the Internet

Sooner or later, you will have to find a way to incorporate video into your marketing. Think about it this way, if you don’t like writing and writing blog posts feels like a long slog through the swamp of words and ideas — then, producing videos is an great alternative. Here’s a quick summary from 7 Tips to Leverage Videos for Your Small Business?— this will get you really excited about what’s possible! Here are 5 of the 7 tips:

Get some video testimonials: Make the testimonial valuable to your customers by making the video a mini commercial for them. Let them tell their story, and highlight how your business helped them grow for double the benefit.

Establish Yourself as an Expert: You know a lot about your industry. Why not create a series of videos where you share your expertise. You can always share where you think the future of the industry is going, or any technology that will impact your business or focus on your customer with short, actionable tips. For example, if you run a hair salon, you could create a series of videos illustrating how to create the latest hair trends or hair care techniques.

Juice up your email:If you use email marketing to reach your target audience or want to extend the relationship with existing customers, consider send a video email. You never know how including a video could boost your open rate and your results. Studies show that including the word “video” in an email subject line can increase the open and click-through rates as much as 65%.Interview thought leaders:?(This is one of my favorites) You can build relationships with key people in your field by interviewing them. You reap three major benefits by doing this: First, you give your audience new perspective and information beyond what you can provide. Second, you always elevate your expertise to the level of the person that you are interviewing. Third, the person you interview will help you promote the video, which will help your brand reach a wider audience. This is especially helpful if they have a bigger social media footprint than you do.

Livestream: Social media is currently riding the video wave, with free tools such as Google Hangout and new tools like Periscope and Blab. These services are creating raving fans of livestreaming. It’s still in the early days for these tools, so be an early adopter and establish yourself as a livestreaming pro.

Even MORE Video Marketing Ideas

Check out this infographic featured on marketingprofs.com (made with and by Venngage) offers you a long list of video ideas you might try while avoiding four- or five-figure expenditures.

Don’t Be Scared – Jump In and Do it Anyway

Don’t let all of these stats and ideas scare you. Take a look at all of the info provided here, then choose ONE idea you’d like to try. Maybe you want to do an interview with someone or maybe you want to ask for a customer testimonial Doesn’t matter, do ONE thing today and another tomorrow. Take one step at a time and before you know it — you’ll be a video star.