DON'T LET YOUR VIDEO SIT ON THE SHELF!
Scene note: WHY is screamed toward ceiling by mild-mannered producer/video marketer from a Boston video production company seated at desk in a black Henry Miller Aeron chair that is slowly spinning to the left to emphasize discomfort, and interspersed with three to five scenes of giant flocks of birds bursting from trees across the land.
The drama comes from caring, and having watched a lot of good video content sit on the sidelines. I’ve seen videos posted just once on a website, on social channels and on a partially developed YouTube channel with no campaign or follow-up to drive traffic. I’ve seen email campaigns that feature a new video but simply linking to the video with a basic blue HTML link instead of a great still frame from the video and a play icon. And, I’ve seen a video for a new product promoted with just text on a generic banner of an eCommerce site instead of next to the Buy Now button near the product itself. I’ve even seen videos we’ve made age on hard drives and Dropbox without ever getting used.
PUT YOUR VIDEO TO WORK
Among the first questions we ask at the beginning of any project is: “how will you be putting your video to work?” In other words, what will you be doing with it? Video, like everything else in marketing, needs a plan for how you will activate it to achieve your goals. How you’ll be putting it to work might also influence the approach to your video and/or the type of video that is going to be made. If you want to drive meaningful engagement and results, you need a plan for implementation before you start producing the video.
Rather than getting into the nuts and bolts of a plan, we’ll address that in a later blog post so we can stay focused on what a plan can deliver.
IMPORTANT QUESTIONS
Even a few of the following questions can help:
- Will this video support a marketing or sales campaign?
- What stage in the buyer’s journey is our audience?
- Where can we best engage our audience?
- What do you want people to do after watching the video?
- How will you measure engagement and success?
- Do I have someone in my company who can put our videos to work?
Answers to the above questions can have a transformative effect on your video efforts. First, they can help steer you into making the right kind of videos based on your goals. And, rather than having your videos sitting quietly on the bench, you can deploy them strategically to meet those goals, generate leads, and optimize conversions. You can also use these videos to collect valuable data from your audience based on how they engage with your video content.
You can use powerful and cost-effective tools like Wistia with hosting, analytics and video marketing capabilities. We just became a Wista Agency Partner, and we’re thrilled to start offering video marketing services to our clients, and start driving greater and more meaningful results.
How would you like to see a heat map that shows how people are engaging with your videos? What parts of the video are they watching more than once? What parts are they skipping? Where are they watching the video from, and are they using a desktop or mobile device? How do built in calls-to-action and email collection tools sound? Integration with your email marketing and marketing automation tools? Would you like a customized player without YouTube or Vimeo branding?
These features are just the tip of the iceberg when we deploy your videos using Wistia.
USE ALL OF YOUR VIDEO CONTENT
This is a big one, and it breaks my heart. Use as much of your video content as possible. There are almost always extra soundbites, and great footage that can be used in numerous ways. Think beyond the single finished video. Think:” what else can I do with the content that I’ve already paid to film?” Editing and reediting costs much less than bringing a crew out to shoot again. Create A, B, and C cuts of your video. Release single clips with each featuring a different unused soundbite. You can even reuse soundbites because it will be perceived as different content out of the context of a larger video. Also, not all audiences will see every video.
In addition, do you do webinars? If you answered yes, then reuse them! You can even cut them up to make shorter videos.
The are so many ways to get more out of your investment when you plan, and don’t leave your video sitting on the shelf. Just taking one of these actions can pay off in greater content marketing ROI whenever you deploy video.