The Marketer’s Guide To Boost Campaign Performance With Video

If you want to improve the performance of your marketing campaigns, videos should be a key element. Statistics prove that videos provide a greater return on investment than other marketing methods.

Aberdeen report states that each year marketers generate 66% more qualified leads with videos.

Video is a wonderful tool, but you need to use it strategically for it to boost performance.

Reasons to use video in your marketing campaign

An innovative use of video in a well-planned marketing campaign can help you to make the most of your marketing budget. Video can help to:

  • Improve SEO for Google ranking.
  • Engage viewer emotions and create brand awareness.
  • Increase engagement and build relationships.
  • Put across complex ideas in an easily understood form.
  • Optimize your online sales funnel.

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Before you begin

Without a call-to-action (CTA) that’s tied to your marketing objectives, your videos won’t achieve your purposes. To develop the right CTAs for your videos, consider the following questions:

  • What persona are you targeting?
  • What type of feeling do you want the video to have?
  • Where and when will you share it?
  • How will your CTA fit into your buyer’s journey?

Why you need to use SEO on your videos

Search engine optimization is important if you want your videos to rank highly in Google search results. When you host video on your own domain, you get the maximum SEO benefit from it.

Remember that search engine spiders cannot see videos, so they use titles, description, and tags to rank them. If you want people to find your videos through organic search, you need to optimize them with specific titles, good descriptions, and key search terms.

Google also recognizes the length of time spent on a page, and when someone watches a two-minute video on your landing page, it will rank higher in the search results.

Use video formats to suit your buyer’s journey

Before you can begin to work on details, you need to decide on the main goal of each video and how it ties into your marketing goals. Decide what action you want viewers to take after watching a video.

Video marketing should always target a specific buyer persona, and once you’ve established that to guide your tone of voice, you’ll need to make sure your video is also targeting the right stage in the buyer’s journey.

From awareness through to making a decision to purchase, video can guide viewers based on their behavior. Short, entertaining videos work best for initial awareness and tutorials, and product demos offer more insight into how to use a product.

Awareness stage: People are looking for a solution to a problem or to fulfill some kind of need. Entertain them, teach them, and make them laugh or inspire and motivate them. Videos at this stage need to be short format (30-90 seconds).

CTA’s should lead to more in-depth video content on a landing page or encourage viewers to start a free trial. Don’t push products before creating trust with customers.

Postly, an app that allows users to turn photos into postcards, has a great explainer video. Viewers understand how the app works and get brand messages about affordability, customization, and usability in a short 45-second video.

Consideration stage: At this stage, the person is busy researching alternatives and considering options. You need to showcase your solutions and start building a relationship with your brand.

Create informative videos, explainer videos, product demos, etc. to do this. At this stage, videos may be a little longer (2-10 min), and the CTAs should lead to decision-based content.

MuleSoft, a software company, has a full page on the website dedicated to video content, offering product tutorials, FAQs and more.

Decision stage: Your prospect is ready to buy and just needs to decide on a specific purchase and why to buy from you rather than another company. Make this decision easy by providing unbiased reviews, customer testimonials, FAQ, and instructional videos.

Show your prospective customers exactly how to use your products, show them, other people, just like them who have been successful by using your products and address any remaining doubts with the question and answer videos.

Hosting webinars is a good idea at this point. For almost 60% of marketers, webinar is an important part of the content marketing strategy. Kissmetrics is one company that uses webinars very successfully. Videos can be short or long and use CTAs to offer purchase-related offers and discounts.

Best use of video on social media

As a digital marketer, you need to know what works best when it comes to video marketing on social channels such as YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter and LinkedIn. There are so many variables when it comes to social videos that you need to be open to experimentation and measuring results to find your company’s sweet spot.

For your video to do what you want it to do on social media, you need to follow best practices for each platform. Remember too that most people are on their mobile phones when using social apps, and so they are far more likely to engage with short-form content.

Different lengths

Each social media channel is distinctive and suitable for different lengths of videos. HubSpot recommends the following lengths for videos:

  • YouTube: 2 minutes
  • Facebook: 1 minute
  • Instagram: 30 seconds
  • Twitter: 45 seconds

Different audiences

Audiences also differ from platform to platform. For example, Instagram caters to a younger audience, and LinkedIn is for professionals. Videos must appeal to audiences on the platforms you choose.

Different types

A few of the types of videos brands use on social media are:

  • Explainers
  • Product reviews
  • Testimonials
  • Case studies
  • Product demos
  • Video ads
  • Presentations

Two popular types of videos on social media

  1. Live video

Today live video is very popular because it does not require a huge budget (it can be shot of an iPhone) and creates a sense of immediacy and excitement. Many of the largest social media platforms, including Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube, offer brands the chance to go live anytime, and they are finding it delivers results.

You can use live video to capture authentic moments, promote events and share your brand personality in an informal setting. On Instagram live videos only stay up for 24-hours and are in a real-time format. It’s really easy to test out – swipe over to Instagram Stories Camera, and it notifies others to watch.

Facebook live is another way to engage users in real-time and allow them to react and leave comments. Use live video to give a personal feel to an announcement or event.

Benefit Cosmetics did a cross-platform video promotion. They asked followers on Snapchat to submit makeup tutorial questions. The questions were answered on Facebook Live. The segment was very popular and created a direct interaction with customers without having to spend a fortune.

  1. User-generated content

User-generated content tends to drive more views and comments than any kind of promotional video. People tend to trust this type of content more – they would rather listen to other customers talk about products or services than the company that sells them.

GoPro uses this tactic very effectively on its Facebook page where customers upload videos of them using a GoPro in all kinds of environments.

Video for different social media platforms

YouTube: YouTube is not only a video sharing site but the second, largest search engine in the world – that’s why it’s important for a marketing campaign to include YouTube videos. According to TechCrunch, people watch a billion hours of social video on YouTube a day.

YouTube is suitable for longer videos, such as video tutorials, DIY videos, behind-the-scenes videos, and testimonials. Longer videos have some advantages, such as being able to offer more in-depth explanations.

Facebook: Shorter videos of a minute are most suitable for Facebook, and you can use a clickable call-to-action to direct viewers to longer content on your website.

Most Facebook videos are watched without sound, so add captions to make sure viewers get your message. What’s great about Facebook is that you can target groups who will find your video most relevant. You can also set a featured video on your Facebook page.

Instagram: On Instagram, videos must be succinct and eye-catching. Many brands create a teaser trailer for Instagram and include a link to longer form content. This also works well when you have a series of videos on a linked page that viewers can browse through at their own pace.

Instagram Stories are 10-second video or picture clips at the top of an Instagram feed, and many brands are using these very successfully to create brand awareness.

Twitter: Snackable, short content on Twitter is great for attracting attention. Twitter feeds have the fastest scroll and so eye-catching content is important. Brands use Twitter to upload teasers, announcements, promotional and user-based content.

A short behind-the-scenes video may scratch that itch for more knowledge about a brand. A countdown to a launch helps to create a buzz about a new product.

LinkedIn: Videos on LinkedIn are directed at professionals. A video could be about an industry trend and how your product or service is designed in response to it. You can share a variety of content, including slideshows and videos.

Video ads can increase campaign performance

As per a recent survey, marketers and media buyers allocate 23% of the total video advertising budget especially for the social media video ads, and this is increasing further at a very high rate. The focus on social media video ads is more than ever.

You also need to think carefully about using video ads on social media as this can make your marketing campaign more effective. A powerful video ad can get through to a specific target audience where they already spend time online.

A series of ads can communicate your message and keep viewers engaged at all stages of the buyer’s journey.

A video ad needs to grab attention quickly. It should appeal to viewers’ emotions or offer them something valuable, or they won’t waste their time watching.

A key benefit of video ads is how carefully you can target content to state of mind and stage of the marketing funnel. Make clear what you want viewers to do after watching an ad and make it easy for them to do it. Take as long as you need to communicate a message and no longer. Shorter is better unless you have a very good reason.

YouTube: On YouTube, TrueView ads play before or during another video. Viewers see five seconds of your video before being given the option to skip it. If a viewer watches for 30 seconds or to the end of a video or takes some action, you are charged.

Bumper ads on YouTube are six-second, non-skippable ads that play before some else’s video. They can be used as an effective reminder of the message of your campaign.

Facebook: Video ads on Facebook have flexible formats that work on every device and connection speed. You can target your ad to users based on factors such as interests, connections, location, demographics, and connections.

A sponsored video post may show a targeted audience how to get the most out of your services or products. On Facebook, users have various ways to engage with your content, such as liking, sharing, commenting or clicking on your call-to-action.

It’s possible to run a Facebook ad on just about any budget and use the reporting tools to see how it has impacted your business. You are also able to select the time period during which you want your ads to appear.

Instagram: Video ads on Instagram appear in between organic feed and have a high view rate. A promoted video may show a targeted audience how to use a product creatively.

Twitter: With a promoted tweet, you pay Twitter to display your tweet to a targeted group of users. Promoted videos are cost-effective because, with the cost-per-view model, you don’t get charged unless the user plays the video. Twitter is often used by brands to display short clips with a call-to-action that leads viewers to a longer video on a landing page.

Snapchat: If you’re offering a product or service that appeals to millennials, advertising on Snapchat should be a serious consideration. Snapchat has features that tend to create engagement, such as filters and bitemojis.

Whatever social channels you choose to use, it’s important to use analytics to find out what’s working for you and to ditch what is not converting. For example, use A/B testing to see at what times of day viewers are watching your videos.

Try video retargeting

Use video advertising to target contacts that have previously watched a video or visited your website. For example, visitors who watched a high percentage of one of your videos have shown enough interest for you to follow up and show them an advert to dispel any doubts they may have about taking action.

If someone has taken an action on your website before but has not followed through, you may want to send them an ad with an invitation to subscribe to your newsletter or a testimonial video.

Use video effectively on campaign landing pages

Your landing pages are unlike other web pages in that they are specifically designed to convert leads. A study by eyeviewdigital.com states that videos on landing pages lead to 80% higher conversion rates.

Creating a video landing page that offers high conversion rates needs to accomplish three objectives.

  • Capture the attention of your audience.
  • Tell your audience what you offer and what you expect of them in a clear, concise way.
  • Reassure them that they can trust you.

Create high-quality video: Videos on landing pages should be high quality – shooting a blurry video with your smartphone will put viewers off rather than leading to more conversions. People tend to equate the quality of your video with the quality of your products or services. You may need to use a production company for videos on your landing page if this falls within your budget.

Test autoplay versus press play: Most people prefer press play to autoplay, but there are times when autoplay can increase conversions. You need to test this for yourself.

Choose the right thumbnail: Your thumbnail is the first step to engaging and converting your leads. It may consist of a static image from your video with a big play button overlaid.

Make your message clear and concise: A DollarShaveClub video has one purpose, and that’s to get people to sign up to the club. The words you see immediately are “Shave time. Save money”.

The video leads viewers towards a decision. Remember that most online users admit to relying on videos to help them make decisions. You need to make every second of a video count and let your viewers know exactly what you’re offering by the time they come to the end of the clip. This can then lead on to your next call-to-action.

Engage people’s emotions: Try to reach people’s emotions rather than bombard them with facts. Be a good storyteller and address people’s pain points. Emotions are a key factor in the decision-making process. If you know your target audience well, you understand what emotional cues to use to trigger a response.

Create trust: Online transactions, regardless of what you offer as a marketer, are based on trust. If customers feel uncomfortable, they simply won’t take action – it’s that simple. Since face-to-face interactions are clearly impossible, you have to find ways to establish credibility and gain the trust of your leads.

There are many ways to do this. One way is to use Trust Seals to establish reliability within a field. Another way to establish trust is to use customer testimonials and reviews.

The next CTA: Once your leads have watched the video on your landing pages, it’s important to get them to take the next step. Use a CTA to ask them to download an eBook or sign up to your newsletter, or to take them to more video content.

Directional cues: Direct visitors on your landing page to your conversion goal in some way, whether verbally or with an arrow. It doesn’t matter how you do it as long as they are very clear about what you want them to do.

Try out different lengths: Try out short or long video content to see what works best for your leads. In some cases, products may need a more detailed study.

Video in email marketing

As per eMarketer report, between 40 to 50% marketers have stated that using videos in emails increased their CTR, amount of time spent on reading email, and the overall shares and forwards of the email. Now, that’s phenomenal.

Prospects in the middle of the funnel have shown their interest and given you their contact information. At this stage, you can share videos with them via email. Sharing videos with them at this stage helps to cement your relationship. Some considerations when using video in email marketing are:

  • It helps to segment your email list and target each segment with relevant content. Email marketing software can help you to do this successfully. When you use a product like Drip, it segments your audience based on actions taken and sends them the appropriate content.
  • Put ‘video’ in your subject line. This has been shown to boost open rates.
  • Make sure your thumbnail is enticing and have a large clickable button. You must make it easy for people to click.
  • Promote your free online video course or replay of a webinar to your email list. Online education is very popular today.
  • Send personalized videos to make them feel you care.
  • Use a video hosting platform and integrate with your external email marketing platform to make the whole process easy for you.
  • Give viewers the option to play your video. Many viewers dislike autoplay.

Email gates: When people reach the consideration stage of the buyer’s journey, you can start introducing email gates. If you use an email gate too early, users do not have enough motivation to continue because they don’t know what you have to offer.

Some email gates allow users to see an introductory part of the video and they can only continue watching if they submit contact information in a pop-up form.

Study analytics to improve performance

It’s tempting to focus on the number of times your videos are shared, but there’s more to success than shares. It’s not always easy to measure the performance of video campaigns because they may span many channels and the use of many devices.

There are some metrics you need if you’re to understand more about your buyer’s journey. Without these metrics, you’re like a blind man, unable to tell where you’re going. You can’t tweak your strategies unless you know where you’re failing or succeeding.

Number of impressions: The number of times a video has been loaded in the viewer’s app or browser.

Total views: The number of times someone has clicked on a video.

Play rate: The number of views divided by the number of impressions.

View length: How long a viewer watches your video before bouncing. If you know exactly how long people are watching your video and when they drop off, you can make some adjustments.

Take some of the videos you’ve created and study where viewers drop off. This can give you an idea of what’s making you lose them. Are you being too salesy at that point? Are your videos just too long?

Engagement rate: The number of people still watching at a certain point divided by the number that started watching. If you want to go into greater detail, engagement rate can shine a light on what’s working and what’s not. If you detect problems, you could try running A/B tests using different versions of the same video.

Device type: What devise is the viewer using? If most viewers are using mobile devices, for example, you need to make sure your website is mobile-friendly. Device types matter because some actions are more difficult to take when you’re on a mobile device like an iPhone.

Viewer location: In which country or region is the viewer watching? If your audience is largely based in a specific location, you can use a targeted local campaign to reach them.

Referral source: Where did viewers come from? This can help you to find your best source of traffic and focus on them.

Conversions: The number of viewers who watched your CTA and took action. All of your marketing efforts are built around this goal. A conversion will mean different things depending on your CTA. Someone may sign up for your newsletter, download a guide or sign up for a free trial.

Using metrics helps to boost your conversions because you can measure performance and make adjustments. Using a hosting platform offers you all the analytics you need. For example, Cincopa uses heat maps that make it easy for you to see viewer behavior.

View competitors’ analytics

If you want to take a look at your competitors’ analytics, this is possible too now with a new feature on TubeBuddy (a YouTube management tool) called Videolytics. By clicking on the Videolytic’s arrow on the right-hand side of the video, you will see some statistics on a competitor’s video, such as average view duration.

Successful video marketing campaigns

One of the best ways to find out what will work for you is to take a look at successful campaigns, particularly by companies selling similar products or services to you. Here are some examples.

Knorr: Love at First Taste

This food brand is famous for its stock pots and sources. It created an ad campaign that revolved around a love of flavors. Many millennials regard themselves as “foodies,” and Knorr wanted to capitalize on this.

Millennials not only want to eat delicious food but many of them are dating. When Knorr’s global research indicated that people were likely to be attracted to those who enjoy similar flavors, it had the seed of a great idea.

The brand used videos to tap into the desire for food and romance. They had strangers meeting for the first time over a meal and feeding each other. The campaign ran ads on YouTube, Facebook, and other social networks.

They also teamed up with Tasty, a foodie community, to help share the videos. Viewers who watched the videos were directed to a mini-site where they were asked questions about their favorite foods to sort them into one of 12 different flavor profiles.

BuzzFeed for Purina: Puppyhood

BuzzFeed created a video telling the story about a man who adopts a puppy. All the cute, entertaining adventures of owner and puppy made the videos adorable but also gave a great example of subtle product placement in a video.

Children with Cancer: Keeping Families Together

To raise awareness and funding, U.K. based charity Children with Cancer launched a campaign focused on keeping families together.

Using the landing page for invaluable insights and a powerful YouTube video, this campaign was the start of a new chapter for the charity – it showed the enormous value of its efforts and tugged heartstrings.

Squarespace: Make Your Next Move

Squarespace is a company that makes great-looking websites and so their content works extremely well on Instagram. The brand has a series of videos about inspirational entrepreneurs. They use gorgeous visuals, a case-study and a snapshot of the back story.

This type of ad is targeted to those with some knowledge about Squarespace who are beyond the stage of awareness. With these videos, the brand builds social proof and stays in the minds of those who are already engaged in some way.

Blendtec: Will it blend?

The company’s “Will it Blend?” video series was a viral hit. It showed objects such as car keys, marbles and cell phones being thrown into the blenders to back up their tagline “The world’s most advanced blender.”

To Conclude

Video content is only going to gain more ground in the years that lie ahead. Cisco predicts that by the year 2020, video will make up over 82% of all consumer traffic. Video has the power to show and promote products and services in ways that text and photos can’t, making it crucial in marketing.

Using video successfully as part of a marketing campaign needs to be done strategically. Using the right tactics and understanding video analytics are keys to success, proving a clear return on investment by matching specific videos to specific goals and measuring results.

powerful

Marketing Tools

For videos that click.

Originally published on March 10th, 2019, updated on April 22nd, 2019
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The Marketer’s Guide To Boost Campaign Performance With Video

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