What do people want? To connect.
Marketers know that emotion plays a massive role in getting a message across. Consumers choose and stay loyal to certain products and brands because of how they make them feel – and what they broadcast about themselves.
It’s no surprise that re-purposing TV commercials online is not nearly as effective as creating Web video content specifically for an Internet audience. With high-quality video more affordable and more accessible than ever before, you’d be hard-pressed to find a better way to connect with potential customers.
A few of video’s main benefits include:
Video makes your website and e-mails ‘sticky’
The longer that someone spends time learning about your product or service, the more likely he or she is to become a customer. Video also works great when it’s delivered by e-mail too, even if it is just a click-through link. See:, for instance, Embedded video lifts conversion rate 50 per cent . More video equals more sales.
Let video fast-forward your way to success. According to MarketingSherpa : “Putting video on websites has been a huge success. Marketers gave us hundreds of great examples touching on dozens of ways in which adding video to their site has had a positive impact on sales, lead-generation, use of the site, and improved customer relations”.
Whatever can be said through text can be better expressed through video. If a photo is worth a thousand words, video is worth many, many more.
Video is awesome for SEO
Studies have shown that videos are 50 times more likely to appear on the first page of search results. “Not only are video results increasingly common in Google’s search results, but your videos stand a much better chance than your text pages of being shown on the first results page,” says Nate Elliott at Forrester, a global research and advisory firm.
Search engines offering video as part of integrated search results lend themselves to obvious benefits. With YouTube being the second-argest search engine, it just makes sense to have a presence there.
They key is to make sure your uploaded videos are listed using the correct words you want your business to be found by.
Video is delivered ‘on demand’
No matter what use you find for video, it is easily experienced on demand. It’s like being able to deliver your best sales pitch 24/7, and to a worldwide audience, at that.
Companies are using video to their advantage in so many ways:
- Corporate profiles
- Client testimonials
- Sales presentations
- Product introductions and demonstrations
- Website FAQ’s
- Team bios and profiles
- Q & A expert series
- Original Web TV content
- Video blogs
- Event promotion and coverage
- On-location events and tradeshows
- Recruitment and training
- Executive and staff presentations
- In-store
- Video press releases
As well, video is the No. 1 way to connect with people via social media, with video links being shared more often than any other types of content, such as articles or photos.
If you’re tweeting or on Facebook, you should definitely consider rolling video into the mix of your engagement strategy.
If you’re a camera-shy business owner, you may have to work to get over it. With much of business being about trust, it’s no wonder why videos featuring CEOs outperform those that do not feature them.
It’s time to put your best face and your brand’s best message forward via video, and start to reap the benefits.
Lisa Ostrikoff: Special to The Globe and Mail
First Published Thursday, Aug. 30 2012