It’s no secret that video is an increasingly critical part of any marketing strategy.
As online video content has expanded to reach more than 93% of internet users in early 2021, businesses are finding new ways to connect with their audiences through this medium.
Because of this, 41% more businesses use video marketing now than they did in 2016.
If you’re not sure how to incorporate video into your marketing strategy, though, you’re not alone. Video marketing can be an intimidating strategy to pursue if you’re not familiar with it.
This article will take you through video marketing basics to give you some ideas on how video can work for your marketing strategy. We’ll look at how video benefits your business, some top video marketing ideas, and tips for producing excellent marketing videos.
How Video Helps Your Marketing Strategy
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The main benefit of video marketing is clear: you’ll reach a huge portion of the internet users that make up your target audience.
But how exactly do marketing videos impact your bottom line? Video production can be a significant investment of time and resources, so you want the ROI of your video marketing to be worth the effort.
Turns out, 87% of businesses that use video marketing say they generally get a good return on their investment. How exactly? Here are a few ways, according to Wyzowl’s 2021 State of Video Marketing Report:
- You’ll get more website visitors who spend more time on your site
- You’ll get more leads and sales — 84% of people say they’ve bought a product based on a brand video
- You’ll get fewer support calls since your users can develop a better understanding of your product through video
It’s understandable to be hesitant about diving into the world of video marketing, even with all the potential benefits waiting for you. But consider that 51% of marketers say video is becoming easier than ever to create.
In the next section, we’ll give you a few ideas for videos that might work well for your business and marketing strategy in the next section.
19 Video Marketing Ideas for Your Business
Your online customers and video watchers aren’t expecting you to produce the next Game of Thrones. They just want clear, good-quality videos that provide valuable information in an easy-to-digest format.
With that in mind, let’s take a look at five video marketing ideas and how they can play a role in your overall marketing strategy.
Product demo
One of the most powerful uses of video in marketing is showing customers how your product actually works.
No matter whether you’re selling a high-tech new gadget or the latest SaaS business software, a product demo video gives your customers a real-time peek into what product experience might be like.
Here are a few ways you can approach a product demo, depending on your video marketing goals:
- Announce and demo a brand-new product or feature, as Apple or Tesla have done
- Explain how to use a certain feature in clear, step-by-step terms to aid in troubleshooting
- Show how your product helps solve problems for different types of customers or situations
Take a look at some of the product demo video topics on Zoom’s YouTube channel:
As you can see, Zoom mixes product announcements with general and feature-specific videos about how its customer base can benefit from the product.
Testimonial
Consumers love to hear about other consumers’ experiences with different brands or products. Combining this valuable type of content with an impactful video format creates a powerful marketing tool for your business.
For instance, let’s say you offer website migration services. Website migration is a complex and risky process, so prospective customers will want assurance that you provide a good experience.
With a customer testimonial video, you can feature a real customer who speaks to their genuine experience with your business. You’ll be able to include more details and portray more emotion than you would with written reviews.
Behind-the-scenes
Sometimes, a simple behind-the-scenes video of your company can go a long way to connecting with your audience.
Behind-the-scenes videos help put a real personality to the perception of your brand. You can feature anyone from customer-facing workers to your product development team or C-level executives.
This kind of video can help improve customer loyalty too. When you pull back the curtain on your company’s operations, you’re showing your customer base how you actually live out your brand values.
And increasingly, customers want to buy from companies that reflect their values. 84.3% of consumers said they’re more likely to stay loyal to a brand with similar values.
Break down a complex topic
You might have the best blog content strategy on the internet, but if you often write about complex topics, a video might prove to be a more approachable medium for customers.
With an editorial or informational video, you can use visual aids and subject matter experts to lay out a complex topic’s nuances.
Take Moz’s popular Whiteboard Friday videos, for example.
These videos explain complex SEO and marketing concepts as the expert writes notes, diagrams, and other visuals on a whiteboard behind them. Moz then uses the whiteboard images throughout the accompanying video transcript.
Moz continues to produce these videos each week — a testament to their positive impact on Moz’s marketing strategy.
How-to or tutorial
How-to and tutorial videos can work as both editorial content and help content for your support team. For example, you can attract new potential customers by developing videos on common processes in your industry.
You can also support existing customers with detailed videos outlining how to navigate your product. This data center monitoring software, for instance, might create tutorial videos setting up each feature listed on its website:
By showing visitors exactly how to complete a certain task using your product, you can address concerns and solve problems for future and current customers alike.
More video marketing ideas
There are infinite ideas for making marketing videos that work for your business. Here are plenty of other ideas to jumpstart your video creation:
- Announce a product launch or business expansion
- Answer customer questions
- Feature an influencer using your product
- Show how your product is made
- Play off a viral meme or trend
- Offer quick tips and tricks on a hot topic
- Introduce your team
- Go live from an event
- Highlight your top products, influencers, or content from the past month
- Explain your latest offer or deal
- Reveal how your product can transform something
- Share your company successes
- Tour your office
- Unbox your latest product
Use these ideas to get the creative juices flowing. Adapt any of them to fit your brand, product, and marketing goals.
3 Tips for Using Videos in Marketing
Still not sure how to jump into creating videos for your marketing strategy? Check out these three tips to help you out.
Use a video production agency
If your marketing team hasn’t fully developed their in-house video production abilities yet, don’t be afraid to hire a video production agency.
These teams work together to develop your video from concept to release. They’ll help develop storyboards, write a script, and film and edit the project. Simple videos like project demos or whiteboard videos can be relatively affordable to produce.
Pick the right distribution platforms
To use video marketing effectively, you need to publish your videos on the right platforms.
That means you’ll need to know what channels and platforms your audience spends the most time on. Should you stick to Instagram reels, or will your audience follow you on TikTok? For others, YouTube or Vimeo channels may make more sense.
Of course, you can also publish videos directly on your own website too. Just make sure you have the technical capabilities to handle a high volume of video and an increased flow of traffic to your website.
Create a video production workflow
As you create more videos for your marketing strategy, you’ll want to develop a streamlined process to make sure every video is well-optimized for its campaign.
One great way to get a handle on this is to create a workflow diagram. This handy tool helps you visualize each task in the process of producing a video and create a consistent list of tasks to complete each time.
With a well-defined workflow, you’ll be able to create effective marketing videos no matter which employee is at the helm for your latest campaign.
Brainstorm a Video Marketing Strategy Today
Video marketing is becoming more and more accessible to businesses of any size. That means all businesses — including yours — can reap the benefits of incorporating videos into your marketing strategy.
Use these video marketing ideas and tips to inspire your next Instagram reel or YouTube ad. Pay attention to what your audience wants and create videos that excite them. You’ll see a return on your investment more quickly than you might expect.
