Why video marketing is so important (and how to make watchable videos)

Have you embraced video marketing yet? Find out why you need to start making videos now, and how to make them watchable.

Over the years, Hax from Hax Media has seen video become an every-more essential marketing tool for small businesses. Now he explains why you can no longer afford to ignore video marketing – and the secret ingredients you need to make yours watchable.

Is video part of your marketing plan?

When you’re preparing a marketing plan today, it’s a safe bet to assume that a website SEO, email marketing and social media will feature in it. But what about video?

Too many small businesses still shy away from the idea of creating video content. But this is becoming an ever-more expensive mistake. Over the last few years, video has become an increasingly popular and powerful marketing tool. Every day, 8 billion videos are watched on Facebook alone, and over 300 hours of video being uploaded to YouTube EVERY minute of the day.

Mobile use is driving video views up

This trend is being driven by an increased reliance on mobile devices. And it’s not just cute videos of cats or inadvisable dares that we’re consuming so avidly. We also rely on videos to learn valuable information about business products and services.

And if you were still in any doubt about the importance of embracing video NOW, just read this quote from Forbes:

“By 2019, it has been predicted that 80 percent of all Internet traffic will be to videos. That figure would be 64 percent higher than 2014 … and a significant portion of the growth will probably occur in 2016.”

Three important ingredients of video (and one secret sauce)

So, you’ve decided that you need to make video content for your business. Where do  you start? Watchable videos have three important ingredients:

  1. Production value – producing video has never been easier or cheaper but production value must be high, especially when it comes to sound, image framing and editing.
  2. Engagement – engagement is your video’s ability to attract viewers and keep them. It combats boredom by keeping to the points and delivering them simply and succinctly.
  3. Relevance – relevance is such a vital ingredient and yet is often overlooked in a bid to be either creative or include too much. The subject of the narrative needs to be specific and well presented.

But what binds these three ingredients together and creates the ‘secret sauce’ of a very watchable film is one tiny thing: know your audience.

You need to understand who are the intended viewers of your video, and what is the question that they would typically be searching for. And just as importantly, how the narrative script of your video can deliver that.

If your audience is unclear or you distribute your video in the wrong place, it won’t be viewed entirely and will be totally ineffective on your campaign.

Questions to ask before creating video content

With this in mind, here are some questions you need to ask yourself before creating video marketing content:

  • Who is this video for?
  • What do I want them to know or learn?
  • What do I want them to feel?
  • What do I want them to do?
  • What can I say or show that will achieve this?

Try to make each video single-minded. If you try and cram too many messages into one video, you’ll just confuse people and risk them clicking off without absorbing any of them.

You also need to be clear about what success looks like, and how you’ll measure it. For example, is your aim to get your video shared? Or to gain clicks to a sales page? This insight will ensure not only that you create video content that achieves this, but you can measure and test your videos so that, over time, they get better with high conversions.

Are you ready to embrace video marketing?

Making video content may seem a scary prospect if you haven’t tried it before, but you don’t need to start out with Spielberg-esque productions.

You don’t need a he budget to get going. As long as you start with the right approach (as outlined in this article) you can start making modest videos yourself and uploading them. Over time you’ll find out what works and what doesn’t – and gain more confidence and experience.

Or you can bite the bullet and hire a video content expert to help put together some videos for you. Which, given the growing importance of video marketing could be a wise investment.

To find out how Hax Media can help you create great video content and get it in front of the right audience with a cost-effective campaign, visit their website