A few years ago, businesses used newspapers, radio, television, and magazines to market their products and services. Today, building brand awareness and reaching the target market has become modern and state-of-the-art in the form of video content. More than 85% of small, medium-sized, and large businesses use video as part of their marketing strategies. The number is projected to double this 2020 and beyond.

Why do companies use video content marketing? What are the best video content marketing practices to follow for beginners and experienced businesses? This guide got you covered! Enjoy!

Video Content Marketing – What is it?

As the name indicates, this type of marketing presents content in video formats, including vlogs, webinars, animated GIFs, recorded presentations, live videos, and customer testimonials. That’s why businesses have a lot of options to expand their reach, increase the pool of customers, and double their sales.

Why Should You Invest in Video Content Marketing? 

Video content marketing has taken the world by storm. Reports conducted by Google indicated that more than 60% of consumers prefer to watch videos over live television in the US. It also showed that consumers aged between 18 and 49 are spending 74% of their time on YouTube since 2015. No wonder why many digital marketers are taking advantage of this trend. Many brands would double their investment in video content marketing in the future, according to Vidyard.

Best Video Content Marketing Practices 

Many businesses have tried video content marketing. But only a few succeeded. You’re probably wondering what’s wrong. In most cases, this is due to the non-realistic projection of their business goals. The hard part is not recording and editing a video but addressing your customers’ needs and developing content purposefully. That being said, your first step to success is to find a reliable video production company to work with. They will offer tons of experience and valuable insights to manage your production and marketing strategies.

Here are the best practices you should follow as a digital marketer:

Choose Your Platform 

Maybe, you’re quite confused about where to start with video content marketing. Decide on the platform where you want to publish your advertising content.

Popular and effective choices include YouTube, Snapchat, Vimeo, TikTok, Twitter, Twitch, Facebook, Instagram Stories, and IGTV.

As the second biggest search engine across the globe, YouTube is an obvious and popular choice for businesses. With more than 1 billion registered subscribers, YouTube is the best platform for your digital marketing. It reaches more people aged from 18 to 49 compared to a cable TV network or TV channel.

Recognized as the number one social media platform used by companies, Facebook has more than 2.01 billion active users every month. It is no surprise that businesses used Facebook as a powerful tool to interact and engage with possible customers.

Exert Effort on Pre-Production

You’ve finally picked the platforms you like to use. Video production is next.

Whether you want to create videos for LinkedIn, YouTube, or Facebook, thorough planning is critical.

Who wants to shoot in front of the camera without anything to say? No business owners like that.

During the planning stage, make sure to think of topics you want to cover, write a script, transitions, graphics, b-rolls, and other important aspects. It is also important to be natural and spontaneous, which your target audience would love. Your friends, shares, and likes on Facebook would start to increase. Your subscribers and views on YouTube would also double.

Prep your Studio 

Shooting and editing do not need to be a disaster, which is a common problem to new and even seasoned digital marketers.

Prepping your studio can be a lifesaver. What’s an ideal and perfect studio? Many factors are considered, including noise, lighting, and reverb.

While the clarity of videos is important, its audio should not be ignored. Have you ever experienced watching content on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and Twitter? You probably do. Perhaps, you skip videos with poor quality audio right away.

That means you could lose several potential customers as a business owner. Although editing audio is possible, it could be time-consuming and could cause you more resources in the long run.

Whenever you’re planning to shoot your first video content marketing, make sure there’s not much traffic noise.

Apart from audio, proper and enough lighting is another factor to consider. Yes, natural light looks great on your DSLR. Sometimes, it is unreliable. The secret is to have some lights on hand you can use all year long. What type of equipment to invest in? When shooting indoors, consider a ring light, tabletop studio lights, a lantern setup, and two simple lamps.

The echo is another huge pain to remove from audio. If you’re recording somewhere with echoes, using throw rugs and other pieces of furniture might help. If nothing works, a professional soundproofing material is better than ever.

Edit for User Engagement

Let’s say you’re done filming and shooting. What’s next? Well, your job does not stop there. It’s time to edit your videos.

What’s your purpose in editing videos? Of course, you want to maximize engagement.

For an IGTV video, you want views and comments. For a landing page or customer testimonial, you expect new subscribers and sales.

Filming is difficult. Editing is more daunting than ever. If you are a first-time digital marketer, use the right graphics, transitions, and animations as these elements can make your content interesting. Don’t forget Call to Action (CTA). Instead of hard-selling, provide value. Your audience would love something that resonates with their pain points, needs, and expectations.

Optimize Your Content 

You’re losing lots of customers if they don’t find you on top of their searches on YouTube, Facebook, and other platforms online.

Publishing HD videos is simply not enough. A combination of well-optimized and clear content is always the best.

Now, how to be on top of search results? Simply find popular keywords and use them in your titles. Also, keep both of your descriptions and tags keyword-rich. But avoid stuff keywords. Quality content always matters. Make sure to have your posts leave everywhere- social, Youtube and even embed your videos on your wordpress site.

Don’t Just Stick on a Single Platform 

Digital marketers stick to a single video platform. Don’t do the same thing. Experts recommend businesses to repost video marketing campaigns on YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Vimeo, Snapchat, LinkedIn, Dailymotion, and other platforms.

Yes, reposting your content can be a headache. But all of your efforts will pay off at the end of the day.

Are you still searching for effective marketing strategies? Don’t look further than video content marketing today!