5 Reasons you need video marketing to win
Would you like your business to be more successful? There are 5 reasons you need video marketing. The fact is, you can achieve most of your business goals through video marketing. Don’t believe me? Although the business landscape has changed dramatically over the past couple of years due to the coronavirus pandemic and consequent periods of lockdown, one thing has remained constant: video is the most effective marketing tool you could be using right now!
In fact, whether your business is a large conglomerate or a one-person show, the key to marketing success is the same: video marketing. You may well feel doubtful. After all, social media videos are a relatively new idea. However, video marketing is not just a good idea anymore. It’s the only way forward.
The statistics speak for video marketing
Your competition is probably already using video to promote their products and services. Did you know? Since 2020, at least 86% of brands have been using video marketing in their campaigns, compared to just 41% in 2016.
There is little doubt that video is imperative for growth. But why? Keep reading for my top 5 reasons why you need video marketing, now more than ever!
- 72% of customers prefer learning about a product or service through video rather than the written word
- 78% of internet users watch online videos weekly
- 55% of people view videos every day
- 6 out of 10 people would rather watch online videos than television
- 92% of users will share a video with others after watching it on their mobile phones.
- YouTube is the second largest search engine on the internet, after Google
- 59% of executives prefer watching a video over reading text
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Reason #1: video is the most engaging type of content
Of all 5 reasons why video marketing is important, this is probably the most significant: engagement! Most businesses have to fight for consumer attention in markets that are completely saturated. This is not easy and it comes at a price. But, even if you are one of the lucky few whose marketing budget still allows them to keep throwing money at this challenge, nowadays this is no guarantee for success.
Why not? Well, even if you run paid ads across all major social media platforms, your business may still struggle to stand out in the crowd. You see, it’s not the 1950s anymore. In fact, consumers are rather resistant to advertising. What this means for your business is simply this: paying the platforms can guarantee that your ads will appear on the news feeds of your target consumers. However, nobody can guarantee that these prospects will pay any attention to your ads.
In fact, we have all been so over-exposed to advertising, we barely glance at static images. In other words, your ad might appear in the feed of your target consumers, but nobody can stop these prospects from skipping your ad and scrolling onto the next thing.
If only they would stop and listen, you say! If only they would stop scrolling? Well, the highly engaging nature of videos can indeed make them stop and pay attention. Videos are fun, attention-grabbing and fast-moving. They come with bold, easy-to-read captions and sticky music. Videos are impossible to ignore. In fact, your prospects will most likely keep watching till the end.
Look at this example of a fun, fast-moving video.
How many seconds of it did you watch? Even if you didn’t watch all the way through, you engaged with it longer than you would have, had it been a still image.
REASON #2: Video reduces ad expenditure whilst amplifying ad impact
There is little doubt that video marketing can help you reduce your overall advertising expenditure. It is – by a long way – the most cost-effective way to promote your brand. The possibilities are seemingly endless.
Take Facebook, for example. It is the most popular social media platform in the world, with at least 2.8 billion active users at the time of writing this. That’s almost a third of the world population! You should be able to find some people who need your products and services on this platform, right?
Right! But consider the following. A static post can hold the average Facebook user’s attention for just over a second. But, a video holds the same user’s attention for at least five times longer. Given that Facebook allows you to highly target the viewership of your videos for just a few pennies (or cents!) per viewer, it has never been cheaper to reach new prospects. As long as you use video to grab their attention.
YouTube is another platform that offers advertising opportunities that are worth looking into, In fact, it remains the ultimate platform of choice for video marketers. YouTube enables advertisers to run interactive ads. Under a video ad, consumers can see a list of products and their respective prices. They can scroll through the list and, in a few clicks, purchase the items they want.
Another type of video ad that you can use is the lead form ad. This type of video is engaging and persuasive. It grabs your prospects’ attention right from the start. It also prompts your prospects to take action, making it easier for them to sign up for a service or an event.
In other words, video marketing is a high impact and cost effective way to set up sales funnels for your business.
REASON #3: Video builds customer trust and loyalty
In an ever-changing business landscape, trust is one of the most important assets for your brand. You can use video to build a trusting relationship between you and your audience. How? There are many possibilities.
First of all, you can create Question and Answer (Q&A) videos. This provides your audience with the opportunity to ask questions and share any concerns directly with you. In doing so, you will be able to nurture a strong and trusting relationship with your customer base.
Using video marketing, you can also show the people behind the brand. A brand with a human face is perceived as more trustworthy and more relatable by the average consumer.
Put simply, your customers will feel a deeper connection with your brand if they see it as a collection of people trying to help them, than if it comes across as a faceless corporation. This heightened sense of loyalty means they will be more likely to recommend your business to others.
REASON #4: Video drives engagement on social media
Due to the global health crisis, brands can’t interact with consumers face-to-face. Everyone is missing this rich interaction and craving a substitute that can deliver similar levels of connection.
According to a study by Wyzowl, 91% of marketers consider video content to be even more important now, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This is in agreement with observed consumer habits which suggest that 96% of consumers have significantly increased the times spent watching videos during the pandemic.
There is a lot of evidence that video drives greater engagement. On Instagram, video ads receive three times more engagement than sponsored photos. In fact, even organic video posts perform better than still images – in the order of 38% more engagement!
This holds true on Facebook too. Video ads have 20-30% higher conversion rates than images. Likewise, their click-through rate is two to three times higher too.
Pinterest is another important platform that used to be dominated by static content, until recently. Since allowing short videos, however, Pinterest has seen a 240% increase in video pins. If you are using Pinterest, it is clear that the best way to draw attention to your brand and prompt prospects to take action is by posting videos.
Ideally, a professional social media video creator will also help you optimise your video content to fit the format required for each platform but also the preferences of each platform’s users. For example, the ideal video length on Facebook is 2 to 5 minutes. For YouTube it can be up to 10 minutes. However, Twitter and Instagram prefer much shorter videos, which are no more than 30 seconds
One thing is certain: a correctly optimised video marketing strategy will drive your brand’s engagement, click-through rate and visibility on all platforms.
Reason #5 Video boost your website's search engine ranking
Aside from social media video, you can leverage video to rank higher on search engines, such as Google. In other words, if your video content performs well, it will show up on search results. More specifically, the performance of your video, that is the view count, comments and other forms of engagement, can help your brand gain more visibility online.In fact, your website is 53 times more likely to show up as one of the the top results of a Google search, if it contains videos.
There are many good reasons for this. Search engines such as Google use various ranking factors to determine the visibility of a web page. However, most experts agree that one of the most important ranking signals for Google is “dwell time”.
Dwell time refers to the amount of time a person spends on a web page before clicking back out to return to the search results page. In other words, dwell time is the metric that tells search engines whether your content is useful, captivating or entertaining to your website visitors.
Adding videos to your website, whether on your homepage or on your blog, will encourage your visitors to stay on the page longer, because consuming even a short video takes more time than a static picture.
If visitors spend a long time on your website, this indicates that they consumed your content. It means that they found something worth their time. Therefore, improving dwell time can help you boost your search engine ranking.
What’s more, adding videos to accompany written content can also make your web pages more shareable. This will help you earn high-quality backlinks, which can also improve your ranking on search engines.
conclusion: there are at least 5 reasons you need video marketing now
To sum up, if you are thinking of leveraging video marketing, you should know that there is no better marketing tool out there right now. Video will grab your prospects’ attention, reduce your marketing costs, help build trust between you and your customer, drive active engagement between your prospects and your brand and help you rank higher on search engines. And due to the uncertainty of the ongoing pandemic, there’s never been a better time to get those cameras rolling.
So, what do you think? Are you planning to create a winning video marketing strategy for your business this year? Are you ready for success beyond your wildest dreams?
If the answer is yes and YES, but you are not quite sure where to begin, we would love to help. Let’s talk. And let’s make it happen.