If you watch videos online, you probably know how video marketing is now scaling up faster than ever. Modern brands can no longer rely on written content and images alone, as that’s not interesting enough and quite unengaging for most consumers. Audiences nowadays are primarily intrigued by entertaining video campaigns, live streaming, interactive 360 videos, augmented reality, and more.

If you haven’t started video marketing for your business yet, the best time is now. With the performance of traditional marketing diminishing and the traction of video skyrocketing, video marketing has now become vital for every business.

In this comprehensive guide, we’ll discuss most of the key concepts you need to know about video marketing. 

A Short History of Video Marketing

Video marketing was identified as a mainstream marketing strategy around 2010, and it wasn’t until almost four years later that marketers on smaller budgets could have access to it. However, video marketing is now accessible to all businesses, all thanks to the technological innovations in cost-effective online tools and the evolution of social media.

1. 1. • Earlier, the cost was one of the major aspects that stopped brands from leveraging video marketing. 
      • In 2021, it’s possible to create a studio-quality video online in under 15 minutes without much creative skills or a huge budget.
      • Another significant parameter that has fueled the rise of video marketing is the exceptional traction of video on social media. 
      • Social media platforms have made us realize that video content drives far more engagement than text and image-based posts.

How Video Marketing Works?

Video marketing has undoubtedly come up in a big way, but still, it’s important to utilise it optimally. To be safe, you need to know what are the latest trends around video marketing. Not only will this facilitate you in targeting the ideal audience, but it will also help in getting the most out of your marketing campaigns. Here are some practical strategies that you should acquire to optimise your video marketing campaigns:

1.Know Your Audience

An efficient marketing strategy is to know your audience so that you can present your products and services effectively. This raises the opportunity to target the ideal audience having the potential to buy your product.

More importantly, this way, you will have a high conversion rate when it comes to turning leads into sales.

2. Make Sure To Brand Your Videos

Video branding is a vital aspect of marketing, and it just can’t be ignored. Branding gives your business the required visibility and attracts more people.

Some simple examples of branding could be – logo at the corner of a video, a character wearing a shirt with the company’s logo, etc., they can provide visibility.

3. Clarity In the Subject of Videos

Youtube probably already has a ton of videos on the topic that you might post, so there’s a dire need to be a bit different. Being creative and relevant at the same time will help you to utilise Youtube marketing optimally.

4. Optimal Social Media Usage

We all know the incredible power and reach of social media, and it is rapidly increasing day by day. A massive social media audience presence can act as your prospective customers if and only if tapped exceptionally.

You need to turn to analytics to leverage social media effectively for your video marketing campaigns. Analyzing data will immensely help you in targeting the right audience for your business. 

Why Does Your Business Need Video Marketing?

Video Marketing is worth everything when executed the right way. We are not saying this because everyone’s doing it, but clearly, video is one of the most versatile and profitable digital marketing tools out there. Here are the top six reasons why you should use video marketing right now.

1. Video Builds Trust

We all know trust is the basis of conversions and sales. So building trust should be a primary goal for all businesses. In fact, the entire concept of content marketing revolves around trust and forming long-term relationships.

2. Boosts Conversions and Sales

We know you have your priorities sorted, and we know sales top that list. Well, you’ll be delighted to know that videos can help you make some serious money. Adding a product video to your landing page can substantially increase your conversions. 

3. Enhanced ROI

To get you even more excited, 83% of businesses agree with videos having a good return on investment. Video production is never easy or economical, but it pays off big time.

4. Search Engines love Videos

Videos push users to spend more time on your website. Hence, the prolonged exposure builds strong trust and hints to search engines that your site has valuable content.

5. Appealing to Mobile Users

YouTube reports mobile video consumption doubles every year. Clearly, people prefer watching videos on the go against consuming other types of content. Even smartphone users are rising, so your video audience is constantly getting bigger!

6. Video Marketing Can Explain Everything

If you are launching a new product or service, you should create a video showing how it works. Animation can bring ideas to life that no other form of content can. Moreover, just the monotonous talking heads are not enough anymore to help you spread your brand’s message. Animated videos present an ideal combination of entertainment, excitement, and nostalgia. And more importantly, they work. To enhance the visual appeal and storytelling of your content, consider utilizing innovative animated video makers which will help you create compelling videos

Challenges of Video Marketing

1. Lack of Proper Strategy

Improper video strategy (or no strategy at all) is the most prominent factor holding businesses back from executing video marketing successfully. If you don’t have the right approach in place, you won’t know whether your idea is working or not. That’s more like shooting in the dark, and none of us would ideally want to do that.

The first step to overcome this roadblock is to identify the aim of your video marketing campaign. What is it that you want to achieve through your efforts? Prior to moving forward, outline the following:

1. 1. • The goal of your video campaign
      • Who is it for?

2. Inadequate budget

The next roadblock marketing teams face is the lack of an adequate budget. For obvious reasons, effective video marketing usually requires a certain amount of resources. To achieve what you want, you will need to invest as per the expected value of video marketing.

3. Lack of good content

Another major mistake marketers make is not creating compelling content. With stiff competition all around, it is harder for individual brands to break through the noise. The only solution to overcome this challenge is to make better video content.

4. Lack of metrics

Analysing which metrics to use is a critical part of video marketing. Similar to the lack of strategy, not finalising metrics will give you no performance indication, so you won’t know whether your ideas are working.

Best Practices for Video Marketing

When implemented strategically and creatively, a video marketing campaign has the potential to engage millions of minds in a short time, regardless of producing it in-house or using an outside agency.

Here’s how you can maximise the impact of your brand with the following best practices in your videos:

1. Know Your Goal

Every video you create or produce should have an objective. How will you measure a video’s performance if you don’t have a fixed goal that you’re trying to achieve? Before you even press the record button, decide on what you’re going to do and how it will serve your business.

2. Tell Your Audience a Story

Storytelling is one of the best ways to communicate a message with your audience. Leverage your videos for the same purpose. Release a message through a story. It should consist of an arc—a beginning, middle, and an end. Focus on hitting your viewers’ emotions.

Make Sure Your Videos Work Without Sound

If you want to share your videos on social media channels, it is vital that your videos still convey your message when muted.

1. Analyse Your Metrics

View count is the first and usually the only metric that your audience notices when you post a video, but you should understand it’s far from the most important. Instead, you should focus on the back-end metrics that are often ignored, like your conversion rate and engagement levels.

2. Incorporate Video Everywhere

Marketers need to understand that video isn’t a standalone form of marketing; practically, it is best when paired with other valuable forms of content. When you integrate video into your content marketing strategy, you’ll discover the real power of utilizing video as part of your marketing campaigns. Additionally, you should try complementary video content that goes well with other types of content, say emails and articles.

The growth of video marketing presents a unique opportunity for brands like yours. As modern consumers continue to prefer video over other types of content, they now expect brands of different sizes and various industries to connect with them through video.

Social platforms are also increasingly prioritizing video content. That directly implies business owners have to take complete advantage of video marketing strategy to be competitive. So what are you waiting for? Start your video campaigns and keep learning from your mistakes; it’s fun!