Increased use of video marketing is one of 2019’s biggest digital marketing trends. According to Wyzowl, where both video and text are available on the same page, 72 percent of people would rather use video to learn about a product or service. Whatever stage of the marketing funnel you’re in, videos should be part of your strategy.
Because real-time social media monitoring helps increase brand credibility and awareness, it’s one of the most important aspects in brand reputation monitoring. This is where video marketing comes into play with boosting social media engagements. Videos reach a wide audience and communicate your brand’s story effectively through various social channels. We’ve outlined some tips, tricks and best practices to incorporate into your video marketing strategy to grow your social media engagement.
Create a video that starts a conversation.
A brand’s video that goes viral creates a lot of buzz. Recent brands that have achieved this level of success were Dos Equis, Dollar Shave Club and Old Spice. What made these videos so successful were they created conversations around the brand and kept engagement going by using social listening.
With video ads, we’ve seen plenty of high-profile, viral videos that fall on both sides of the sentiment spectrum, creating positive or negative reactions. Some say “all press is good press,” but you need to ensure whatever video you create, you keep your audience in mind, otherwise you risk putting your company’s credibility at risk.
Host a user-generated video contest.
A user-generated video contest is another great way to use video to create social media engagement. When you create your contest, remember to specify rules like the contestants tagging your organization’s handle and using the contest’s hashtag. This is especially effective because if you create a hashtag surrounding a contest, it becomes searchable on social media platforms.
Reach out to 3rd-party publications.
Publications are always looking for content. Offering your video as a source not only provides journalists content, but it also increases your chance of being featured on their publication’s social media channels. When you create your video, you should focus on an educational topic that will resonate with the most amount of publications in your industry. Finding out what topics they write about will help you better pitch to editorial departments and propel your company to become a valuable resource as a subject matter expert.
Create a how-to video on a popular topic.
Creating a how-to video on a DIY subject featuring your product or service is another fantastic way to get your brand’s name in front of new viewers. Since more people search YouTube for how-to help than ever before, this is great for SEO, as well as social media engagement. If you create something that features your product but isn’t a hard sell, outlets and other businesses will be more incentivized to share your video with their followers.
How-to videos also give you a wonderful opportunity to create a FAQ video. Creating how-to videos about your product shows you anticipate your customer’s needs by answering their questions before they call in and also attracts new prospects.
Until next time!
Critical Mention
Hope Horner is a three-time entrepreneur that has been featured in Inc.’s Top 25 Entrepreneurs to Watch in 2017, Entrepreneur’s 11 Marketing Experts that Could Change Your Business, and Pepperdine’s 40 Under 40. Horner is a regular contributor at Entrepreneur, Forbes, Inc., and multiple other publications where she shares startup insights and scalable solutions. She is currently working on her third startup, Lemonlight, an LA-based business that produces and distributes branded video content at scale.
