AgenteNews Insurance Producer's Online Resource
Video marketing can be a vital part of any multimedia marketing strategy. It can give your service or product a name and a face, while also giving your company a true personality using a medium that has become incredibly favored in the U.S.
In 2012, statistics from comScore, a company that measures digital information, showed that a whopping 37 billion videos were viewed online in the U.S. in the month of April alone! Video has a strong presence because for a specified period of time, people are entertained. Why has watching movies and television been, and continue to be, a favorite past-time of many? From black and white noirs to the drive-in (maybe not so much anymore, but lovely just the same) to 3-D motion pictures or our favorite TV shows, the moving image has continued to enthrall us all.
It’s hard to ignore that comScore also stated that the average U.S. viewer watched 21.8 hours of online video in the month of April. Pretty impressive. Interested in how to make a professional, informative video for your company? Here are five tips that can help enhance your next (or new) online video marketing campaign:
1. Keep it short and sweet.
Ideally, the viewer will watch all of your marketing video while also retaining the presented information. Write a topic sentence on a piece of paper that summarizes what your video will illustrate. Don’t stray from the topic. Stay on point by also writing key ideas that will support your topic sentence. This will help keep your minute-or-two long video short, sweet and memorable.
2. A video is visual.
It’s no conundrum that the origin of video marketing is television advertising. How many TV ads have you watched that are visually unappealing? There are some, but they are hard to remember . . . more than likely because during that particular commercial, you went to the kitchen to refill your popcorn bowl.
A video is more than just text on a computer screen; and content is created not only by what we want to say, but also by how our words are enhanced visually. Will your video have illustrations, text or a spokesperson? Will there be special-effects? What message do you want to convey to the viewers about your company, and how do all of these visual options play into that? For instance, if you’re an insurance agent appealing to consumers, would you want to present yourself as a business person in a suit or as someone in a casual outfit? This depends on your company culture, how you want to be perceived and the “topic sentence” of your video. All of the visuals in your marketing video have the potential to say something about you and/or your company.
3. Professionalism . . . rocks.
Professional equipment is key to making a visually appealing video. Proper lighting, a good camera, the right backdrop and correct editing software can all make or break your marketing video. If your company does not have access to this equipment or know how to strategically title and place your video content online, hire someone who does.
4. Tell viewers where to find you.
The main objective of a marketing video is to educate viewers about your company, product or service and then direct them on where to find you to make their purchase or learn more information. In the end, even if your video is strictly educational and not up-front selling, the goal is that the viewers will become consumers. At the end of your marketing video, direct viewers to your website. This would be a good time to utilize visual text in your video. Think about the size, color and font of the text, and also display your company logo.
5. Use sound to make your marketing video presentation better.
Scary movie-lovers know the power of sound—the creak of a floorboard, the scratch of a branch against the window, a telephone ring that pierces a dark hallway. These all enhance scary movies, but how does sound enhance your marketing video? The tone of voice of your spokesperson can have a calming effect on a viewer, or alternately have a take-action effect (imagine the way a drill sergeant might speak). Which tone do you want to convey? The power of sound, like background music or even a strategically-placed silence, could do wonders to enhance your marketing video.
Using these five tips, online video marketing could be an integral part of your next multimedia marketing campaign.
comScore. (May 18, 2012). comScore Releases April 2012 U.S. Online Video Rankings. http://bit.ly/RHOmsF
