How to add Video to your Digital Marketing Strategy

Digital marketing without video has become unthinkable. Now more than ever, marketers are using video to get their message across.

Read to learn how to implement video on your next digital marketing strategy.

Why Video?

Video is a very versatile and engaging content format.

It has the opportunity to gives us a real-life picture of what is going on. Deployable on multiple platforms, consumers love video because it’s easy to digest, entertaining and engaging. For marketers, it’s appealing because it gives a great return on investment through many different channels.

Search engines love video because they view it as high-quality content. The use of video on a web page can give your SEO an enormous boost, as long as the video is optimized correctly. It is therefore very important to include the right keywords, a clear meta description, and a strong title.

Here’s the facts:

·       97% of marketers claim that videos help customers better understand their products.

·       81% of businesses are now using video as a part of their digital marketing strategy.

·       By 2022, online video content is predicted to command more than 82% of all web traffic (15 times higher than it was in 2017).

·       90% of consumers claim a video will help them when making a purchasing decision.

Different Types of Video?

Video is a great way to humanize your brand by showcasing real employees, customers, or partners. It also allows you to build credibility by publishing informational content that helps your target buyer.

There are a lot of video types to choose from. Here are some examples:

• Explainer videos are perfect to educate people about your product or service by explaining the process step-by-step. This can be done with animation or live-action video.
• Interviews/testimonials can start a dialogue between sides. You can invite a special guest, a client, or even an influencer. If you are creating videos featuring guest experts, for instance, you can always re-use the audio and market it as a podcast.
• Product reviews and demos help your audience understand, and maybe convince them to buy, your product or service. A product review feels more “real” to the audience than an advertisement.
• Live video is the best chance to get up close and personal with your audience, and it works well on social channels in particular. Real-time content is great for:
  (1) Offering a feel of face-to-face interaction
  (2) Building trust
  (3) Offering audiences casual, interesting updates (eg: behind the scenes)

How to Use Video in Campaigns?

Back in 2014, Google invented a guide for increasing the viewership of your YouTube videos. They called it “Hero, Hub, Hygiene.” Since then, this guide has proven so effective that marketers are using it across other platforms as well.

The idea is based around 3 different content types, each with their own purpose in the buyer’s journey.

HERO

The “Hero-movie” is brand focused, driven by emotion, and a high-quality production.

It’s intended to reach a wide audience, limited to 1 to 3 campaigns a year (depending on the budget) and should raise brand awareness, familiarity, and create a connection with the public.

A good example is Nike’s ‘Just do it’ campaign. Appealing (emotional) movies that speak to a wide audience without going into the details of their products.

HUB

“Hub content” is regularly scheduled content that provides a reason to subscribe to a channel and return on a regular basis. Episodic and formatted series work best as hub content.

Some good examples of this are: vlogs, interviews/testimonials, explainer videos, and demos.

HYGIENE (aka HELP)

You know the audience you want to reach. But to draw viewers to your channel, you need to capture their intent — that is, understand what they’re searching for when they come to YouTube. Use search insights to find the most frequent searches (aka “queries”). Which queries can your brand credibly answer?

Start making videos that quickly and clearly answer these queries. These videos are called “help content.”

“Help content” means your channel’s basic, always-on videos. These could also include tutorials that answer the most popular search queries in your content area.

Using this 3H model can help you plan and structure your content while serving every customer in the buyer’s journey.