Everyone knows that blogging and other long-form, high-value content are essential components of any marketing strategy.
But with today’s ever narrowing attention spans, written content is no longer enough to make your B2B company stand out from the competition on its own.
If you’re not prioritizing video marketing in 2021, it’s time to start taking this marketing tool seriously, especially since 86% of businesses are already using it.
The question is, how do you do it effectively? If you’re unsure, we’ll break it down for you. Keep reading, and you’ll begin to understand why you need to focus on video marketing and how you can get started developing a video marketing strategy.
Why Should My Company Invest in Video Marketing?
In the past, video was primarily used for internal initiatives like training. Today, video plays an integral role in communication—especially when it comes to generating leads, communicating with prospects, and driving conversions and sales.
To put it simply, video marketing is a versatile medium. It enables B2B companies to not only engage audiences, but also educate them with demos, inspire them with testimonials, and inform them in the decision-making process with valuable webinars.
If you’ve been hesitant to invest in video marketing because you thought it was just a method to increase brand awareness, try considering all of the ways you can use it, and you’ll understand why it’s a worthwhile marketing investment.
Creating Your B2B Video Marketing Strategy
Getting started with video marketing can feel overwhelming if you don’t have a content strategy in place. Start with your target audience. Ask:
- What are their pain points?
- What types of content do they find valuable?
- What messages resonate with them most?
Setting Goals
Now, think about the overall goals for your video marketing. What are you hoping to achieve? Goals are best achieved when they’re SMART. If you’re not familiar with this acronym, it means Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-Bound. With a single, specific goal in mind, it will be easier to maintain your focus and attain the end result you want to achieve with your video marketing.
It’s also important to think about which stage(s) of the buyer’s journey you want to target with your video marketing.
Set Your Budget
When it comes to creating videos, there are a few different avenues you can take.
If you want to keep your marketing video production costs low, you can use DIY platforms to develop your video content in-house.
Or you can work with an agency, a production company, or hire professionals individually. Doing so can help ensure that you always achieve a professional final product with your video marketing, whatever the goal.
Decide which avenue you want to take, and set your budget accordingly.
Develop a Video Content Calendar
Before you can flesh out your content calendar, think about what types of B2B marketing videos you want to produce. Once you know what you want to produce, develop a video content calendar for when you’ll shoot each video and how/where you’ll promote or debut them once they’re complete. Here’s a quick description of some of the most popular marketing video styles:
Brand Awareness
Brand awareness videos should emphasize your company’s key differentiators and vision rather than promoting your products or services. The main goal of these videos is to educate your target audience and help them understand how you can help them, while developing brand awareness and recognition.
Where to Use in the Buyer’s Journey: Awareness Stage and Consideration Stages
Explainer
In an explainer video, the goal is to inform or educate your target audience with a short video that explains an idea, service, or product. Whether it’s a Q&A style, you’re discussing a new product or service, or promoting an event like a webinar, this video style is flexible. Determine what you want to explain and go from there.
Where to Use in the Buyer’s Journey: Awareness and Consideration Stages
Product/Service Promotion
Product or service videos are straightforward. By promoting your product or service and how it would help your target audience, you can generate brand awareness and make it easy for viewers to understand how they would benefit if they invested in your products or services.
Where to Use in the Buyer’s Journey: Awareness and Consideration Stages
Testimonials
Testimonial videos are an effective way to put your success stories right in front of your target audience in an engaging formant that’s easy to digest and understand. Testimonial videos are particularly valuable for B2B companies because they focus on real experiences, which can help build trust with new prospects because they can hear directly from your customers.
Where to Use in the Buyer’s Journey: Consideration and Decision Stages
Produce Your Marketing Videos
By this point, you’ve either decided on a DIY platform to use to produce your videos in-house, or you’ve decided to work with an agency, a production company, or a professional. Your video content calendar is also ready, so now it’s time to put in the work and develop your marketing videos.
Publish Your First Video
Like any other form of content, where you publish your first marketing video will depend on your target audience and the goal of the video. Brand awareness videos can be published on your website’s homepage and social media channels, while more in-depth videos can be published on product or service pages or LinkedIn, where your B2B buyers are most likely to be engaging with content like yours.
Promote, Promote, Promote
Once your video is published, you need to promote it—just like any other piece of content you develop. Leverage all the channels: promote it through email marketing, content marketing, social media, paid advertising, and by optimizing it for SEO. Be sure to engage with your target audience after you promote the video, so you can continue building relationships.
Track Your Video Marketing Success
When you need to break down a difficult concept or help customers learn more about a particular product or service, video is a valuable tool. But if you don’t track your results, you won’t know if you’ve been successful—or how to tailor your videos or your video content strategy in the future.
Need help crafting compelling marketing videos, developing or refreshing your brand identity, or another area of marketing? Sagefrog would love to help. Let’s talk!
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