Editor’s note: You may have missed the original version of this article last year. We’ve updated it and are sharing it now because video is only growing as a critical tactic for content marketers.
Video is a powerful storytelling medium: Not only can it serve as a prime proving ground for your business’ promotional campaigns, influential ideas, and experimental content efforts, video’s emotionally resonant combination of sound, motion, and visuals can also help you drive deeper, more satisfying relationships between your brand and its audience.
However, to be successful, you need to understand the right ways to leverage video’s tremendous power. One reason for this is, in the words of Enterprise Marketer video blogger Jeff Julian, the way we consume content is moving more and more toward video, motion graphics, and audio. “The growing sophistication of technologies like virtual reality, voice recognition (hello Alexa), and artificial intelligence means we will soon interact with screens very differently than we used to.”
In addition, younger generations are increasingly communicating through visual means –including GIFs, live-streaming, and social media platforms like Instagram and Snapchat. In short, it’s hard to deny that brands that aren’t embracing video internally and growing their expertise are going to fall further and further behind.
Video’s value proposition
Videos are among the most versatile of tactics content marketers can leverage, since they can be cooked up, loaded up, cut up, and served up in a wide variety of ways. For example, they:
- Work well in both long and short formats – from brief video messages on Snapchat or Instagram to full-length documentary films, and everywhere in between
- Can serve as timely, standalone statement pieces, or ongoing serialized conversations that unfold over time
- Can be presented as the main course or served as a pre-roll advertising appetizer
- Thrive in virtually any content platform – e.g., when embedded on your website or blog; shared via emails, through mobile apps, or on third-party video sites like YouTube; or incorporated into SlideShare presentations, live events, and webinars
- Are well suited to being consumed in both the desktop and mobile environments
- Can be simple affairs (like brief customer testimonials or product demos) or produced as slick, show-stopping efforts that launch your business into new spheres of influence
- Can be repackaged, repurposed, and republished in conjunction with your other relevant content efforts
- Can be archived for the ages, or produced on the fly as live-streaming events on messaging platforms like Live.ly, Facebook Live, or Periscope.
When to use them
As with any content effort, your video-based storytelling needs to be supported by a deliberate, strategic plan. Among the components of your plan should be an outline of the core message you want to communicate, how you want the audience to react, and what the next steps are that you want them to take after viewing.
You should also consider how you want your videos to reflect your brand’s values and aesthetics. For example, the content marketing team at REI – a top outdoor lifestyle brand that has received high praise for its video program – built its video strategy on a solid foundation of internal brand guidelines and clearly defined brand voice. According to REI’s Managing Editor Paolo Mottola (2017 Content Marketer of the Year), this base has helped his team provide a consistent audience experience, no matter what stories they decide to tell at a given time.
Of course, video may not always be the ideal format for achieving your marketing goals or for the consumers you are looking to target. As Paolo reminds us, “The story needs to be conducive to video. You have to be honest and see how visual the subject will be, and if motion is the best way to get the story out there. Sometimes it will be, but other times long-form journalism, infographics, or a photo series will give the story a better voice, or will better serve the consumption preferences of your audience.”
TIP: How can you tell if creating a video is the right decision? Ask yourself if anything about your story would be lost if you told it without the benefits of visuals and sound. If the answer is no, consider a format that requires less of a commitment (both to produce and consume). If the text version is well received, you can decide down the line if you want to repurpose the content as a video.
How to put videos into play
As is the case with any tactic, the decision to create content as a video should trace to your marketing goals. Fortunately, from a marketer’s standpoint, video offers a range of creative and strategic options that can be applied to virtually any content marketing purpose.
For example, Juan Mendez shared some suggestions on videos that suit stages of the buyer’s journey:
- Top of funnel: Educational videos – They don’t blatantly promote your product or service but reveal valuable and useful information to help your audience understand how their problem can be solved.
- Middle of funnel: Explainer videos – They can make the perfect pitch every time – literally explaining (not just showing) how your product or service solves the problem. They are also highly shareable on social media.
- Bottom of funnel: Demos and testimonials – At this stage, your prospects may be more willing to invest their time in learning details about your products or services. By sharing explicit information, step-by-step guidance, or honest customer feedback on your brand’s advantages and disadvantages, prospects can get more comfortable with the experience your solution will provide – giving them the confidence they need to pull the trigger on a purchase.
Let’s look at a few examples of video content that drives specific goals throughout the purchase process:
Thought leadership
Video can convey an appropriate emotional tone in a way that text alone can’t manage. This makes it an excellent platform for educating viewers on topics and issues directly related to your business and positioning your brand as a credible, trustworthy source of vital information.
Some suggestions:
- Host a video roundtable discussion to debate and discuss popular topics of interest from multiple points of view.
- Create a video showpiece that demonstrates your company’s expertise and/or the unique role your products play in an area of interest that your audience might share.
- Film your response to a sensitive public relations issue or controversial event to show the values your brand stands for.
Example: The Lexus Slide
Luxury car brand Lexus surprised the world with this video depicting what seemed to be a working hoverboard. While viewers initially thought the invention was a hoax, it turned out to be a fully functional prototype, demonstrating that, in the words of the company’s chief engineer Haruhiko Tanahashi, “There is no such thing as impossible, it’s just a matter of figuring out how.”
As a bonus, the Slide video ends with a link to a microsite that explains the technology behind the invention, and gives viewers a glimpse of other automotive technology projects Lexus has in the works.
While Lexus had no intention of manufacturing levitation devices…
