As a savvy small business owner, you undoubtedly recognize the benefits of well-executed video marketing strategies.
Not only can it elevate your business by showcasing your products, services, and brand, but it can also connect with your customers meaningfully. It can also increase brand awareness, drive website traffic, and boost sales, taking your business to the next level.
However, crafting an effective video marketing plan can be daunting, especially for small businesses with limited resources. Fear not, though. This four-step guide will show you how to create a top-notch video marketing strategy for small businesses.
1. Define your goals and target audience
Remember when you did your due diligence before starting your business? You probably created a business plan, defined your goals, and chose the correct business entity to support those goals. You’ll need to do the same thing for your video marketing campaign.
The first step in creating a video marketing strategy is to define your goals and target audience. You need to clearly understand what you want to achieve with your video marketing campaign and why you want to achieve that goal.
Your goals could be to build a brand, increase brand awareness, generate leads, drive sales, or promote a specific product or service.
One brand that uses video marketing to increase brand awareness is Flyp. Rather than showcasing their product or service, Flyp’s videos aim to inspire viewers. They create decorative videos that leave a lasting impression on customers, reminding them of the Flyp brand.
Once you have identified and arranged your goals in order of priority, you must define your target audience. You must know who you create the videos for and why they would be interested in your message.
Look at your existing customer base and develop buyer personas to understand their demographics, interests, and pain points.
Also, research and stay current on industry trends to understand what appeals to your audience. Finally, analyzing your competitors can help you determine what strategies are successful with your audience and which are not.
This information will help you craft your message and create videos that resonate with your target audience.
2. Plan your content
An effective video marketing strategy involves creating engaging and valuable video content that meets your audience’s needs and interests. It’s essential to plan your videos’ content and format, choose suitable topics, and optimize them for SEO and social media channels.
96% of marketers say video has helped increase user understanding of their product or service.
So, you must plan an effective video strategy that aligns with your goals and brand-building efforts.
When planning your content, consider creating different types of video content, such as explainer, product, testimonial, behind-the-scenes, and educational videos. Short-form video formats like reels and YouTube shorts should also be planned for.
Kodiak Cakes confidently provides diverse video content, including cooking recipes, challenges, and brand-related information.
Next, acquire the right equipment, write a script, rehearse, and film the content. You can also record the audio separately & if need be, get some supplementary (b-roll) footage that can help establish context.
Another thing to consider is the length of your videos. This report by Sprout Social shows that shorter videos (less than two minutes) tend to perform better on social media platforms.
However, longer videos may be more suitable for website landing pages or email marketing campaigns.
You should also consider the tone and style of your video content. Your tone should be consistent with your brand voice, and your style should be aligned with your target audience’s preferences.
For example, if you’re trying to appear trendy and casual on your website and other marketing assets, the same voice and style should be reflected in your videos.
We recommend aligning your video marketing strategy with your other content marketing efforts. Say you’re doing SaaS content production, and your content for the next quarter is around a specific topic cluster.
In addition to writing blog content and guest posts around, plan your video content around that topic as well. This makes sure that all your content supports each other. It’ll also ensure that you never run out of video content ideas.
3. Create your videos
Once you have planned your content, it’s time to create them. You can create videos in-house using a smartphone or camera or hire a professional videographer.
The quality of your videos will play a crucial role in video views. Quality videos will attract and retain audience attention, thus giving you an edge. This edge could be the top reason your small business succeeds.
When starting the video creation process, consider investing in good equipment like a camera, microphone, and lighting to ensure your videos are well-lit, have clear audio, and are visually appealing.
Also, consider adding captions or subtitles. Many people watch videos on social media platforms without sound, so adding captions can help you reach a wider audience. Captions also help people better process the information you are putting out.
It’s also essential to optimize your videos for SEO. An effective SEO strategy involves adding relevant keywords in the video title, description, and tags. For example, in the video title below, you can quickly tell that the brand is targeting the keyword “bulk email finder.”
This will help your videos rank higher in search engine results pages (SERPs) and increase your visibility. That brings us to the last point.
4. Promote your videos
Promoting your videos is essential to reach your target audience and grow your business. You can use several channels to promote your videos, such as social media, email marketing, and your website.
On social channels, for example, you can share your videos on your business page and run targeted social media ads to reach your desired audience.
You can also respond to their comments and questions to boost engagement, drive shares, and ultimately broaden your organic reach.
KIND Snacks uses video marketing to promote its offer on Facebook. Their video features endearing concepts of gift-giving to loved ones.
Email marketing is another excellent strategy for advertising your videos to subscribers and customers. It doesn’t require a massive budget to get started, either.
Furthermore, incorporating your videos onto your website’s landing pages, blog posts, or product pages can enhance engagement and boost traffic to your business website significantly.
Finally, you can collaborate with other small businesses in your niche to cross-promote each other’s videos. This helps you to reach a new audience and build relationships within your industry.
In Closing
In conclusion, creating an effective video marketing strategy boosts the marketing efforts of small businesses.
An effective video strategy requires careful planning and execution. By defining your goals and your target audience, planning your content, and creating high-quality videos, you can engage your target demographic more strategically.
Promoting the videos you’ve created through social platforms and other channels can increase your brand’s visibility and ultimately drive sales. Don’t forget to track your video’s performance and adjust your strategy to ensure you get the best results.
All in all, a video marketing strategy is a powerful tool that small businesses should use to accelerate business growth.
