Most business owners know that creating video content is a must if they want to have an effective marketing strategy. It is one of the most engaging forms of content that can help businesses reach a wider audience, build brand awareness, and boost sales. But creating video content without a strategy can be a waste of time and money. No business creates videos just for fun. To make the most of your video content, you need to put together and implement a video content strategy. That is what we will learn how to do in today’s Video Lion. Come with me!
Ok, so let’s get straight to work. Here are some practical steps you can follow to create an effective video content strategy for your business:
- Define your goals.
Before you start creating any video content, you need to ask yourself what do you want to achieve with your videos. Do you want to build brand awareness, drive traffic to your website, generate leads, or increase sales? Do you want to educate your existing clients or make prospects curious, so they reach out to you? Defining your goals will help you create videos that are aligned with your business objectives.
2. Identify your target audience.
Once you have defined your goals, you need to identify your target audience. Who are the people you want to reach with your videos? When you’re doing this, don’t be generic. Try to imagine a specific individual, your ideal client. How old are they? Where do they live, where do they work, how much money they make? What are their interests, pain points, and needs? The more specific you are, the better. This will help you create videos that resonate with the type of client you’re looking for.
3. Choose the right video type.
There are different types of video formats that you can use to achieve your goals. Some of the most popular formats include explainer videos, product demos, testimonials, how-to videos, webinars, and more. Each format has its own strengths and weaknesses, so you need to choose the ones that are most appropriate for your goals and target audience.
4. Develop your messaging.
This is important. Your messaging is the core of your video content strategy. It should be consistent with your brand values, tone of voice, and key messages. It should be consistent with the messaging you’re using in any other type of content, be it printed, online or in-person. Your messaging should also be tailored to your target audience and aligned with your goals. Make sure that your messaging is clear, concise, and easy to understand.
5. Choose the right distribution channels
Choosing the right channels is crucial for the success of your video content strategy. There are different channels that you can use to distribute your videos, such as social media platforms like LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and TikTok, video platforms like YouTube or Vimeo, email campaigns, and your website. Each channel has its own audience, so you need to choose the ones that are most relevant to your target audience. Different channels many times need different video formats. For example, if you’re posting on YouTube, you’ll want your video content to be rectangular, which is called 16:9. If you’re posting on Instagram, you’ll want your videos to be square, or what we call 1:1. It is very possible that you may end up creating versions of the same video to fit different channels.
6. Create a production plan
Once you have defined your goals, target audience, video formats, messaging, and distribution channels, you need to create a production plan. This plan should include a list of the topics of your videos, a production schedule that determines when each video will be created and distributed, the budget, and the resources needed. Make sure that your plan is realistic and achievable.
7. Produce your videos
Finally, it is time for you to start creating your videos. Depending on the type of video, there are some videos you can for sure create in-house, or at least partly in-house. For more elaborated videos, that need to look more professional and finessed, you will want to outsource to a video production company. Usually, a balanced video strategy will include a combination of in-house and outsourced videos. Many production companies that specialize in creating videos for businesses offer consulting services that will help you set up correctly to start producing your in-house videos, with a relatively small investment.
8. Optimize your videos for search
In spite of many rumors, SEO is not dead yet. Optimizing your videos for search is important if you want to help your target audience to find them. You can optimize your videos by using relevant keywords in the titles, descriptions, and tags. You can also add transcripts and captions to your videos to make them more accessible and SEO-friendly. This is more specialized work that involves thorough keyword research and should be done by marketing professionals. That would be the digital marketing agency you work with, or your internal marketing department, if you have one.
9. Measure your results
If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it, and for sure, you can’t improve it. Measuring your results is very important to understand the impact of your video content strategy, and to be able to fine-tune it. You can use metrics such as views, engagement, click-through rates, and conversions to evaluate the performance of your videos. Based on your results, you can adjust your strategy and improve your future videos. On Video Lion 24, I went over 5 different methods to measure the success of your video campaigns. There is a link to that video here and in the description of this chapter.
In conclusion, creating a video content strategy is essential if you want to make the most of your video content. By defining your goals, identifying your target audience, choosing the right video formats, developing your messaging, choosing the right distribution channels, creating a production plan, producing your videos, optimizing them for search, and measuring your results, you can create videos that will engage your audience and, most importantly, produce results for your business.
That’s it for today. To watch this blog in Video Format, CLICK HERE
See you in the next Video Lion!