Nowadays, with technology and the online sphere evolving, videos have become ubiquitous in our everyday lives. You can hardly get away with seeing videos everywhere, especially if you live in a metropolitan area like London or Hong Kong. Especially since videos can now be watched on everyday items that you bring with you, such as smartphones, tablets and laptops – not to mention the PC and  TV itself. In fact, a 2018 study highlighted that 85% of US internet users watched online video content every month. New Zealand users topped that with 91% of them watching online video content monthly.

So, how can brands get started with video marketing? Well, they can either choose to do it in-house or outsource their production efforts to a freelancer or digital marketing agency such as MediaGroup Worldwide. Either way, making video content can be an incredibly effective way at boosting brand awareness and promoting your products or services. It also has a very high return on investment.

If you are looking to get started with video marketing by yourself, then we have listed down a few steps for you to get creating. Keep reading the article to learn more!

What is video marketing?

As its name suggests, video marketing is where companies use video primarily to promote or educate their target audience. Video marketing can also be used to increase brand awareness as well as engagement. If used correctly, video marketing can be an effective marketing tool to reach larger audiences, potentially increasing a company’s overall bottom line.

Define your audience

The first thing a company needs to do before they jump into creating a video is to understand who its target audience is. As most experts say, content that is created for everyone will inevitably be viewed by no one. One way you can find out who your target audience is is to check out your list of existing customers. Through them, you will be able to see any similar characteristics that they may have. For instance, see what kind of problems and pain points they face, how they found your brand, their age range and demographics, and why they have decided to choose your brand over your competitors.

Of course, you should never assume that you 100% know the answer. Instead, you should make the effort to actually talk to and conduct market research with your target customers. Reach out to them to see if they are fine with jumping on a business call with you. Or, if calls are out of the question, maybe send out a questionnaire or customer service for them to fill out in their own free time.

On the other hand, if you do not have an existing list of customers, you can start by thinking about who would choose to use your product or service. What and who does your product or service serve? For example, if you provide SEO services or software, then the people whom you may service may include those who are looking to drive more traffic to their website.

Know your primary objective

Afterwards, you need to define what your primary objective is when making a marketing video. These can include:

Education: The main goal of creating your marketing video is to teach your customers how to solve their main problems and frustrations. Especially if your product or service can help them. These brand videos can also include tutorials on how to use your product or service in different situations.

Brand awareness: The goal of creating videos is to make sure people know about your brand’s existence. After watching your videos, people should immediately know your brand name and have an understanding of what exactly you do and provide. The video should also include your brand’s unique selling point – basically what makes it stand out from its competitors. This way, with more people being aware of your brand, you can ultimately create more leads that can lead to more conversations later on.

Entertainment: Also, pretty self-explanatory. Instead of being educational, you can choose to go the more entertaining route of providing value to your target audience. You should create entertainment that relates in some way to the product or service that you are selling. For example, Red Bull – an energy drink brand – creates videos on their YouTube channel showcasing extreme sports as a way of drawing in its target audience.

Create the videos

Now, you need to actually get cracking and create the videos. Of course, because your audience, goals, objectives, and creative process will differ depending on what video you are looking to create, the actual steps are most likely going to be slightly different. That being said, there are still a few guidelines that are similar no matter what video you are producing:

Plan the video

Of course, the very first thing you should do before actually getting your cameras out is to start planning out your video. More specifically, you need to know the topic and what you will be creating content about. Of course, this will depend entirely on your marketing goals. If you are having trouble coming up with ideas, you can use a keyword research tool to see what types of content people are searching for on platforms like YouTube.

Now is also the time when you should consider if you need to outsource or work with freelancers or marketing agencies. Especially if you are looking to create a more professional, ‘branded’ video. Remember that video production takes a lot of time, effort and manpower, which you may not have in your company. As such, provided you have the budget for it, you can always choose to work with other experts instead of doing everything in-house.

Script the video

Unless you are incredible at improvising, it is highly recommended that you either script or write bullet points on cue cards to prompt you to speak. This will not only make your video production process smoother, but you will also likely reduce any unneeded words like ‘ums’ and ‘ahs’. After all, the last thing you want to do is go off on an unrelated tangent that may wind up boring your audience, meaning a higher chance of them clicking away from the video.

For example, if you are thinking about creating an educational video, here is a short guideline you may want to stick to:

• Problem: Lead and introduce the problem that your video will help solve
• Teaser: Show that there is a solution without giving everything away at first
• Solution: Teach the audience how to solve the problem (preferably by using your own products or services)

Recording video

Now, here comes the technical details. There are plenty of things you need to keep in mind if you are planning to do things in-house. If you are outsourcing video production, then the freelancer or agency should have you covered.

Location: You need to pick a location that is conducive to video production. Most experts suggest that you should pick a location where you can control the environment – such as the echo and light. For instance, you may not want to film right next to a large window because the changing amount of sunlight can affect how the video looks. If you have to shoot outside, you may consider filming at certain times of the day for a specific look or feel, for example, during the ‘golden hour’.

Lighting: There’s no surprise that lighting can seriously affect how your video looks. While some people prefer natural lighting, it can be very difficult to control. As such, most filmmakers would recommend you use a key light and a fill light.

Audio: If you have great visuals but no one can hear you, then that doesn’t make your video very effective, right? In fact, some filmmakers view audio as being more important than the camera equipment you are holding. Some suggestions to make sound clearer include using a shotgun mic or a lavalier mic.