7 Ways to Integrate Video into Your Content Marketing

In today’s world, website visitors are hungry and less patient. They want the information presented to them quickly and without much effort to consume.

That’s why video can be so effective. It’s also the way a lot of people learn. So using helps expand your appeal instead of just providing text.

Let’s look at some numbers to show why video content is so powerful:

• Video shows up in 70 percent of the top 100 search listings.
• Visitors who view product videos are 85 percent more likely to buy than visitors who do not.
• Adding videos can significantly increase conversion rates.
• After viewing a video, visitors are 40 percent more likely to visit a company’s website or contact a company.
• 59 percent of senior executives would rather watch video than read text and about 50 percent of those went on to make a purchase for their business.

I could offer you dozens of reasons why you should integrate video into your marketing efforts, but instead, I want to talk to you about some ideas for integrating video into your content marketing efforts.

 1. Testimonials.

Perhaps one of the easiest and best ways to use video on your website is to get customer testimonials. This gives visitors the chance to actually hear from your clients directly and see why they enjoyed working with you. This is far more powerful than a text endorsement.

Check out this example from Way Solutions. If you want career coaching, doesn’t it help to hear from people who’ve benefited from the service?

Way Solutions Testimonial – Magan from Jennifer Way on Vimeo.

In addition to customer videos, Clover websites shows a pull quote of the testimonials for those that would rather read than watch. A smart way to showcase both.

2. Employee introductions.

It’s a common practice to include employee photos on websites, but why not add video too? A short introduction from each employee allows visitors to see the personalities of the people who work for you and get a better sense of what it would be like to work with your company.

Videos also give you a chance to inject more personality into your company brand. Through these videos you can show that you’re fun and quirky, intellectual and serious or creative and passionate.

For example, the law firm of Arnold & Itkin showcases videos of each of their attorneys on their bio pages. If you’re searching for someone to hire, doesn’t it help to hear directly from the attorney?

3. How-tos & demonstrations.

As I mentioned yesterday, educational content can be very powerful. And sometimes, the best way to explain something is through video.

You can show how your products work, demonstrate your services or provide how-to guides that showcase your expertise. Informative videos like these can be the backbone of your website and also make for great blog posts.

The University of Phoenix does a great job of providing educational content and job search tips with short 15 to 30 second videos. This one shows how to answer a tough interview question.

4. Go behind the scenes.

Give visitors to your website or blog and inside peek at what happens behind closed doors at your business.

Give a tour of your office. Film part of a brainstorming session. A restaurant can show how they make their world-famous pizza. Manufacturers can show products being made. You get the idea. It’s this kind of stuff that helps people connect with you and what you do.

I love what Jeni’s Ice Creams is doing on Vine, for example. They’re using Twitter’s short video service to show how they make their delicious treats. Every time I see one, it makes me want to hop in my car and go grab some ice cream. How’s that for effective?

Testing new treats for the South Beach Wine & Food Festival.Caramel sauce on the inside. #sobewff vine.co/v/bnjm7nlHdaX

— Jeni’s Ice Creams (@jenisicecreams) February 7, 2013

5. Answer questions.

Think about the questions you get from clients and prospects every day. You can use videos to answer those questions. You could build an FAQ page with videos, weave these into your sales process or include them on your blog.

Another great idea is to solicit questions from social networks as Gini Dietrich does with her Facebook Question of the Week. Then, she creates a short video with the answer. This allows people to pick Gini’s brain and gives people a chance to get to know her better and see if she is someone they’d like to work with.

Here’s an example of her answering a question about whether CEO’s should tweet for themselves or under the company name.

6. Interview outside experts.

Another way to engage your audience is to bring in authors or experts on topics that you think your target audience would find valuable. This expands the topics you cover on your site and may also brings in new audience based on the expert you bring in.

I did this last year with a weeklong video interview series. For example, here’s my video interview with Pam Slim from Escape from Cubicle Nation about entrepreneurship.

 7. Entertain!

Sometimes, the best videos are just plain entertainment. Although this won’t work for every company, creating funny, inspiring or entertaining videos can be a great way to show the personality behind your brand.

I love this fake case study that John St. agency created about putting together an eight-year-old’s birthday party. Although the video is entertaining, they also showed their creativity and capabilities with the video. Genius.

Best Practices for Developing Video Content

Now that you have some ideas on what kinds of videos to create, here are a few best practices on how to do them well:

• Keep them short. Unless you’re recording a lengthy webinar or in-depth piece of information, most videos should be relatively short. Two to three minutes is a good rule of thumb for most. If you get much longer than that, people tend to tune out.

• Be focused. Know what you’re going to say in advance. Practice a few times if you need to. It doesn’t have to be perfect, but you should stay on point so people will stay engaged. 
• Have good lighting & sound. Professional videos will always be best. However, if you’re going to do it yourself, you should still make sure that you have good lighting and sound to make it easy for people to see and hear you.
• Be yourself. The point of video is to help people get to “meet” you on a more personal level. Don’t be afraid to let your hair down and show who you really are. This will help people connect with you in a deeper way.

Do you create videos for your business? What has worked well for you?

Image credit: jsawkins