Developing a video marketing strategy for 2012

A planned approach to make better use of video marketing

 Video has now become a staple part of many business’ marketing toolkits, but there are still plenty out there who are yet to jump on the horse.

This guide is designed to help you get on that (still pretty young and frisky) horse and quickly. It is not an exhaustive guide instead we will point you to the resources you need to get your first video out there.

1. Work out how video will support your goals

Don't use video marketing because everybody else is. Instead, start with what are you trying to achieve as a business in 2012?

Your video marketing efforts should part of your marketing plan - an engagement tactic to support your goals. You should not be creating a video just because others are. Of course take a look at what your competitors are doing as well as what other businesses in different verticals are doing but ensure that your plan is unique to you and has a clear focus.

Here are a few more specific approaches to creating a video strategy.

2. Plan your first videos

Once you are clear on a strategy then you can start thinking about your first video.

As part of the planning process you should also think about:

• Who the audience is.
• What the end goal is for the video; this should be a verifiable result e.g. 3000 views on Youtube, 5000 new Facebook fans, £10,000 in new business sales etc.
• What the budget is? What can you afford for the production? This should be based on the end goals and what their perceived value is.

Here is a short video guide to help you -plan your first video.

3. Find the right video production company

Yes, you could save a lot of cash by doing it yourself and this is possible. If you are really keen to do your videos in house then take a look at this video by Tim Carter, still relevant, "an oldie, but goodie".

However, if you are keen to hire a professional video production company then you should take some time to find a good one that suits you. You could search from Google but how about tapping into your social and business networks. Who are you connected with on Linkedin that is involved in video production? Do any of your Facebook friends have a personal connection to a video production company? Referrals are often very reliable places to start.

However, if it comes down to you then take a look at a minimum of 5 video producers websites.

See who they have worked for before and what the productions are like. Read the testimonials on the site, yes they have been chosen and placed specially for this purpose but a happy customer is a happy customer.

Finally, take time to speak to each company on the phone. See who you like from the conversation, tell them what you want and see what ideas they come up with, who do you feel is genuinely interested in your project and will do a good job for you? A disinterested arrogant response is a no-goer however impressive their past portfolio is. Leave price until last, first understand what you need and want as well as who can meet these needs for you the most effectively.

4. Get actively involved in the production process

Most important during the filming; stay involved in the project. Don't just leave it to the experts; nobody knows your business like you do so motivate the production company to be passionate about your business so that they go the extra mile for you.

5. Market your video

Now that you have a polished video, what are you going to do with it? That’s right take it for a spin around the town.

• Create a Youtube channel and get the video on there. Here is a blog explaining how it is done.

There is a new layout to Youtube but this is still a relevant and easy to follow guide.

• Once the video is on Youtube then you can embed it wherever you want it on your website (or elsewhere) using the embed code. In the screenshot below you will see just below your video an option to share the video, click on that and then an option to embed will be shown. Click on that to get the embed code to insert into your website. It really is dead simple:

• Create a blog article or a page on your website that focuses on the video but also has a textual explanation of the video’s content. The reason for this is that Google and other search engines are not yet able to understand the content held within a video file so you need textual content for Google to categorise and rank according to it’s context.
• Once you have a page on your website that holds the video and accompanying explanation then you can submit this page to social bookmarking sites such as Digg, Delicious, Reddit and Stumble Upon. These are mainly consumer related sites so if your video is more niche focused then it may be better to look for related blogs and to email the owners a link to the page so that they can watch your video and if they like it perhaps give it some publicity on their blog with links to you. You should also add the link to all of the social networking sites that you use such as Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, Google+ etc.
• Use Tubemogul to distribute your video to other video platforms other than Youtube. There are about 20 other channels that you can distribute your videos to from simply uploading your video once to Tubemogul. This saves you the time and effort of uploading your videos to each of the platforms one by one. However, on first use you will still need to set up all of the accounts on the other platforms so that they can receive your videos from Tubemogul, but second time around it is a breeze.

Of course there is more, plenty more, that you could be doing but these are all quite easy to do so should be enough to get you started.

My last tip is to be yourself, show your personality in your videos and writing and have fun. If you do, it will come through in your work and it will appeal to others.

About Neil Davidson

This post was written by Neil Davidson, CEO of video production company My Web Presenters who specialise in corporate video for the web. They are also the pioneers of video web presenters technology. If you would like to have a conversation about how to create video for the web then please contact Neil here.