20EVO Video Strategy Starter Kit
Updated: 5 days ago
Video marketing is all the rage these days. But, it can be hard to get started when you're not sure where to start. That's why we created this video strategy starter kit for you! Inside, you'll find video marketing tips that will help promote your business and increase conversions on your website. So lets get started!
We will talk about:
Target Audience
Video Ideas
Frequency
Call To Zction
Being Authentic
Being Creative
Target Audience
The first thing you should do is determine your target audience - What are they most interested in hearing about? Are you speaking to an internal or external audience? What do they want to learn? What do they care about? What are their interests? What's the average age of your target audience?
These considerations are very important when thinking about the shooting and editing styles for your videos. Besides the message of your content, other factors of your content may change based on the above variables.
For example, if your target audience trends younger, capture a lot of b-roll footage so the editing team can make videos with faster cuts giving the audience plenty to look at. You may also think about the graphical animations that may be used in the video and where those graphics might appear in the frame. Understanding your target audience goes a long way in video marketing!
When crafting any message it would be helpful to think about your target audience's issues and concerns. Ask yourself: what if I was a_________ wouldn't it be nice if___________
Look for opportunities where your product or service can solve for issues for your target audience.
Another tactic might be to think in terms of why certain types of people value your product or service. Ask yourself what value you bring to those people. Identifying your brands value to segments of people will be invaluable as you craft messaging to your audience.
Next, we'll talk about video ideas.
Start with buckets
You may want to start by thinking in terms of categories or buckets for video content, each serving a unique purpose.
You may break your buckets down by type of video.
Examples may include:
Product reviews
Interviews with experts
Ads and promos
Behind-the-scenes footage
You may break your buckets down by what the video content will be used for.
Examples may include:
Outreach
Building affinity
Training
Another way you might break down the content you need is by the platforms within your omni channel.
Examples may include:
Website
Social media internal
Social media external (ads)
Email
TV
Whichever way you choose to break things down, once you identify the lanes your videos will live in, it will be easier coming up with fresh ideas that can reside in each lane.
Video Ideas For Your Business or Brand:
Advertisements
Creating video ads can be intimidating. It’s not something everybody can do, but it doesn’t have to be so difficult. Videos are an extremely popular marketing tactic these days, and for good reason. They keep people engaged more than traditional marketing methods like print ads or billboards ever did.
A great ad can share your product or service benefit in a memorable and compelling way. Depending on the platform the ad will run and who the audience is you can approach this in unlimited ways.
You can leverage video ads to share product demos, explain how your services work or show customer testimonials, all great ways to capture attention of potential customers who have never heard of your brand. When promoting a product try to empathize with the target audience and explain your product benefits through that lens.
Finding the right production company can be tough. Just like with marketing agencies, there’s a huge range of companies out there that specialize in video production and marketing. You want to find one that has experience working for clients who have had similar objectives as you do.
To have the most success make sure you have a clear idea of what your goals are. Do you want to sell a product? Get more people into your business? Promote an idea or philosophy? Figure out what’s most important and communicate those goals to your production partners.
It’s also important to have a clear understanding of your budget. Video marketing can be expensive, especially if you go with a company that has experience with larger brands. But this doesn’t mean it needs to cost an arm and a leg either.
The video production process is like any other marketing campaign: start by brainstorming ideas and don't be afraid of getting creative. If you're having trouble getting started with ideas you may want to start by outlining AIDA frameworks to figure out how best to engage your audience.
The AIDA framework is a marketing strategy that was created in the late 1800s and has been used by some of the world’s most successful marketing campaigns ever since. It stands for Attention, Interest, Desire, Action.
Attention means you need to grab your audience's attention with an interesting headline or video title. You want them interested enough in what you have to say so they keep watching or reading on. Once they're hooked on your content then you'll want them desiring whatever it is you're selling (whether that's a product or service). And finally once they've reached this point then you want them to take the action you've been marketing towards (like buying a product or signing up for your email list). You can learn more about the AIDA framework here.
While considering any of your marketing you should also consider retention marketing strategies. This type of marketing is focused on keeping people engaged with your brand over time.
Storytelling
Storytelling is one of the oldest forms of communication. Not surprisingly, video is an incredibly powerful storytelling medium. You can use video to share your brand story in a way that engages, entertains and inspires people. You can do this through ads, company profiles, corporate films, social media posts to name a few.
The most successful stories for brands include four main points
Who you are
How you got here
What you do
Why it matters
How you've helped others
But storytelling videos are not just for marketing purposes. Storytelling videos have been shown to increase employee engagement and productivity. Storytelling video has also been shown to be a great communication tool within companies! It's so valuable because it connects with employees on a personal level while still being informative and engaging. A storytelling video can be used to inform employees about company happenings or changes. A storytelling video can also be used as a training tool. For example, storytelling videos can be used to train new employees on company policies, or by immersing new hires in company culture. Using video in your corporate strategy can foster a more open and engaged company culture, build camaraderie with employees, facilitate marketing campaigns across the globe.
Looking to learn more about the importance of storytelling? Luckily we have a separate post all about storytelling check it out!
Experiences
Capturing epic experiences and sharing those with your audience is a great way to build trust and authority. To make video work in this space, you need storytellers who can capture the magic of people's adventures or journeys. Try to use some of the storytelling techniques we outlined above to amplify the effectiveness of this type of video content.
Experiences are a great way to launch social campaigns and generate UGC content. Creating videos that focus on experiences offer a great way to get things going, just make sure you include a clear CTA (call to action) in your communications. For example you may want to kick off a UGC campaign by telling a story about a certain cause or relationship to a product and then using a CTA to gather similar stories from your fan base.
Marketers often use in person experiences in their outreach through events but often these events can create opportunities to create invaluable content for your brand.
Some examples of content to capture at events:
Behind the scenes at an event you run or attend
Tip: shoot in 6k or above and try to keep important subjects in the center of the screen so your editor can create versions of videos in both vertical and horizontal format.
Interviews with attendees
Tip: have a clear idea of what you want the message to be before you interview anyone. That way you can make sure answers are guided towards your message.
B-roll of products
Tip: events can offer a great opportunity to capture your products in the hands of people. This footage will prove invaluable as you create content for your brand throughout the year
Frequency
You can never have too much video content on hand. Posting an abundance of value based content allows you to post promotional material that engages better as they will be spread out more.
People don't want their newsfeeds filled up with marketing messages so you'll need to be subtle with marketing messages. But this also means you can take your time and build a foundation for your brand's narrative before going all out marketing on social media.
If you're looking to post videos to social media you will want to aim for a video every week or perhaps even daily depending on the platform you're on, bandwidth and the buckets you have setup.
For example, for platforms that feature stories, brands can post behind the scenes on a daily basis to keep fans interested in the latest news coming from the brand.
When starting out it might be better to create a batch of several videos, letting them build over time until you've created enough content and momentum for your audience to stay interested in what you're doing.
The amount of videos that you need to be prepared with upfront will depend on what industry you're in, how often video content needs to be posted and the preferences of your target audience.
Tip: When starting out build a content calendar and bank of content that can last three months. Having content on hand will ensure you never loose momentum.
A great idea is to post live videos on Facebook, Twitch or YouTube on a schedule these are more likely to be shared and engage a user's emotions since they're happening right now in real time. They offer an inexpensive way to generate content and by broadcasting on a schedule they offer your audience something to look forward to every week.
Whatever you do, make sure your video production partners or staff are capturing a variety of content and offer to invest in hard drives to keep all footage archived for other uses as needed. Having an arrangement like this can offer a win win for organizations and production partners.
This also means finding the right partner is key. You may ask any potential video production partners if they have experience working on long term contracts or will work on a retainer basis. Ask them how such an arrangement can benefit both parties. Remember, the ideal video production company will feel more like a partner than just client/vendor.
Call to action
Whenever ideas happen there might not always be a clear CTA (call to action) but it's far too important to think about at the last minute while posting the content. It's vital to start thinking about your CTA as soon as possible in your process whenever considering any video content you're posting.
The marketing world is a competitive one and with the advent of new technologies, it's becoming more difficult to stand out. Video marketing is an effective way to reach your target audience and have them take action on your message. With so many options available, you need to make sure you include a clear call-to-action in all communications as this can help drive conversions from viewers of your video content. Making sure that the viewer knows what they should do next will increase their likelihood of doing so.
You can start by thinking about your audience, what problem are you solving for them, and how you want them to engage. Learn more, Subscribe Here, Click Below... are great CTAs that you can always use.
You can also include marketing offers, promotions or discounts for viewers who engage with your marketing messaging.
The key takeaway for anyone looking to create marketing videos is to keep things simple and always include instructions at the end of each video directing viewers on how they can act on what they just watched.
Whatever CTA you use make sure the video content is valuable and engaging enough that your audience will want to take action.
Be Authentic
The first step to building brand authenticity is to build out a brand ethos, vision, or mission people want to know what you care about so make sure you tell them in your communications.
Authenticity goes a long way when it comes to video marketing. It's important you are transparent as this builds trust with audiences, especially in B-to-C marketing where people need to feel like they can connect to the brand they support.
It's vital that you're authentic and true to your brand in all of your marketing communications. People can tell when you're not being genuine, and they will lose interest fast. Your marketing messages need to be real and speaking from the heart or people won't believe them. It takes a lot of work at the beginning but it pays off in the long run because if people like what they see then they'll want to know more about you, will be more willing to engage with you, and ultimately buy from you.
You want to represent your brand well so making sure your on screen talent has the skillset to be natural in front of the camera is key. If your project needs staff in front of the camera that doesn't have experience you may consider hiring a video production company to direct, an approach we often use in those situations is to interview them.
A skilled director can pull the story out of on camera talent no matter their experience level in front of a camera.
When the shoot is for an ad or to show off a product feature you should hire talent that is authentic to your brand. If you stick to hiring talent who live the life your product lives doing the things they normally do, you minimize the risks of coming across as disingenuous in your marketing.
Be creative
When it comes to video marketing, creativity is important. You want the video content you produce to stand out and be unique! It's vital that your audience walks away with something they haven't seen before which will help them remember who you are. Hiring talent that's adept at improvisation can really help, just make sure you don't stray too far off the rails. The last thing you want is to create a piece of content that hurts your business.
If your video strategy includes things like product reviews or customer testimonials make them fun for the viewer. For example, video reviews can be done as a skit while discussing the features and benefits of your product.
Be creative in your content strategy, figure out how you can generate new, free UGC content through paid campaigns. All businesses need video but be smart about how you source content and always look for creative ways to maximize opportunities to generate more video. Being creative in your content strategy will really maximize your budget, allowing your business to generate more content than ever before.
You can also get creative with camera angles and editing style.
Creative camera angles are a great marketing tool. They can help to set the mood for what you want your brand's video to portray. One example of this is adding an aerial shot or establishing wide-angle shots, which could be used to capture the expansiveness of your business’s location. Another creative angle would be shaking up the typical interview format by shooting it from another point of view, such as down low or even on the ground looking up at someone in authority talking about their accomplishments. These are just two examples that show how creative filming can make marketing videos more effective and engaging. If you're looking for ideas read our guide to camera angles for corporate videos.
A montage captures events rapidly by cutting from one event or scene quickly into another without any significant time lapse between the two scenes. This type of editing style is great for showing quick changes in space or time such as different settings or periods of time passing.
Using this technique will also allow more information to be conveyed in a shorter period of time. It will make the video feel more dynamic and fast paced which can create excitement around your brand or content marketing message.
An interview is an excellent way to share information about you or your business with others. It allows viewers to access information that they may not know without watching other videos or reading articles on the subject matter at hand.
By asking relevant questions from experts within your niche, you are able to get valuable insight from people who have been working for many years in their field of expertise that would take hours upon hours of research if done by yourself alone.
Editing multiple interview segments taking sentence fragments of different people allows you to tell a complete story without the boredom of one person's talking head. You can also use this technique to drive home a point at the beginning of a video.
Bhushan Thakkar, 20EVO and Trone Brand Energy
used a montage of interviews at the open of this video for
Craft Central to help introduce
Foothill Brewery's Sexual Chocalate to their audience
Conclusion
If you want to be successful with video marketing, it’s important that your plan is clear and simple. Begin by thinking about the types of videos you might need for various purposes – from storytelling to teaching a new product or service. Once you have an idea what type of content will fulfill a unique purpose, think about how this content can be used in different ways within your business or brand story. Be authentic and creative as well as mindful not to overwhelm potential viewers with too many marketing messages at once.
A good video strategy will have all these elements working together to build momentum for your brand & help drive sales. If you're planning on implementing video marketing into your ommi channel plan it may take some time before seeing results from video but staying consistent will get you far.
Video marketing is a powerful tool that can really help you generate an edge over your competitors.