Video is the easiest (and most common way) your customers consume information. So, if it isn’t a regular part of your marketing, you’re missing out.
Before you get scared and begin to sweat, fear not. We’re not asking you to download TikTok and dance. In this article, we’ll show you a few simple steps so you can start today, share your expertise with your customers and see results.
More is Less – Don’t Over Produce
If you’ve spent any time online, you may have noticed that ads and organic content don’t look like they used to. Don’t get us wrong, we love a well-produced video. But now you can create content that followers will appreciate, right from your phone.
For the sake of practicing what we preach, take a look at our monthly president’s notes as an example by our CEO, Allison. Watch one or two and notice the simplicity of the setup. The only thing that changes each time is the background (which is intentional) and the topic.
Pick Your Company “Influencer”
People love people. We discovered this after we struggled to get our company’s LinkedIn profile better engagement. We had a theory that our page might do better if our followers could “see” the faces of Grapevine, and our hunch was correct. Since we began consistently posting our videos, engagement has nearly doubled.
Choosing Allison as our spokesperson was an easy decision. As our CEO, it made sense that she’d be shooting these videos. But she also does extremely well on camera and speaking with minimal prep.
These aren’t everyone’s strengths, so make sure you pick someone who is comfortable on camera, known in your community and can speak without reading notes or flash cards. Using prompts can often make a video feel cold and overproduced.
Find Your Creative Flow
Circling back to tip number one, the main goal is to keep it simple. Allison films the videos on her phone horizontally. Then she sends the video for review and notes to our creative team. If we’re okay with the first draft, we start working on the small edits.
We like to use Canva (shocker) to create the thumbnail for the video. CapCut is also another favorite of ours. We don’t use any intros or outros because the point, again for the people in the back, is to keep it simple and authentic.
Choose Where to Post
As with any type of content, you’ll find your videos will perform better on some platforms than others. We always start by posting our videos on YouTube and organizing them by playlist. This makes it easy for you to add them to your website, or eblast at any point in time. YouTube is also one of the most popular search engines, so it only makes sense.
When it comes to our president’s notes, our main goal was to improve our LinkedIn presence and engagement, so we have channeled most of our promotional efforts there. But that doesn’t keep us from posting it other places. Where to post and how will depend on your internal marketing goals. Pro Tip: Never post a video link on social. Always upload the video natively. Social media platforms don’t like to send users to another location on the web.
Have Fun & Experiment
Like most things in marketing, there is always room for improvement. We decided that we wanted Allison to speak to our business community through a video series that was fun, relatable and raw. That’s why the topics covered touch on business, life as a mom, marketing and so much more.
You will find throughout your journey creating video content that some things work better than others. The most important thing is that you listen to your audience and adjust accordingly. It can be easy to overcomplicate it , but the truth is, there are so many conversations you have daily that are relatable. Why not take 10 minutes out of your day to capture it in a video?
About Grapevine Communications
Grapevine Communications is a full-service creative marketing agency celebrating 21 years of success on the Suncoast of Florida. To learn more about what we do, visit www.grapeinc.com or call us at 941-351-0024.
