The Secret to Successful Business Videos is as Easy as ABCDE
In ancient days — which, by today’s hyper-fast standards, were about 3 years ago — business videos were known by a more traditional term: commercials.
And that means they were expensive, risky (you never quite knew if you had target viewer attention, or even target viewers — period), and generally treated with suspicion by folks who wanted to get back to their regularly scheduled programming. That part hasn’t changed much.
But now, online business videos – when done correctly – are high-ROIs that build trust, generate business, and can be used across multiple channels: web, YouTube, directories, videoblogs, microsites, email marketing, and yes, that old fashioned medium known as TV. And let’s not forget the SEO value, which has the potential to eclipse all other benefits and take a business to the next level in a matter of months – sometimes even weeks.
So put all of that together, and it’s easy to see why, each day, more businesses are using – or, rather, trying to use – videos to promote their business, get more customers, increase profits, and get to the next level.
Unfortunately, most of these businesses are failing. Big time.
Here’s the story: just because many businesses (especially smaller ones) are creating videos to spread their message, that doesn’t mean that they’re doing a good job. In fact, even a quick glance at what’s going on out there on the net reveals that the vast majority of attempts range from “That’s pretty bad” to “Oh no, please, don’t do that, please!”
What’s going on? It’s simple, scary and kind of frustrating: most businesses have the best of intentions, but they frankly don’t know what they’re doing when it comes to creating videos. As a result, the videos they create either don’t work or, often, are counter-productive. That is, instead of generating business, they repel it. Instead of distinguishing brand, they erode it. Instead of impressing prospects, they irritate or confuse them.
Like we said, it’s simple, scary and frustrating, but it’s NOT hopeless!
Because right now, we’re going to roll out the A, B, C, D and E of creating persuasive business videos. Follow these tips, and you’ll not only rise to the top of the Video Marketing mountain, but you’ll set yourself so high above your competition that they’ll need binoculars to see you.
A: AUDIENCE
Paradoxically, the most important people in any Video Marketing effort are never in the room when the filming happens: because they are the audience. If they were in the room, they’d no doubt make it clear – perhaps by getting up and walking out – that the entire focus of the video is not about the business sending the message; it’s about the audience receiving it.
Yes, the content is going to be about the business and what it has to offer. But the direction of the message, the benefits that are offered, the problems that are solved, are all about the audience.
Remember, you don’t need to sell anything. Rather, you just need to position your audience to buy and you do that by ensuring that what you say and how you say it is filtered through the lens of this simple query: Is this valuable to my audience, and part of their stated and un-stated expectations and aspirations?
If the answer is yes, proceed. If not, don’t.
B: BRAND
Business videos are, contrary to popular belief, not about informing. They’re about influencing. And that means that videos must be seen as a tremendously valuable opportunity – not a guarantee — to promote your brand.
What makes your business special? What makes it different? What core value propositions does it offer? What are its key customer-facing competitive advantages? What is its personality? What is its vision? How does it want to be described and discussed?
The answer to those probing questions come together in what we conveniently call a brand. And it’s critical for you to use your video as an opportunity to convey that brand and it’s an opportunity that you literally can’t afford to miss.
And before we go on to the next tip, if you don’t know what your brand is, then make sure you figure this out BEFORE you start making a video. The minimal investment will be worth more than you imagine.
C: COPYWRITING
Everyone. Hates. Wooden. Videos. Where. The. People. Speaking. Seem. To. Be. Possessed. By. Some. Alien. Force. That. Renders. Them. Lifeless. And. Robotic.
But that’s exactly what happens when scripts aren’t written by a copywriter. The message gets stuck and the presentation values plummet to Funniest Home Video levels. And while that that may be fine for dogs that play piano, or that unfortunate squirrel who tried to eat the golf ball, it’s not the standard you need to achieve for your business.
So the moral here is to ensure that your scripts are created by a copywriter, so that your business comes across as competent, trustworthy, engaging, and the right choice.
And. Not. A. Possessed. Robot.
D: DATA
Compared to other kinds of marketing (such as display advertising), Video Marketing is refreshingly easy to measure and monitor – which means it produces all kinds of useful data. Things like how many people watched the video, if they watched the whole thing, what sites or pages they came from, where they went afterwards, and more.
All of this data is marketing gold that you want to use to refine your existing videos, and design your new ones. Just make sure that you know how to capture and organize it, or instead of basking in audience insight you’ll be awash with numbers that will make little or no sense. Then it’s no longer data. It’s drivel.
E: EXPERTS
Most people would think twice before representing themselves in court. They’d also hesitate before performing their own root canal, rebuilding their transmission, piloting a 747, or deciding it might be fun to tear down their house and build a new one themselves. In other words: most people understand where their expertise begins and where it ends.
Except, evidently, when it comes to making business videos. Because, as mentioned, the vast majority of business videos look bad, sound bad, and don’t work.
So what’s wrong with them? Usually everything! There’s no direction. There’s no script. There’s no concern for lighting or imagery. There’s no professionalism. There’s no expertise. There’s just some person (or maybe a few people, or even a group) staring into a camera, saying too few or too many words, and inspiring in their prospects precisely the things that they don’t want to: confusion, boredom, frustration, irritation, anger, and the incentive to leave the site ASAP and head straight to a competitor.
And keep this in mind, too: with cheap Yellow Pages/CanPages videos, you get what you pay for: a generic, mass-produced entry-level product. Basically, you end up with a glorified home video – not a persuasive, professional business video that reinforces your brand, delivers key messages to your target audience, and is transformed by professional video editing into a riveting “must watch” production (and not a webcam-created yawner that chases prospects away).
In a nutshell, business videos are incredibly effective mini-movies that are well produced by experts. Home videos are videos that are badly produced by non-experts (or just cheap, mass-produced assembly lines).
The former makes millions for all the right reasons. The latter may go viral for all of the wrong reasons. Which story do you want to tell?
The ABCDE of Video Marketing = CBVS
As discussed, creating effective business videos means paying attention to audience, brand, copy, data and expertise. And for most businesses, it’s prohibitively expensive and time consuming to achieve — which helps explain why they don’t do it.
But there’s a solution to this dilemma, and that leads to the next series of letters: CBVS.
CBVS stands for the CastleCS Business Video System, which is our targeted, cost-effective and results-oriented approach to creating business videos that:
- Are created by our established network of production and marketing professionals, so that they’re persuasive, polished and powerful
- Reach your target audiences through a variety of key channels, including website, YouTube, directories and more
- Convert prospects into customers by establishing your benefits, advantages, and why you’re the right choice
- Drive your business to the next level and leave your competition scrambling to catch-up
Plus, the CastleCS Business Video System is specially designed to make the business video process easy, enjoyable and efficient. We do all of the production, editing and production work from end-to-end, take care of all post-video tracking and Internet Marketing, and equip and train your staff to take full advantage of this transformative leap forward in your business growth strategy.
Click to learn more about the CastleCS Business Video System. Get ready keep your competition up at night worrying about the future, while you rest easy, safe in knowing that your business videos are working round the clock to take your business to the next level.