Video has become an integral part of the internet experience. Already, video content represents 82% of all consumer internet traffic. The majority of internet users would rather watch and listen to content than read through walls of text.
Fortunately, video content marketing can be better than other content formats for achieving any marketing objective. You can create educational videos to help your audience accomplish their goals; create product videos to spread brand awareness or use informative videos to promote thought leadership/insights. If you have a subscriber list, you can increase your open rate by adding videos to your email newsletters.
However, your motivation for video content marketing should go beyond ‘everyone’s doing it.’ You must understand the why, the how and the what. To optimise video making as an effective and profitable digital marketing tool, you must understand why it is important.
Why Use Video Content Marketing
Videos add personality to your brand
Consumers already see most brands as faceless and impersonal. They also see products and services through the same lens, especially when demonstrations and how-tos are presented in text format. When asked how they would like to learn about a product or service, 69% of consumers said they would prefer to watch a short video. To support this trend, the number of businesses using video as a marketing tool almost doubled in the last five years.
Videos are better for multitasking and are more mobility friendly
Videos fit nicely into today’s lifestyle where people are trying to get many things done simultaneously. People watch videos on the go with their smartphones while engaging in other activities. YouTube says mobile video consumption rises by 100% every year, and about 7 out of 10 Youtube views are from mobile devices.
Videos are versatile
Whether you are launching a new product, trying to explain a concept or product that consumers are struggling with, or simply want to throw more light on a service offer, creating a video is your best bet. Most videos made are explainer videos, and 84% of consumers would buy a product after watching a video.
Videos have a higher share value
According to WyzOwl, consumers are 2x more likely to share video content than other types of content. If you create a fun, entertaining and relatable video, people will share them with their network. This means more exposure and engagement with your brand.
Your motivation for video content marketing should go beyond ‘everyone’s doing it.’ You must understand the why, the how and the what.
SlvrWlf Insights
Strategies for Your Video Content Marketing
You may already understand the importance of making videos and the ROI that making videos will bring. Still, you just do not know what to do. You may not have any idea what types of videos you can make for your sector. What can you do?
Start by setting a video content marketing goal. Be as specific as possible. What value do you want to create with this video? Why would anyone want to watch it? Do you want to describe your company because you want people to better understand what you do? This is a good goal for startups. Do you want to help people better understand a concept? This is great for schools. Do you want to show how to follow a process that might be otherwise complicated? Government agencies can always do this. Do you want people to know you better? This is always a goal for political candidates.
After you have decided on your goal, the next step is to think about the type of video that fits this goal. Here are some ideas that can help schools, government agencies, political candidates, and startups who really want to benefit from making videos to get you started.
Types of Video Content Marketing that Boosts Audience Engagement
Educational videos
Teach your audience something new with educational videos. If you aim to build trust and establish industry authority, we recommend this type of video content.
Update/What’s New Videos
Use this to gain credibility by revealing what’s new in your industry. A startup can easily use video updates in this way. Tell your audience what new thing you have discovered while working on a product. Political candidates/Government Agencies can also use What’s New videos to keep their audience informed about what is going on in their agencies. What new projects are they engaged in? People like to know what’s going on, and updates are great for such news. Schools can also make this type of video. Add a twist to your end of year celebrations by making a video of how your school grew in the past year and how you achieved this growth.
Work/Company Culture Videos
You can use this type of video to show off your company’s personality. Use this when you want to attract the right talents, gain public trust and recruit volunteers. When making work culture videos, focus on your mission and values. The aim is to present your organisation as a great place to build a career.
Schools can use work culture videos to show off their school environment. You can show your teachers in class, the students at play, staff meetings in progress, teachers brainstorming before preparing their lesson notes, students being taught how to do research and lots more. Anything that is part of your culture can be presented in a fun video.
A government agency can also use company culture videos to get goodwill. But such an agency needs to be careful with how the video is made. If it is seen as contrived, it will do more harm than good. For example, a day at Agency X videos will be a good way to showcase what the agency does.
Company culture videos are an excellent resource for startups. Especially in a country like Nigeria, where employers are often mean to their employees and do not pay them well. And where generally, a poor work culture is promoted, a startup can use this type of video to show they are different. The video can even help in writing their pitch deck.
Testimonial Videos
Nothing humanises your brand like testimonials, especially video testimonials. If people are singing your praise and talking about how you helped them solve a problem, then you should make videos. Those who have experienced poor customer services will want to try you as an alternative.
For a political candidate, video testimonials are easily one of the best tools you can use to drive your campaign. Publishing video testimonials from people whose lives you have touched can give the final push to those who are still indecisive about your candidacy.
Top Platforms for Video Content Marketing in Nigeria in 2021
After making your videos, you would obviously want to share them. Here are the top platforms for distributing your videos for free in 2021. Don’t forget that you may need to invest in boosting your video’s chances of being seen. You may need to use paid adverts or influencer marketing because these platforms are competitive.
YouTube
With over 2.3 billion users worldwide, YouTube is the most popular video platform and the second most popular search engine after Google. It has every kind of video that you can ever think of. It does not matter if you have been around for ages or you’re a startup; your video will always be suitable for YouTube.
Uploading videos on YouTube can also help your SEO. How? Google now owns YouTube. And so when people run internet searches, three videos from YouTube are displayed on the first page. Videos with topics that consumers will prefer to watch instead of read or which provide answers to ‘how to’ questions rank high on Google SERP. You must also do keyword research to find topics that are high in demand and optimise your YouTube videos for Google search. 87% of videos marketers said YouTube had been an effective channel for them. And, for Nigeria, YouTube is the third most used social media platform.
Facebook is the second most popular social media platform in Nigeria. 30.95 million Nigerians currently use Facebook and the number keeps growing daily. Most of these users are between 24-35 years. Right now, 15% of Facebook content are video and marketing experts have predicted that this number will increase with time. So if you want to get ahead of the pack, now will be a good time to do so.
Many Nigerians have had success using Facebook to pass their messages. But a few things to note about the types of videos that work on Facebook. Vertical videos with description lengths of 300 characters can raise engagement rates on Facebook. A vertical video is a video created for view in portrait mode; you don’t have to turn your phone horizontally to watch it. Also, making your video at least three minutes long increases the algorithms’ chances of finding them and making them more discoverable.
Instagram is also an excellent video marketing channel. There are about 8.5 million Nigerian instagram users in March 2021 with people aged 25 to 34 forming the largest group. Instagram is a highly visual platform with tons of pictures and videos. One can post videos on the Instagram feed, stories and there are video reels for short videos. There is also the option of live videos that is also available on Facebook. So you have enough options for your video marketing strategy on Instagram. And since 81% of people use Instagram to research products and services, it means that if your video is catchy and you use the correct hashtags to post, people will quickly discover your video.
Video email marketing, website, Pinterest, LinkedIn and even TikTok are great for video distribution. Although WhatsApp is a messaging platform, it has proved to be a great video sharing platform for Nigerians. So, look at the stats and think of your audience demographic and then decide what platform, or combination of platforms, work best for you.
How to Create Professional-Looking Video Content
Now, let’s talk about how to create professional-looking videos. As a small business owner, school or startup, you don’t need heavy equipment or professional cameras to make your videos. You can start with your phone. Budget Android phones with 13MP cameras are affordable. This can serve until you can get something better. Follow a blog like Mobility Nigeria to get good recommendations at reasonable rates.
But after recording your video, you may need to edit them. We have made a list of five free editing apps available to Nigerians that you can easily use to edit your videos.
These video editors are easy to use and do not require a learning curve, so a beginner can easily use them.
What Should be your Next Steps
As more people embrace a ‘show’ not ‘tell’ online communication strategy, the demand for video content marketing will increase. But so also is the competition for what goes into videos that sell. Already, it’s no longer enough to adopt video as part of your content formats. You have to be ahead of the trends and set a clear goal to measure to know how your video marketing strategy performs.
You would notice that all the strategies we discussed are high level. Should you need specific help with creating, executing or monitoring your video marketing strategy, Slvr Wlf is here to guide you. Why not start with a free consultation?
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