Why should your business use videos at all stages in its marketing?
YOUR WEBSITE
Many professional websites are brilliantly constructed. They have wonderful graphics, a header, and lots of content in terms of what you do, who you are, what expertise you might have, and a call to action. This is great because people landing on your website get a nice clear image of what you do.
THE PROFESSIONAL WEBSITE
If you are solicitor (lawyer) accountant, business, administration company, vegan restaurant, fashion house, or energy company, it is expected that you have a professional looking website that at minimum says the above. Why then do you often have many failed visits – assuming you even monitor your traffic to your website?
MEASURING SUCCESS
Let’s break it down a bit. Firstly, we’ll assuming you’ve read our FREE guide and understand the importance of measuring what visitors do when they arrive at your website. For example, have you the skills to know if they clicked a button or a tab on your website? Do you know this from your google analytics or does it just say how many visitors you received and the usual bounce rates? If it does, you are missing a trick, which we know about, but not many businesses do. Knowing if a promotion is working or a button is being clicked is the difference between making a sale or obtaining a new client and them going elsewhere. It means you can monitor if something you add to your website is working.
PERSONALITY
This brings me to the second problem with most professional websites. They lack personality. Some try to get around this by showing static images of the people who work for them. A picture might equal a thousand words, and often does, but if the picture is of someone is has a brilliant mind, and is a genius at what they do, but their photograph says something else, then you can easily lose a customer.
APPEARANCE
Why? Unfortunately, people judge each other by their appearance. They associate beauty with purity, and often with intelligence. Tall men often are more successful than short men, this is not because the short ones are inferior, but simply because the opportunities are given to the taller men! That’s very odd things to consider but it is true. Women equally are judged often by their face, figure, leg shape, the nails, make-up, and general vivacity. Of course, this is often a poor way to judge anyone’s character or ability. To have someone who has both brains and beauty is as rare as genius itself.
SOLUTIONS
How does a business get around this problem? Customers nowadays are hooked on videos. Everyone who is anyone has a smart phone. On that phone they are all watching YOUTUBE, VIMEO, TIKTOK, FACEBOOK, TWITTER and INSTAGRAM and video rules because it is the most natural form of entertaining content. The television largely replaced cinema, and the smartphone has replaced television. Now we truly have the whole world in our hands. Video must be a fundamental part of your future advertising. From the short punchy video on Facebook to the introduction to your company on your website, to the short videos that each of your staff could make about themselves, and their explanations of why any customer should use their expertise, rather than your competitor.
“BEWARE THE IDES OF MARCH”
The Roman Emperor Caesar like many Roman Emperors failed to understand his competitors. Don’t be Caesar.
Be aware, be very aware, that your competitor is right now dreaming up how he or she can add video content to their solicitors, accountancy, and administration firms. The vegan restaurant, the energy company, the sustainable development software company, and the cleaning agency, all are considering how to use video to market themselves. If you compete with any of these and don’t do this, you will be left behind. You will become the dinosaur on the internet. Google will punish you for failing to keep up with video content, and soon your rankings despite your SEO will plummet. That which does not develop new traits dies. That which evolves new adaptability survives. This is the story of evolution and natural selection and it applies to the professional business environment. Your brand will go the way of Caesar, whose molecules we drink in every glass of water!
THE DO IT YOURSELF METHOD
Now you must work out how to go about this. Some companies think it’s possible to do-it-yourself. There’s even a company advertising DIY videos which you can make on a smart phone and upload them yourself. Then they supply the graphics and send it you back to host on your website. Guess what happens? Nothing. Why? Video is not a panacea. It does not work if you don’t know who to make the video. There are 7 elements that are important in making any movie. These are: script, music, sound, editing, directing, and acting. The question is non-film makers simply don’t understand which are most important. Also, non-advertising film makers fail to grasp the importance of a 7th element: subtitles.
You can get away with a bad script. There are many films with poor scripts that have succeeded as adverts because the actors made it believable. You can get away with poor music, because everyone’s taste in music is different. You can even put up with bad editing to some extent, though its not a good idea. If the film is badly directed, sometimes it still works simply because the audience have no reference points to criticise it. Thus, although a better angled shot might have been more effective, the audience don’t grasp that point. Sound is extremely important. It must be clear and free from too much noise. It mustn’t be too loud or too soft. Without this the film will fail miserably. The most important element of all is the acting. Now if you are going to star in your own video, you need to understand a little about how to act on camera. Acting on camera is different to acting in real life. Shakespeare or one of his team of writers (perhaps Christopher Marlowe) may have written: “All the world’s a stage and men and women are merely actors” but he didn’t live in the age of the video camera and its audio recording systems. Talking to a camera naturally is exceedingly difficult without expert help and a little coaching. That’s why DIY videos don’t work, period.
HOLLYWOOD OR BUST
If you are professional company such as an accountants or solicitors, you need a Hollywood approach to making your videos. That can only come from professional film makers used to making documentaries. The trick is not to be rushed in the race but to take your time. To find a company that offers not just the video, but the coaching of how to deliver your lines yourself to the camera. A company that goes beyond the ordinary and makes your videos the extraordinary. That has an idea of how to grab leads using videos, can advise you on how to measure those results using data analytics developed in the film industry, uses cutting edge equipment and creates a strategic plan on how to build your brand on Youtube, vimeo, twitter, facebook and yes, even Instagram (where you can also employ brand Ambassadors to promote your company and its outstanding services). You can work with the people who charge you by the hour or you can work with people who charge you by results.