The Three Pillars of Creating Effective Video That Gets Results
Everyone knows that online video is becoming such an important marketing tool for businesses of all sizes. With a conversion rate of over 68% and search engines like Google, prioritizing websites with video, it’s no wonder why companies are allocating more money for video. It’s able to condense the information in just a few minutes, viewers have a higher rate of absorbing the information, it humanizes the business, it engages with the viewer, and most importantly it has a positive return on investment.
2017 was the year of video making massive growth online. 2018 is going to be the start of quality video content. But how does one know what consists of a quality video? Well, I’ve created three pillars that every video should have no matter of it’s a business promo video, a webinar, a customer testimonial, a facebook live, ect. Each type of video may vary in the levels of each pillar but it’s imperative that every video has each pillar. I’ll dive into this more as we progress.
The three pillars are Engage, Educate, and Convert. Write that down, memorize it, type it in your phone, whatever it takes to make sure you have these three pillars down for your next video marketing strategy session.
Engage is the first pillar. An engaging video will keep viewers wanting to continue to watch the video from the beginning to the end. When you’re using video as a marketing tool, it’s important to use the medium of video to your advantage as much as possible.
Using a business promo video as an example, this means to have an effective intro, have a variety of shots and angles, and lastly great music. They key to this is to not make the video look like a talking head. Those kinds of videos are often boring (but they have their place which we will get into later). The strategy that I have taken with my clients is a documentary-like-style approach to the video.
Having an effective intro is also important to creating an engaging video, because those first 8-10 seconds are going to determine if the viewer is going to continue to watch the video.
A common mistake is to put the logo upfront for 5-10 seconds before the video starts. I generally recommend to not do that, unless the logo appears in an interactive way (such as an animated logo) and it’s super short. Hence, the first 8-10 seconds should consist of the best shots of the whole video. Once the introduction has been set, you need a variety of shots (including the interview shots) to showcase what your business is about.
Get a lot of different angles, have the editing faster paced, shoot 3:1 ratio if the opportunity allows it and have it look as cinematic as possible. The third piece is having great music, and this can seriously make or break the video. The music should have the same feeling and tone that will represent your brand and fits the style of the video.
Most of the time videographers will use royalty-free song but every now and then an original piece is crafted just for that video. Now as I mentioned, there are a lot of different types of videos out there besides a business promo video. Sometimes a talk head video is effective such as a webinar or a training video. Does that mean I need to follow all these steps like have a variety of shots, and an effective intro…it would be great but it doesn’t need to be a 20+ hour project to get done.
I have filmed and edited many webinars and training videos and the best way to keep the videos engaging is to use two cameras, and slides that way it can be cut with two different angles and cut to slides when the information is handy to see.
It keeps the video personable and yet still educational. Check out the business promo video below about Poco Loco Paintball Park that I created and see how many different shots you can see.
The next pillar is Educate. This is really focused on the story of the business or organization utilizing the Who, What, Where, When, Why, and How. Depending on the business some of these may not fit in but ultimately the goal of this pillar is to teach the viewer something new about the business that they didn’t know.
This is basically the story of the company. How does a story get told through a business promo video? I generally use customer testimonials or interviews of the staff.
Using sound bites of these interviews is how you create the story, but sometimes using a formal script and a voiceover is effective as well. But the reason why I prefer live interviews is that it can help establish who the target market is. When creating the story structure of the video, here is the outline That I generally use.
- The business
- the problem
- the solution
- the USP (unique selling proposition)
- The differentiation
- The objections and how to overcome them
Depending on the business, they too may change but it’s a great structure to follow. It’s important to note that when crafting the story you need to use both the interviews and the visuals to help tell the story and the story has to be told in a way that creates emotion to the viewer. Here is an example video we produced last spring for Delaware Valley Friends School
Convert is the final Pillar and while it’s the simplest one, it can often be overlooked. Converting is basically, the viewer taking action. At the end of the video what do you want the viewer to do? Is it to give you a call? Sign up for a newsletter?
Check out your website for more information? It can all vary depending on other marketing materials you have but the important thing is to have a call to action at the end of the video. During the video however, if the video is effective and being distributed to the right target market, the video itself will often convert.
At the end of the day, this is both a marketing and a sales toll to help grow your business. Check out this video that has a great call to action for veterinarians.
Following these three pillars will really help step up your video marketing game. Whether you are telling a story of your business, creating training videos for your customers, or educating prospects, its important to make sure that the video is engaging for them to finish to the end, its educational and adds a lot of value, and has steps for them to take that will allow them to contact you to create a business transaction. Remember video is suppose to humanize your business and to connect with people! That is the best way to grow your business.
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