We live in a world where you need to be able to communicate your message in all formats possible. This means that sometimes you are going to have to produce video content. You might not be a professional videographer and that’s okay! Video marketing is not just for big studios with huge budgets.
Video marketing is an essential tool for any startup. It provides a way for a startup brand to share their ideas, thoughts, and overall market stance and vision in the current time. Many people see video marketing as a cost-effective way to reach audiences who are accustomed to consuming content on mobile devices rather than TV screens or radios. This guide is meant to help startups take advantage of market opportunities through video marketing while also avoiding costly pitfalls that could harm their success and sustainability from a financial standpoint.
1. Determine Your Target Audience
It is important for any marketer to know who you are going to be targeting with your video marketing. To do this, you will first need to outline your target audience:
First and foremost, you need to understand what your specific product or service is. Once you have this down, develop the most important message that you want the person watching your video to take from it. What are the benefits of purchasing your product? Or how is this impacting their life?
2. Know Your Goals
Next, you need to set short and long-term goals for your video marketing campaign. These goals should be detailed and actionable.
For example, short-term goals include:
- Establishing credibility with a new audience
- generating brand awareness
- exploring ways to better connect with customers
- communicating the benefits of the product or service
- increasing traffic to your website or landing page
Long-term goals include:
- Increase sales of the product
- increase the number of customers or clients
- increase sign-ups to email list / viral traffic
- increase authority or credibility in the market
Each video should have one primary goal. Determine what your main message is. What’s your goal with the video? This needs to be a focused message! Avoid trying to promote yourself or ask questions that do not relate to your main point. If you are promoting a product, make sure you are showing how that product can help solve their problems in some way. For example, “What are the major benefits of using our product?” Or “Who is this video for? …. Someone who wants more information on our product!”
3. Create a script that is easy to follow
This is extremely important. You need to create a script that is easy to follow and isn’t too long. Almost everyone has a hard time following a long video or one that moves too fast. Remember, no one wants to watch a 1-hour video! Your audience will lose interest in watching if it does not have an end-point or purpose. The idea is for your video to be interesting, educational, and engaging. Keep the video short and sweet by sticking to a script.
4. Use good quality audio
You will want the audio quality to be very clear. This means that you need to use a good microphone and high-quality speakers when recording any video marketing campaign. It is also recommended that you have decent lighting so that the video you are creating has professional-grade visuals. A video editing tool such as InVideo will be necessary in order to add special effects, text, music, and sound. All of this will help your startup brand stand out from the rest of your competitors!
5. Create multiple videos
Not all videos are created equal. Some are great at promoting a product or service while others are only meant to create awareness in the market about its existence. You will want to create multiple videos using a high-quality video editing tool. For example, a video that is only promoting your product and its benefits would be different than an educational video on how you designed your product!
6. Quality Matters
Always remember that your startup is still a business and you want to keep your brand image professional. You may be excited about creating a video, but this shouldn’t mean that you rush through it. Keep in mind that there will always be critics who watch your videos. This is part of any video marketing campaign! You have to understand the difference between good and bad quality. The quality of your video will impact the number and quality of viewers that you get to see your video. While video editing and creating content it is important to know what audiences your video is going to be aimed at as well as how they interact with videos on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc.
7. Engagement
Engage with your audience during the video creation process. You should make them feel involved in the overall process by showing them a sneak peek about the project or asking for their input on certain topics or questions that you may have. This will help create trust and rapport with your audience during this time period. It will also provide you with important feedback and ideas on how to improve your overall video marketing campaign.
8. Use a high-quality video editing tool
If you are going to be creating videos for your startup brand it is necessary that you use a high-quality video editing tool to help create them. This will ensure that your video is professional, clean, and easy to follow. It also helps improve the overall quality of the final product. The social media platform is a great place for startups to market their business, but it is important that they use the correct tools when creating videos. As simple as this sounds, too many startups fail to take advantage of this feature! So make sure you learn how to create and upload videos that are simple to follow, contain clear sound and video quality, and delight your audience!
9. Give a call-to-action (CTA)
Every video you create should end with a call to action. This is extremely important. If you want people to take action after watching your video, then you need to make a specific request! Tell people what to do next! These requests should be unique to a particular video and something that will help your startup prosper even more! The best way to get people interested in purchasing a product or knowing more information about an idea is through an action they can take. A call-to-action can be written or spoken – sometimes both!
10. Measure Your Success
After creating multiple videos you will want to measure the success of your video marketing campaign. Sometimes these metrics can be tricky to find, but they are always key! They will give you a good idea of how many people viewed your video, what percentage of those people actually watched the entire video, and how engagement with your content increased over time.
And lastly…
11. Be Honest
Last but not least, always be honest with your audience! It is important that you let them know if you are launching a new product or sending out a new email newsletter. At the same time, it is important to keep things real and show your audience that you are a human being and not something impersonal like a robotic voice!
By following these steps you will be creating multiple videos that are engaging, entertaining, and educational and provide your startup brand with the exposure it needs to succeed! Also, get creative with your videos by utilizing simple methods of marketing! Have fun!
About the Author
Sanket is a 2x founder having successfully exited his earlier tech start-up. Sanket studied technology at the University of Michigan. He hails from Mumbai, India, and is a proud dog parent to a two-year labrador named Dexter. Sanket started InVideo with a vision to enable everyone to create breathtaking videos fast and easy.
InVideo is an online video editor which allows businesses to create custom content easily and quickly. Through templates, media, filters, transitions and more, InVideo accelerates the process of video creation, enabling businesses to turn their ideas into high converting videos.
