For most of us, the definition of a “successful video” is that it has a high view count. Yes, that is one measure of a video’s success, but what happened to your business after the “success” of that video? Did anything change?
If you can’t really put your finger on how that video impacted your business, then maybe you’re not leveraging video’s other success factors. The reality is that the mere process of producing videos, especially with influencers and potential customers, can generate lots of positive and measurable business value.
We all look to view counts as the primary measure of success because for most it’s the only metric they know.
View counts are only one measure of a video’s success and often it’s difficult to impossible to tell how it impacts your business. Conversely, the act of producing a video has many more values that often have direct and immediate impact to your business.
WOW! You’re shooting a video
Whenever you’re out publicly shooting a video, you’re a spectacle. People are enamored of video production crews and are eager to know what you’re shooting. At a trade show, a video setup can be a booth attractor. Our clients say that the mere appearance of our video shoot in or near their booth increases traffic.
With a microphone flag, you’re a walking billboard
Whenever we do a shoot for a client we get a professional microphone flag produced with the client’s logo on it. Everyone is jazzed when they see their company name on a microphone. “Hey, we’re a professional TV news crew!” At every event I shoot, passersby or friends of the interviewee will pull out their phone and take a photograph of me conducting the interview, all with the client’s branded microphone in the shot. Those photos are inevitably published on social media.
A camera is a prop for fast engagement
In the article, “How to Be Really Successful producing a crappy video,” I mentioned that networking with a camera in hand provides the excuse to get in out of conversations really quickly. In fact, if you’re shooting a video, you can get to your point right away. No need to waste time with “what do you do for a living” small talk. Cut to the qualifying question immediately. You’re shooting a video. The subject quickly understands why you’re being so abrupt.
Quickly getting to your question allows you to qualify people quickly and you’ll also have an excuse to walk away when you’re done. There’s no awkward moment when you need to find an excuse to leave.
Get access to influencers
If you ever just wanted to get connected to an influencer, don’t ask them to join you for coffee, or just “ten minutes of their time.” In both cases you’re asking them to do you a favor. If you’re interviewing them, yes they’re doing you a favor, but more importantly you’re doing them a favor by featuring them in a video. Influencers stay influencers by others acknowledging their influence and publishing their wisdom. By asking them to be interviewed, you’re providing that service.
When we do shoots at events where we’ll interview lots of people and influencers, we highly recommend our clients shadow us during the shoot. Simply put, we’ll meet more people, have more conversations, and engage with more industry influencers, than someone without a video camera. By shadowing us they’ll get to meet all of them in a relaxed “it’s about you, not me” setting.
An interview request initiates a waterfall of positive engagement
When you meet someone at an event you want the experience to be positive for them. Eventually you want it to be positive for you, but it’s important that you consider them first. In addition, we all know fostering relationships requires multiple touchpoints. To be successful fostering relationships, think like a great chess player. Always be thinking multiple moves ahead of your first move. We’ve found that the simple question of “can I interview you?” initiates multiple future positive engagements.
Here’s the pattern:
- “Can I interview you?” – Wow, someone wants to interview me?
- Conduct the interview – I got to express my thoughts to a camera.
- Thank the person for the interview – I’m being thanked for expressing my opinion.
- Publish the interview – Here are my opinions live on the Internet. And look how awesome I look on camera.
- Promote the interview – Look at how they’re promoting my thoughts all over the Internet. I’m honored.
Acceptance to that first inquiry (“Can I interview you?”), which is easy to get, sets off a domino effect of positive engagements. If you’re looking to build a relationship with an influencer, this is one effective technique we’ve used over and over again. Whenever you’re ready to pitch your product, the influencer will be far more receptive. You’ve laid the groundwork for a positive relationship that’s about them first, not you.
Video queues up the production of ancillary content
First time clients will often come to us asking for us to produce just one video. We always recommend we do more as there are many economies of scale to video production beyond just making another video. You can create ancillary elements, such as capturing stills for meme images or grabbing short clips for video snippets, to be distributed via Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram.
Audio can be extracted from a video to create a podcast, and we can also create articles from the video.
Video can be consumed within the social platform
If an article or podcast is posted on a social network, users usually have to click away from their social platform to consume the content. Video content can be consumed without ever having to leave the social platform.
Video draws attention on its own
Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn all auto play your video, without sound, making it even more enticing to watch and consume.
Video is a great attractor in search
Two articles appear in a search result. One appears with a video thumbnail and one without. Which do you think gets clicked on?
Video is 50 times more likely to get organic page ranks in Google than plain text results. (Source: Forrester Research)
Video search results have a 41% higher click-through than plain text results. (Source: aimClear)
Source: Brainshark.
Video as a means for implied endorsement
If I get an expert to agree to be on a video and there’s a microphone flag underneath his or her chin and a bug in the corner, I don’t need him or her telling me how awesome my product is. In fact, it’s preferable that he or she doesn’t. Instead, I just want their face, name, and wisdom with my brand all around them.
Those who engage with the video are highly qualified
The people who watch your video and respond are the ones raising their hands saying, “Hey, I’m really interested in this topic” and thus they’re your incredibly qualified candidates. Even if none of them turn into potential customers, they can be your “word of mouth” marketing force.
Difficult to plagiarize
Anytime your video is shared, it’s shared in its entirety with your branding. Unlike text which can easily be copied and pasted without attribution, it is much harder for others to take credit for your video.
Explain more in a shorter period of time
If your product is complicated to explain with just words, video can be a great tool to quickly showcase and demonstrate your product in action.
Same holds true for situations where people need to pass on certain knowledge. Not everyone has the time and skills to write out training documentation, but if you bring along a camera and ask people how to do something, they can often quickly walk you through it.
Video in volume projects industry presence
Even if your videos don’t get many view counts individually, you can make an impact with a volume of videos if you stay targeted. Produce lots of videos on a specific subject and with specific industry influencers and you will establish a noticeable industry presence.
Quick to recognize quality of video
It can be difficult for people to quickly recognize what a good writer you are. It simply takes time to make that determination. But with video, recognition of quality is almost instantaneous. Within a few seconds the viewer can determine it’s a quality product. That can speak well to your brand.
Beware, the reverse is also true. Often companies feel they need to create video and they produce one with zero consideration of staying consistent with their brand. As a result, the subpar video quickly reflects negatively against their brand.
Stand out! There are far less video producers than bloggers
Your industry probably has dozens if not hundreds of prominent bloggers. If you want to rise above the fray, become one of the few video producers.
Inexpensive means of market research
Are you trying to determine whether or not people care about a certain issue? Why not shoot a “man on the street” video asking people that very question. You may be inclined to edit the video skewed towards what you want people to believe, but all the answers in aggregate will be extremely valuable and inexpensive research for your marketing team.
We did something like this for Juniper at the Cisco Live! event. We asked people what they thought of Juniper vs. Cisco. We produced a public video for them, but we also created a longer cut version for internal consumption that let the marketing group know what everyone thought about their product.
CONCLUSION: Great means to initiate a relationship with a potential customer
This I would say is the most valuable use of corporate video. And I would extend this advice to podcasting as well. I mentioned this in the relationship building section. If you want to know if you’re getting a return on your investment for your video, just start interviewing people who could be potential customers. If any of them turn into clients, then you have your obvious and direct ROI. It’s something most of us cannot determine from just looking at video view counts.
