The world’s top 5 social media platforms are Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and Snapchat. Notice anything about these sites? That’s right, they all feature videos as the core part of their feeds. 

So, why are these platforms so dedicated to video content? The answer is that videos grab people’s attention and keep them engaged. Research has shown that even on cross-media platforms like Facebook, people spend 50% of their time watching videos, and platforms like TikTok and YouTube are almost entirely dedicated to the medium. 

Today, we will look at how you can grab your share of people’s attention by leveraging video marketing techniques to drive engagement, improve your click-through rates, and propel your brand forward.

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What is video marketing?

Video marketing on social media is very different from advertising on TV. While they both use the same medium, social media demands content that interests your customers. You want to entice and entertain. This is because people can scroll past content that doesn’t immediately grab their attention or skip through in-stream ads.

This presents many challenges, but it also offers businesses a huge opportunity to reach and connect with customers in a way that wasn’t previously possible. With the right approach, you can find customers in many new ways, from offering educational content to expanding your reach with a fully holistic omnichannel and multichannel experience for your customers.

How video marketing drives brand growth

It’s clear that people can’t get enough of videos on social media. Let’s look at how this can help you grow your brand.

Captures attention and increases audience engagement

Mediums that incorporate visuals and sound to tell a story have taken the world by storm for over a hundred years. There’s a reason—videos capture our imagination. We use sight to navigate the world and hearing to communicate. In short, we’re audio-visual creatures, and videos perfectly combine both to capture our attention. X (formerly Twitter), for example, found that posts with videos get 10 times more engagement than those without.

Video also has the power to capture atmosphere and portray feeling in a way that static images can’t, which drives audience engagement. Compare the reaction you get from seeing a picture of a skier with the feeling of watching an epic ski run down the sunlit slopes of Aspen. That photo might showcase the landscape or clothing, but it’s your creative video editing skills that will truly capture the atmosphere and tell a story.

Demonstrates products, leading to higher conversion rates

Because we absorb information so much better when it’s presented to us in a visual medium, videos are a fantastic way to showcase your product. Product demos are a perfect example of this and a particularly effective SaaS video marketing strategy. 

Instead of selling your product, demonstrate it and let people make up their own minds. When you get people to engage voluntarily, you can go so much deeper into the benefits of your product, leading to vastly improved conversion rates. A huge 90% of people say that demonstration videos are helpful in purchase-making decisions.

Conveys brand story, fostering emotional connection

Video content excels in engagement due to its ability to convey stories visually, tapping into our natural preference for visual information. On social media, storytelling fosters emotional connections, as people are curious about others’ lives, from friends to celebrities to fictional characters. 

For instance, if you’re promoting event venues, you shouldn’t just share generic shots of each room. Instead, show people having fun there – both during events, and ‘backstage’. You’re selling an experience as much as a place, so your videos should make viewers feel like they’re a part of it already.

By sharing your authentic story, including your motivations, your team’s passion, and what customers value about your product, you can create meaningful bonds with your audience. People are eager to listen to genuine stories, making storytelling a powerful tool to connect.

Expanding social media reach through more shares

Research shows that videos are 52% more likely to be shared than any other form of content. It makes sense. If you concentrate on making content that entertains, amuses, or moves your audience, they’ll want to pass on that feeling to others.  

Content on social media is becoming increasingly creative. Today, users are able to share real-time online photo booth pics on platforms like Facebook and Instagram instantly, create interactive polls, use VR and AR, and so much more. So creating innovative and impactful video content that’s highly shareable is a great way to stand out.

Enhances SEO performance, driving organic traffic

Videos are favored by search engines like Google, boosting a site’s ranking for two notable reasons. 

Firstly, videos keep visitors on your site longer, a metric tracked by tools like Google Analytics, and affect how Google ranks your page.

Secondly, video content is highly shareable and can encourage clicks to other sites, such as YouTube, enhancing your site’s performance on search engines, and your SEO strategy. Sharing videos on platforms like TikTok also improves page rankings.

9 video marketing techniques to propel your brand forward

Let’s look at some practical steps you can take to drive engagement with your brand. 

Use trending formats and visuals for engaging, shareable videos

Understanding the dark arts of online algorithms can be tricky. But being one of the first to get on board with trends or a new hashtag can give you a massive boost in visibility and shareability, leading to a snowball effect. You have more shares and likes because you are one of the first, which leads to your content being pushed in the rankings, more shares and likes, and so on.  

This can work well for content in the real world, too. If you spot a news story or political event related to your product, use the free searches by creating content that will appear when people search for it. 

Include keywords to improve search rankings and discoverability

Making sure your webpage has the right words and phrases is crucial for SEO and your search ranking. Similarly, picking the right keywords is critical to ensuring social media algorithms include your video content on your customer’s feed. 

Choosing the right hashtag is even more vital on TikTok, where subscribers can ‘Favorite’ hashtags based on their interests. Do your research: find out what’s trending in your field, and maximize your reach. Start using the creative center, but don’t forget to note what your competitors and existing customers already use. A host of automated marketing tools can also help you find the right information.

Create attractive thumbnails to encourage video clicks

Effective video promotion goes beyond relying on autoplay or algorithms. To truly capture attention, focus on crafting an engaging thumbnail for your video. Here are key points to consider:

• Choose a captivating image:  It doesn’t necessarily have to be a clip from your video, but it must grab attention. 
• Opt for the right size: Use an image with a 1280 x 720 resolution (16:9 aspect ratio) as recommended by YouTube.
• Incorporate text: Since video descriptions often go unnoticed, add brief, compelling text to your thumbnail.
• Maintain consistency: Build a recognizable brand image through consistent styling or templates, which will make your videos easier to identify.
• Ensure contrast: Given that many users watch on mobile phones, make your thumbnail stand out by using high contrast.
• Be honest: Your thumbnail and video content should match to build trust and encourage repeat views.

Remember, the aim is not just to get more clicks, but to grow a loyal viewer base by being genuine and visually appealing.

Encourage user-generated content with hashtag challenges

People who have grown up online demand authenticity from their videos. They’ll spot a fake veneer a mile away. That’s why user-generated content (UGC) can be a great way to put out more content without bombarding your audience or coming across as pushy.

Perhaps the best way to do this is by running a competition to encourage users to post content. A great example of this comes from e.l.f. Cosmetics, who came up with the #eyeslipsface challenge. The challenge soon went viral, and their videos were viewed over a billion times in just two days, two billion times within two weeks.

It’s also worth looking at customer review examples that incorporate videos. When asking for feedback and reviews, incentivize customers to add videos of them using your product or service. This is a great way of using UGC to build trust and market your brand without being overly promotional.

Design videos for seamless mobile viewing with vertical formats

When producing videos, it’s crucial to consider the format and device they will be viewed on, as audiences increasingly watch content on mobile devices. 

This means choosing the right aspect ratio is key—vertical formats work well for quick viewing, while horizontal might be better for longer content that benefits from more detail. Additionally, leveraging mobile devices offers significant advantages, not just for viewing but also for engagement.

Finally, remember that using mobile devices offers some huge benefits. After all, phones aren’t just social media devices, even if it does often seem that way. Suppose you have a customer with a problem. In that case, you could email them. Or, you could use text messaging to send links to demonstration videos or push notifications to tell your audience when you have a new video out. 

Target specific demographics with precise ad campaigns

Social media platforms are designed for advertising. Users aren’t the customers; they’re the product. That means that while a social media platform is designed to keep people engaged, the clever stuff is all behind the hood, and it’s there for you, the real customer, to use. 

Instead of simply posting your videos, make sure you figure out who your target audience is. Figure out their age, economic status, and other demographics to help you reach the right people. Filter using interests, too, or use contextual targeting to ensure you get your video content to the people who want to see it. 

Invest in different ad formats to maximize reach and engagement

From the outside, ads on social media can look pretty standard. In reality, it’s more complicated. It pays for you to diversify your ads to make the most of your money and ensure you get the best reach and engagement without bombarding customers.

For example, to extend your YouTube video reach, you can use in-feed ads, which you pay to have pop up in your customers’ feeds for them to click on when browsing. These skippable and non-skippable in-stream ads appear before, after, or during the middle of other longer videos.

TikTok also has various types of ads, including in-feed ads, branded hashtag challenges, and TopView ads, which play when users open the platform, as well as other features, such as branded effects that can encourage user-generated content.

Engage with comments and build a sense of community

Finally, don’t forget the social aspect of social media. Posting videos is just the beginning of the conversation. A great video can hook customers, but there is always the opportunity to interact with your customers and build a community. This can help personalize your brand and create loyalty while boosting your click-through and conversion rates.

It can also be a great and non-intrusive way to give customers a little nudge to remind them that you’re still there. Instead of sending a “just checking in” email that will inevitably annoy your customers who are too busy to respond, you can gently remind them that you’re there and ready to listen. 

Remember to respond to both positive and negative comments, too. Even if you’re never going to get a sale out of those people who post negative things, your comments won’t go unnoticed by others. Of course, you can still feel free to ignore the trolls. It’s best not to give them any attention at all.

Summing up

Video marketing can be a fantastic way to connect with your audience. We’re hardwired to respond to visuals and audio, and people spend more time watching videos than ever before. With the right story and carefully crafted content, you can improve your brand’s reach and get your message out to people in a way that can emotionally engage potential customers. 

But be sure to put the work in to make your video content hit home. Figure out your ideal customers and target them. Take the time to format your content correctly, and create thumbnails that attract your audience.

Use the myriad tools that social media platforms offer to ensure that you’re getting maximum reach. These techniques allow you to reach new audiences, drive engagement, and propel your brand forward.

This article is written by J.P. Walti, Vice-President of Marketing, Creative, and Web at RingCentral, an AI-powered communications software provider. He has two decades of experience in marketing and creative fields. Visit his LinkedIn page here.

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