A complete guide to curating video content

Video content is no longer a single element in a marketing plan, included as a ‘nice-to-have’ or a ‘maybe one day’. With one minute of video equating to an estimated 1.8 million words, it should be an intrinsic part of your content strategy, central to your outbound marketing, campaigns and social.

7 things to consider in your video content marketing strategy

1. Creating different types of video content – mix it up so your audience keeps coming back for more
2. Producing lots of content marketing videos – a few videos throughout the year will not build enough momentum or create the power that video can wield. Consistency is key, as it is will all types of content
3. Using your videos across your marketing channels – not just on your YouTube site, but embedded in your company website, on email, and especially in social
4. How to deliver value, whatever that may mean in your industry – it could be useful, relevant content that consumers learn from, or it could be inspiring, funny or simply interesting
5. Setting some KPIs – what are your overall objectives and targets for video? Continually measure and learn from your results
6. Paid video ads – including remarketing
7. Budget – some videos can be expensive to produce and it’s important to find a balance of quality, cost and amplification

Video content dominates social media. According to research, four of the top six channels on which global consumers watch video content are social channels.

The stats go on: globally, we watch over 500 million hours of YouTube videos each day. There are 10 billion views of Snapchat user stories each day.  And astoundingly, “more video content is uploaded in 30 days than the major U.S. television networks have created in 30 years.”

If your brand’s target audience is millennials, this is particularly interesting. A massive four out of five millennials say video content influences their purchases – this is the same age group that watches an average of two hours of video per day.

This is why most social media platforms are moving toward video-first.

This huge consumption of video content on social platforms also means that over half of all video is watched on mobile devices.

We also watch video at any time of day, looking at our cell phones from the moment we wake up, on and off until just before we sleep. It’s therefore important to make sure your video content is technically mobile device-friendly, and from a marketing perspective is easily shareable.

The strengths of influencer marketing lie in social platforms – and video content and now vlogging is a big part of that.

Vlogging is essentially a video blog post and as video has seen a surge in popularity, so has vlogging. Vloggers work within a particular niche, and are able to influence, persuade and ultimately sell to their audience, who trusts their opinion, authentic content and credibility.

Vloggers often create product unboxing videos, reviews of new products, and tutorial-style ‘how to’ guides – how to use a product, for example. This is about as ‘real’ as it can get for a brand and their audience without the audience being able to handle the product themselves. It’s massively influential, providing viewers with a relatable face-to-face visualization of your brand, a profile of who uses it and insight into why they enjoy using the brand.

That’s why influencer marketing can be an important part of marketing strategy. It provides credibility, relatability and authenticity, unique content, increased awareness and shareability, not to mention a strong ROI.

As we’ve seen, there are many different ways to use video, and that means there are many different types of video content marketing.

• Company videos – used to showcase an overall feel for a company or brand for prospective clients or employees

• Vlogs – mainly created by bloggers and YouTubers to tell a story, express an opinion, review a product or produce a tutorial
• Interviews – with customers, employees, clients, relevant experts, celebrities

• Webinars – these could be livestreams or recordings that are shared after the fact. They are normally useful, informative, value-adding and highly relevant
• Events – a video summary of an event
• Presentations – normally used to provide persuasive facts about a single topic
• Animations

• Testimonials from happy customers

It’s also worth considering which type of video works best at the different stages of the customer journey.

At the awareness stage, you will want to educate your customers about your brand;

During the consideration phase it’s better to focus more specifically on your products;

and at the purchase decision phase you can go deeper into detail, answering any final questions your customers may have.

Additional Resource: 8 High-Performing Types of Video Content

There are many components which make up successful video content marketing – it’s not just about the video itself, but how you use it.

We’ve already looked at how leveraging different distribution channels works for video, but it’s also about how you use the channels themselves.

For example, an auto-playing ad or pop up actively makes people close their browser. It’s important to respect your viewer’s time and attention and place video content where and when they are likely to watch it.

Not only that, but most people prefer to see video content rather than hear it – 85% of video views on Facebook are watched on mute. We also want video content to be short and engaging; 33% of viewers will stop watching after 30 seconds if you haven’t piqued their interest, 45% after one minute.

These brands are driving dynamic growth across the social media platforms, brilliantly voicing their brand and leaving their consumers wanting more.