In one of the chapters of his controversial biography, rock & roll legend Keith Richards felt the need to get something off his chest and voiced his suspicions about TV. “I’ve always found music and video to be an uneasy marriage,” he confessed in reference to the advent of MTV in the ‘80s. Funnily enough, you will find a few company owners who feel the same way about video and marketing today.
It’s not hard to see why. While some ventures seem to be tailor-made for video (such as this) and the big name brands can always rely on bigger budgets to turn out inspired and larger scale productions (like this), there are still a number of owners who have yet to be converted to the church of audiovisuals. After all, implementing a video marketing campaign is not always easy or cheap and sometimes, if you’re unlucky, it might not even be successful (although admittedly you could say the same about any marketing campaign, be it viral, social or good ol’ fashioned direct mail). More often than not the obstacle is not a financial or logistical one – sometimes it’s just a case of an executive not being sure his business will translate easily on-screen.
But let’s also be realistic for a moment. In a digital age where everything is increasingly being shared, liked, tweeted and “plussed” online, businesses need to start finding new tactics that will keep their audience and prospective clients excited, engaged and interested in their product. Sure, press releases, case studies, and white papers are all good forms of online content, but none of them match the immediacy and versatility of video, which can be hyperlinked in all of the above, as well as being shared on a company’s website and social media portals, including YouTube.
Ah yes, YouTube. The world’s largest video sharing site and No. 2 search engine after Google, it is the perfect platform to market businesses to over a billion users each month. Now there’s a reason right there to jump on the video bandwagon. If that weren’t enough, according to business bible Forbes, over 75% senior executives tend to watch work-related videos on a weekly basis, with 52% watching work-related videos on YouTube at least once a week. Talk about increasing the chances of your brand being discovered!
The signs are all there, people. There has never been a better time to take advantage of one of the hottest media formats on the web and capitalise on its benefits. And as for the reference to Mr. Richards’ quote at the start of the post, yes, video and marketing can be an uneasy marriage, but like all lasting relationships, it needs time and dedication for it to work successfully.