As the owner of a business, you’ve got a lot on your plate! From meetings to managing employees and turning out a great product, you do everything you can to ensure that your business is running smoothly and is successful.

That being said, none of us are experts on every aspect of running a business. How could we be? There is simply too much to learn in one lifetime. One area we see business owners struggling with? Video marketing.

Video marketing is one of the most popular and effective forms of marketing being used today. However, it can come with a steep learning curve that makes it feel inaccessible to many people.

That’s where we come in!

Video marketing doesn’t have to feel intimidating. It all comes down to having a solid video marketing strategy. Developing a video marketing strategy will help you to:

Refine your brand voice
Reach a wider audience
Engage with consumers on a deeper level
Create consistency throughout your branding

Today, we’ll be talking you through how to create a video marketing strategy that boosts engagement and helps your business thrive.

What Is a Video Marketing Strategy?

Let’s start with the basics: what exactly is a video marketing strategy?

A video marketing strategy is a set of clearly defined guidelines that helps you and your team create quality videos that help to draw in customers and explain what your business stands for.

Your marketing strategy can include a wide variety of factors, but it should always strive to answer these questions:

Who is our target audience?
What are the pain points we are solving by offering this product or service?
How are we helping potential customers understand our brand identity?

Benefits of a Good Video Marketing Strategy

If you are a marketing manager, you may be wondering if video marketing is really necessary for your company. After all, you have all the other bases covered; you write a killer newsletter, you regularly update your blog, you send out email campaigns…do you need to add this to your plate as well?

The short answer? Yes.

Here are just a few of the benefits that come with implementing quality video marketing strategies:

Engagement – For most marketing departments, the ultimate test of your skills is building customer engagement. These days, there is no better way to do that than with video content. Video content can be used across multiple social media platforms and has been proven to hold the customer’s attention longer than print media can.
Personalization – One of our favorite parts about using video as a marketing tool is getting to show the true heart behind a business. Video content is a great way to show the real people behind your online presence and help make a customer’s experience feel more personal.
SEO – When it comes to running a successful website, it is all about search engine optimization. One of the best ways to increase your SEO? Keep customers on your website! Video content is a great way to do this, as it tends to hold focus.

6 Things to Consider for Your Video Marketing Strategy

So, how exactly do you craft a successful video marketing strategy? The first step is to get clear about some key elements of your business. Here are some of the things you consider as you start to build out your video content strategy.

1) Brand Voice

The most important thing you can do to increase your brand’s recognizability is to create a strong brand voice. This is a task that sounds simple in theory but involves a lot of moving parts.

Brand voice helps your customer get a feel for your business. This can be conveyed through the language you use, the designs of your work, and how you engage with your customers. Luckily, with video content, you can kill two birds with one stone!

When making your video content, you don’t want to thoughtlessly follow the latest TikTok trends. Instead, have a clear plan in place about how you are going to implement your brand voice into your content. Will you be scripting your videos? Are they informal? How do they support your overall message?

2) Target Audience

A successful content marketing strategy always has a target audience in mind. In a broad sense, this could be your general audience, i.e., the people your product is designed for.

However, creating a video marketing campaign for specific social media platforms gives you the opportunity to closely hone in on a more niche target audience. This will involve a little research. It’s a good idea to look up:

The average age range of the users of a social media platform
The trends on that platform
How they are engaging with the content

All of this will help you create specialized content that reaches the target audience you want to reach.

3) Social Media Platforms

As a marketing manager, you are likely well aware of the various social media platforms available to you. Sometimes it seems like the list is never-ending!

Video content is useful because it can be used across a variety of different social media platforms, such as YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook. However, each of these platforms has different standards that make content more or less appealing to the users.

When developing your video strategy, it’s not enough to simply make video content. Instead, you will need to research trends and editing styles, to create content that appeals to the users of a particular platform.

4) Visuals

Video is inherently a visual medium. Because of this, it is a great place to work on building out your brand’s visual identity. This is a wonderful opportunity to collaborate with your designers on logos, animations, and color schemes.

5) Budget

Budgets. No one likes to talk or think about them, but they are an essential part of creating marketing videos. Before you start, it can be hugely helpful to come up with a clear budget. Not only will this ensure that you are safe financially, but it will also help you get an idea of the scope of the projects that you are able to take on.

6) Goals

We’ve saved the best for last, folks! Before starting any type of production, you and your team should have an honest conversation about what your goals are, surrounding video marketing. Are you looking to:

Boost sales?
Create engagement?
Demonstrate your products?

All of these are worthwhile goals, but they all have different actionable steps. Having clear goals in mind will help keep you on track!

Hire a Team or DIY?: Pros and Cons

We’ve convinced you! You’re ready to start creating content that will resonate with your viewers and help you sell your business to the masses. There’s just one problem.

Where do you start?

The good news is that you are not alone. When it comes to creating video content that stands out from the crowd, many businesses choose to use a professional video production company. Not sure if that’s the right choice for you? Here are the big pros and cons between a DIY approach and hiring a pro.

DIY

With phone cameras looking better than ever and basic editing software being relatively easy to manage, many teams are choosing to create video content on their own.

Pros ✅

Affordability – The biggest draw to creating your own content is, of course, the opportunity to save money. Creating your own videos can save you a significant amount, which makes it a very appealing choice to business owners.
Control – When you create videos yourself, you have full creative control, which can be freeing and allow you to create exactly the type of content you want.
Timeline – Creating videos on your own allows you to make them on your own timeline, rather than waiting for a production company to be available.

Cons❌

Skill – Creating high-quality video may LOOK simple, but the fact of the matter is that video production is a skill that people spend whole lifetimes trying to master. There tends to be a clear quality difference between videos created by professionals and videos created by amateurs.

Professional

Professional video production companies are a great choice for those who are looking for guidance in their journey.

Pros ✅

Professional Advice – Working with the pros means you have access to their wealth of knowledge. Got a question? They can answer it.
Equipment – When you work with a production company, you’ll have access to their state-of-the-art film equipment and editing tools.
Guaranteed Product – When you are figuring things out on your own, it can be hard to know if the finished product will be worthwhile or usable. With a professional team on your side, you can rest easy knowing that you will get top-notch video content.

Cons❌

Price – There’s no way around it. Hiring a production company will cost you much more than the DIY approach. That being said, they created the saying “You get what you pay for” for a reason!
Scheduling – Hiring a company means that the two of you have to work around both of your schedules. This can mean a longer timeline between creating the content and receiving a final product.

Work With the Best Video Production Company in Town!

Think you are ready to get started on implementing your video marketing strategy? Let us help! At Stringline Pictures, we’ve got the experience and know-how to help you create videos that help increase brand awareness and sales. Contact us today to learn more about our services.