Video Content Marketing: What Is It and How to Use It

Liza Brown

Mar 27, 2024• Proven solutions

You might have heard the term video content marketing and intuitively you have a grasp on the concept. Video content marketing is adding a video into your marketing strategy, right? Well yes and no.

A video is not just a person speaking to camera. If you want an effective video-based marketing strategy, you need to think about it a little more.

• Part1: What is Video Content Marketing
• Part2: The Importance of Video in a Marketing Strategy
• Part3: Incorporating Video into your Content Marketing Strategy

Part 1: What is Video Content Marketing?

Video Content Marketing is not a mystery. It is like other marketing content in most of the ways that matter. It has to be good, consistent, it has to be high quality, and it has to be a part of your strategy which works with the other tools available.

Video content marketing is the adding videos to your marketing strategy. Video content must be thought through as well as measured and tracked in the same critical way as any other marketing tactic.

What video content is not, coming across a video which happens to prove your point and adding it in after the fact and hoping it will fly.

Part 2: The Importance of Video in a Marketing Strategy

Of all the content which is available on Facebook, podcasts, blogs, posts, tweet reposts etc., video continues to have the highest overall content reach. Shockingly, the figure for videos watched on YouTube on a daily basis is a billion hours.

No wonder video content should be a forethought and not something you tack on the back. Try to remember video means more than actors and sets.

Part 3: Incorporating Video into your Content Marketing Strategy

You have to think about video in the same way you would any other tactic in the marketing arsenal. But you also must think about it in two different ways.

What you need to consider is where in the marketing plan you use video - it is choice in the same way as deciding on an email or using a tweet.

1. Measurement

Of the ways you can measure video the ones which make the difference are engagement, click-through and conversion.

Engagement means how much of the video viewers watched. Click through means they did what you wanted and came to your site and then conversion, the viewer actually purchased.

With these important metrics in mind, how does video apply to your product or service? Do you need to get the message out to as many as possible? Start with video. Do you have a loyal base and need to educate them? Consider leading with some other interest generation and bring them through to the video, with the aim of converting.

Regardless of your choice, understand the metrics in general and then apply them to your situation.

2. Why Video Works So Well

At an innate level, we already understand why video works so well. It is the medium through which we are used to getting information. We watch the news, documentaries and entertainment. We are pre-programmed (forgive the pun) to take in the content of a video and rely on it.

People who watch product videos believe they know the company behind it better and certainly believe they have a better understanding of the product.

3. Video Works in the Same Way as Other Internet Content

A video is another content piece, albeit an important one. This means you must think about it in the same way as you would anything else, for instance, how people will find it, using which search words, etc. In other words, SEO optimization is just as crucial for videos as for written content. Titles, metadata use and keywords are all important.

4. Good Video Is Central to Your Message

Intuitively we know this too. Think of the times when you have watched a video where the content is in one language but the original speaker’s mother-tongue is something else. It is great for a laugh, but it does not sell.

Video has to be of consistently high quality -- and the word is consistent. A one-off, satisfying as it is, will never get the job done.

The key to consistent quality comes in editing. Of course, you’ll need some editing software. There are many apps available if you don’t have one, including some like Filmora which is free and comes loaded with all the tools needed.

The real trick with editing though, is to shoot in small segments, so they can be edited together to create a powerful message. When you read how to do this, the clear thing is a handle at the beginning and the end. This is a few seconds of video at either end of the segment which allows you to attach it to another to create a whole.

Conclusion

If you are shying away from video because the cost intimidates you, then look again. Today it does not have to be costly. Every time you do a webinar you have created lots of content which can be sliced and diced and used in all sorts of ways beyond the original idea.

Keep this in mind: of the billion hours of video watched today how would you get your target audience to see yours? If you have never used video before then an all-singing-all-dancing video which is going to cost thousands is not the place to start. A how-to video which will attract your current base is a better start and then, once you know how they react, re-purpose the content to another use.

Video Marketing is just marketing, except it will be watched not read. You want the same things from it; you want your prospect to engage to the end, and then to convert, as you would with any other marketing content. A video is head-and-shoulders the best way if you do it right.

Liza Brown

Liza Brown is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Liza Brown