4 Reasons Why Video Belongs In Your Marketing Strategy

With 72% of people preferring to learn about a product through a video, it’s becoming clear why video belongs in the overall marketing strategy.

Twelve years ago, Steve Jobs put video into our pockets with the first iPhone. Every year since, video has changed the way we consume content and interact with each other, from binge-watching shows on a streaming service, raising awareness for healthcare research ala the ALS ice bucket challenge, live streaming important moments to friends on Facebook, to making a purchasing decision based on online video testimonial.

As we enter a new decade, video will continue to impact not only our daily lives, but business outcomes, too. For many organizations, video is already an integral part of the marketing mix. For others, it is just now emerging as an important tactic of their business growth strategies, whether they use video to reach and convert new customers, increase engagement, improve return on investment, and more. With 72% of people preferring to learn about a product or service through a video, it’s becoming increasingly clear why video belongs in the overall marketing strategy.

Here are four areas that speak to video’s strength.

Video Delivers Insightful Data

For marketers, video isn’t just the means to tell a good story and connect with customers. It’s highly measurable, and can provide marketers with a deep understanding of how their content is consumed. Video can even show a return on investment. Metrics such as video views, replays, or even data around when a video is stopped give marketers the insight they need to gauge the effectiveness of the video or know when a video has directly impacted a business’ bottom line.

These analytics even go a step further and allow marketers a deeper connection with their customers by understanding what videos are resonating the best—so they know when to create more. For haircare company Milbon, an analysis of video views and completion rates allowed the company to create more relevant content so they could continuously deliver videos that their customers wanted to see. This level of customer-centricity is essential when trying to stand out in such a competitive landscape.

It’s not just about analyzing videos’ performance against internal metrics either: External metrics in the form of industry benchmarks can help marketers understand how their videos are performing in a broader context to help them adjust their campaigns accordingly.

Video Can Be Optimized For Different Platforms

Creating a video campaign is only half of the equation. The other part is maintaining and continuously refining video campaigns to ensure successful marketing strategies can be sustained. Some video types, such as interviews and live streaming, perform better on social media than on other channels. Various video formats also can be employed for efficacy. For example, GIFs offer a way for shorter takes on a subject matter, and a better mobile experience. It’s critical that videos meet the various viewing expectations on every platform.

Looking at the mobile space in particular, the average person spends four hours a day on their devices. That’s 25% of our average waking hours. For marketers this means an abundance of opportunity for engagement, but they also need to ensure their video content is optimized for mobile viewing to support the variety of platforms videos are consumed on daily–social media, company websites, via streaming sites, and more. Additionally, we’re seeing more companies launch their own mobile apps so that viewers can have video access points that are designed specifically for mobile devices. Whether it is a vertical video or perhaps square if it’s on Instagram, for example, or if the video offers a preview by a quick montage, videos that run seamlessly within the mobile experience will more likely mean the video will be consumed.

To show the effectiveness of their video choices, marketers can turn to video analytics to understand how specific content is performing. From there, they can modify videos that are underperforming, or they can create similar video types that are driving the best results.

Video Can Be Streamlined Into Workflows

Integrating video into current business applications, such as marketing automation platforms like Marketo, is another major component of a successful video strategy. Marketers use many tools in their daily work lives to drive efforts like lead generation, SEO, and social marketing–to name a few–so it’s a more efficient workflow when video is another added feature, rather than an additional standalone tool. For example, online accounting software company Xero found that having video capabilities directly within its Marketo workflow is one of the key factors in retaining its customers, as video has been able to support every stage of the customer lifecycle and allow the company to create more authentic, engaging touch points.

Whether video is integrated directly within a marketing automation platform, a clickable email thumbnail, or an easy upload to social channels, having a seamless process for video creation and the ability to easily share it with customers is a sure way to derive the most value from video.

It’s Not As Hard As It Seems

One of the biggest changes over the past decade has been the shift from highly produced, scripted video content to more authentic and user-generated video. This means brands don’t need to spend thousands of dollars to create branded videos. Instead, they can use their resources to communicate their messages.

In the past, creating videos meant allocating more budget and resources. But these days they’re easier to create than ever, and we’re seeing more companies like Dunkin’ Brands building out in-house video production efforts to increase the use of video and in fact, save money. What is even better is most smartphones can deliver professional-grade video quality with minimal user training, so there’s no need to invest in expensive video equipment.

When video becomes an embedded component in the marketing strategy and properly leverages performance data, businesses can expect to see higher quality leads, better conversion rates, and a stronger overall business impact. Ready to get in on the action?