Unless you have been avoiding the Internet for the last few years, you will have noticed that video is everywhere. Not only are people uploading videos to YouTube, but also blogs, websites, social media sites like Facebook and image sharing apps like Instagram and Vine. Video content is becoming more and more popular with consumers, making it one of the most valuable forms of media for brands to utilise in their marketing strategies.

Improve customer engagement by producing valuable video content for your website and social media pages.

According to a study by Animoto, ninety six per cent of consumers find video content useful when making a purchasing decision online and seventy one per cent of people find that watching video content produced by businesses gives them a more positive impression of their brand, service and products.

Seeing as it is video that consumers are interested in (YouTube alone gets more than four billion views a day) it seems only sensible that brands invest in video production. Here we will delve into some of the reasons why video content is so beneficial in regards to customer engagement and the type of videos consumers find most useful.

Extend your reach by uploading video content to websites like YouTube.

What’s so great about video content?

Before you go ahead and invest in our Newcastle video production services, you will probably want to know what’s so great about video content and how it can benefit your business.

Let’s kick things off by saying that video content is easily the most convenient type of content for customers to digest. Unlike with written content, which they actively have to read and process, with video they can just sit back and digest the information they are being given. It’s also a lot quicker for customers to watch a video that read an article and thanks to smartphones and digital tablets; they can even watch them on the go.

Whereas in the past video production would have been strictly reserved for larger and well-established companies due to its expense, today it is affordable to companies of all sizes. Most smartphones are equipped with a camera, meaning that anyone, anywhere can make a video for their company if they want to. Mixing it up with professional videos produced by video companies like us, with homemade videos shot on your smartphone is a great way to engage with customers.

Business of all sizes and from all industries can benefit from creating video content and here we will explain how.

Enhance customer engagement

If you are looking for a way to increase customer engagement, whether through your website, blog or social media pages, creating video content provides the perfect solution. Customers are much more likely to respond to video content and share it with others. In fact more than five hundred years’ worth of YouTube videos are watched everyday on Facebook and more than seven hundred YouTube videos are shared on Twitter every minute.

It is fair to say that video footage can bring products and services to life in a way that images and text cannot. It also provides business owners with the opportunity to engage with their customers on a more personal level. Although they are not sitting face to face in real time, video provides the next best thing.

Over the last few years video sharing has become a huge part of social media and since social media is such a big part of our lives, it makes sense to promote your products and services this way.

Improve reputation

Customer engagement is all about building up trust and loyalty. The better you engage with your customers, the more likely they are to trust you and become loyal to your brand. A great way to build up trust and loyalty, thus improving your reputation, is to create unique, interesting and valuable video content.

Numerous studies have found that watching company videos gives consumers a positive impression of brands and builds up their trust in a company’s products and services. Videos that contain behind the scenes footage, Q&A sessions and interviews are particularly great for this, as they allow customers to get to know the people behind the business and it suddenly becomes much more than just a website to them.

If you are looking for a way to improve your reputation and give your business a competitive edge, video is the way to do it.

Expand audience

Not only can producing videos help you to engage with existing customers, but it also opens the door to new visitors who may go on to become loyal customers too. Thanks to websites like YouTube, you have the opportunity to market your products and services to a global audience. If you are looking to grow your business and extend your marketing reach to a wider audience, creating video content will prove to be an effective solution.

Video content improves buyer confidence resulting in increased sales.

Increase sales

We have already mentioned that video content can help to build up customers trust in your company, but it can also take things a step further by actually helping you to make sales. Customers are much more likely to purchase a product or service if they can watch a video explaining it first. Video content gives them the confidence they need in your brand to make the purchase.

It is argued that video content is important at all stages of the purchasing process from the initial comparison of products, through to researching different models from a single brand to working out how to use a product post-purchase. So when it comes to producing videos for customer engagement purposes, it is well worth considering how you can use your content to meet the needs and requirements of customers at different stages of the purchasing process.

SEO benefits

Something that is also worth mentioning is the fact that video content has significant SEO (search engine optimisation) benefits. YouTube is the second largest search engine after Google and you will find that more often than not, YouTube videos appear on Google’s search results pages.

Showing you are knowledgeable about a particular niche through the video content you produce is a great way to get noticed by Google. Social signals are also taken into consideration by search engines, so the more popular your video content is, the more likely you are to be ranked higher on relevant search results pages. That’s food for thought right there.

Tips for producing video content

When it comes to producing video content for your website, blog or social media pages, you will need to spend time thinking about the type of content that will be most appealing to your target audience. Think about what information they need from you and the best way to deliver it.

Longer videos aren’t necessarily the best choice for all businesses. Sometimes it’s better to keep them short and sweet; simply delivering the exact information your customers need and nothing more.

You should also think about where they are likely to be when watching your video, what device they are using and how much time they are likely to have. Pre-determining all of these questions will help you create more engaging and effective video content.

When creating video content, think about the types of videos that your customers will engage with the most.

Video ideas for you to consider

Before we finish up, we though we would share a few video ideas to get you started. All of these ideas will prove to be very valuable with regards to improving customer engagement.

• Product demonstrations and how to videos
• Event filming (conferences, product launches etc.)
• Q&A sessions (answering FAQs on camera)
• Interviews with employees / behind the scenes

Conclusion

With so many benefits, it is no wonder that so many companies now invest a significant amount of their marketing budgets in video production. Not only does it help brands to market their products and services, but also engage with new and existing customers. For more information about how your business could benefit from our Newcastle video production services, take a quick look around our website then get in touch.

Image credits: michaelbmxking www_ukberri_net, danielfoster437 and FotodioxPro