How does your brand survive the flood of competition? With all the advertising flooding the minds of potential customers, how do they choose which message to listen to? Noah was able to predict the future, he knew a flood was coming. To prepare, he build an Ark so that he could survive while the rest drowned in the flood of their ignorance. What if Noah never built the Ark? It’s not enough to predict the future, you have to be able to use the tools that will grow your online presence. Here are seven tips on why you need video for your ark.
1. Best Medium for Storytelling
There’s power in telling story through images, motion and music. Video is the only medium that uses all other mediums; images, songs and words. When you use motion and apply it to the other three of these mediums correctly it can create a beautiful alchemy of a video medium that brings out powerful emotions in people. If you have a product that people will buy after using it, you need video. It’s the best experience someone can have with out playing with the product. Its no coincident that when someone watches a video on the product page of ZAGG.com it increases the chances of buying by 65%.
2. SEO Benefits
YouTube is the second largest search engine. Since video and YouTube is newer media, it’s not saturated like the google search engine which makes it easier to rank higher. Video adds a 50% higher rank in SEO for websites that use video. The Google algorithm places a higher importance on sites with video than the sites with no video. Not only do videos show up in the google search engine, but they show above the other highly ranked sites giving your brand valuable online real estate.
3. Brand Awareness
Video is one of the best ways to tell the story of your brand. If you really want to add stickiness to your message or story, using video with YouTube is a no brainer. YouTube not only allows others to easily embed your videos on other sites, but also allows people to easily share your message with others. If you provide valuable content, people will do marketing for you by sharing your message in their networks, thus exposing your brand to more people. Let’s not forget that YouTube is one of the top 3 social media sites as well as a search engine.
4. Video Creates Value
If your website has video, you’re website is legit. That’s a fact. When someone comes across your homepage for the first time and see a video that explains what you do and the features of your product, they’re instantly thinking, “Wow, we’re dealing with some high quality shit here.” People online are freaking lazy, they don’t want to read about your company or product, they want to watch what your product does. Please don’t take the laziness away from people, reading is too much work for people these days. Help contribute to their laziness and entertainment by creating videos for them.
5. AdWords for Video
Google recently released Adwords for Video, which is a marketing tool that allows you to targeted potential customers based on keywords that they search in YouTube. We at ZAGG were one of the first companies to start using this in its beta version and we love it. If you want to get a message out there to a relevant audience this is the tool to do that. As a YouTube Marketing Ambassador I recommend you sign up for free and start experimenting.
6. Your Own TV Channel
YouTube is doing to TV what TV did to the Radio. It’s replacing it with better technology. I grew up watching sesame street on TV everyday, my kids are going to be watching Sesames’ YouTube Channel on the iPad everyday. This transformation is rapidly taking place and brands better be doing the same if they want to last.
Think of the value of a weekly show that your potential customers subscribe to and watch every week on your YouTube Channel. It cost no where near the amount of having an actual TV show too. The beautiful part is the analytics of it. You can see who, where, when and how they’re watching it. Good luck getting that detailed of information from a TV channel. This leads perfectly into the next point…
7. YouTube Analytics
The amount of information google knows about people is disgusting, it should be illegal. Now you can find out more information about your audience than the CIA has on file. YouTube provides its creators with in depth data of their videos. Some of the benefits include…
- Knowing who’s watching your videos
- When are they watching
- How did they find your videos
- What site sent them to your video
- Traffic referrals
- How old are the people watching
- The demographics of your audience
- Where in the world are they watching
- Get Analytics on each specific video or on your Channel as a whole.
As a marketer this information is so valuable. You can optimize your channel by customizing your videos based on the data that YouTube provides.
Takeaway
What would have happened if Noah never built the Ark? We know what the future is, what are you doing to insure your survival? The floods of competition are here and will continue to pour down. Video is the Ark that will insure your success in reaching your customers. Predicting the future is only half of it, building the tools to take advantage of our knowledge is the other half. If you brand wants to survive you need video as part of your marketing. It’s going to keep growing and growing so you better get on the boat now before you drown. YouTube is the wild west… It’s new open territory with no rules. It’s first come first serve and you need to act now to claim your land. There’s so much opportunity in YouTube and it’s reserved for those who act.