Video helps businesses tell stories that sell. The medium’s capacity to communicate complex ideas, create emotional responses, and tell compelling stories makes videos one of the best tools in your marketing arsenal.
Video marketing content doesn’t just consist of advertising videos. The term includes any type of video that targets a specific stage in the marketing funnel. Videos can be used to cultivate awareness, sway consideration, increase conversions, and cultivate loyalty. Multiple types of videos, ranging from explainers to live streams to product demonstrations, have evolved from these different purposes.
Main benefits of video marketing
Below, we list the benefits of leveraging video as a communication tool and how its effectiveness impacts your bottom line.
Can communicate complex information
The difference between video and static forms of media like text, visuals, and infographics is that it allows viewers to consume content passively. Images force us to reach into our minds for associations and feelings, while text forces us to engage our imagination to create a picture. Meanwhile, video can combine audio, text, and visuals to paint the clearest picture possible.
Take product demonstrations, for example. If you’ve never encountered the product before, you might struggle to imagine a text-based description of it. Images might help, but they’re limited in their ability to display the cause-and-effect sequences that occur when interacting with a product.
Meanwhile, video product demonstrations can use visuals to show you how something works and then use audio to provide additional context and explanations.
Increases emotional connection
Evoking emotional responses through static media is difficult, as images and text work with fewer elements that are capable of stimulating the senses. Meanwhile, video can audio, visuals, and narration to keep viewers immersed. Elements like color, music, tone, and composition can create emotional cues that impact the viewing experience. The emotional associations help your brand become more memorable.
Take Budweiser’s anti-drunk driving ad, for example. The narrative takes the viewer through the emotional journey of a dog bonding with its owner. It uses happy music and imagery to create positive feelings that appeal to the relatable experience of loving a pet. The music gets somber once the story presents the risk of losing a person to drunk driving. Because the video plays with the viewer’s emotions, it more effectively drives its point home.
Improves accessibility
Human brains think in various ways. Some are more naturally attuned to text, others to audio, and others to visuals. Because static media limits you to one format, it alienates customers who might prefer others. Meanwhile, video content combines all three, ensuring that every type of viewer receives stimuli that align with their natural inclinations.
Reduces the possibility of misinterpretation
It’s challenging to connect with customers via text and image alone. Static media limits your ability to express tone and emotion, allowing viewers to add their own interpretations freely.
Video, on the other hand, gives you more control. Elements like color, composition, music, and narration can help you deliver your message in the exact manner you want it delivered. You are less likely to become misinterpreted because you have the freedom to control how your presence comes across.
Deepens human connection
Live-action videos often lend themselves to deeper human connections. Representing your brand through human voices or faces helps viewers feel your presence, cultivating a sense of closeness. Formats like live streams take this a step further by letting brand representatives interact with viewers in real time. In humanizing your brand, you foster a sense of loyalty, increasing your chances of converting or retaining leads.
Enhances brand identity
As mentioned above, video conveys tone more effectively than static media. The format’s flexibility empowers you to express your brand’s personality, helping you stand out in a crowded digital marketing landscape.
Let’s look at Bench Accounting’s YouTube page. Bench Accounting is a Vancouver-based online bookkeeping service. Its YouTube catalog consists of a combination of promotional videos explaining its services and educational videos teaching accounting concepts. They convey personality through visuals, tone, and content.
The clear lighting and minimalist aesthetics create associations with transparency, humility, and simplicity; the warm and even tone casts them as trustworthy, caring, and professional; and the educational content establishes their solid industry expertise.
Improves brand recall
Not all video marketing campaigns need to promote your products overtly. Instead, they can provide content that aligns with your target customers’ needs, values, and interests. Just attach your brand label to your creations to have users associate your company with the content they find valuable. In fact, 90% of the video marketers surveyed in a Wyzowl report said that video helped them increase brand awareness.
Take the example of Bench Accounting above. They create educational content on accounting concepts to establish themselves as industry thought leaders. Users searching for answers to accounting questions will find their content and associate them with accounting expertise. Should they need accounting services in the future, Bench Accounting will be at the top of their minds.
Boosts mobile engagement
Smartphone usage occupies a huge chunk of our day-to-day lives. In fact, the average person spends 4 hours and 37 minutes on their phone daily. This means that if you create mobile-friendly content, you stand a greater chance of capturing the attention of somebody who’s incorporated smartphone entertainment into their daily routines. And today, that’s most people.
Additionally, Insivia’s 2023 marketing report showed that 92% of mobile video viewers shared their content with others. Mobile-friendly video engages viewers and compels them to spread your content further into their network. This allows you to expand your reach exponentially with minimal investment.
Attracts high-quality leads
The benefits of video marketing add to higher rates of lead generation. Communicating your brand, product, or service effectively gives your customers a clear picture of what you offer. Increasing brand awareness puts you top of mind. Then, engagement proliferates your content further, increasing your reach. You’re now able to attract leads who are aware of what you do and need your solutions.
In fact, marketers get 66% more qualified leads through video marketing than traditional marketing channels. Attracting more people to your product lends to a higher likelihood of increased sales.
Increases Sales
Because videos are so effective at communicating ideas and generating leads, leveraging video for marketing leads to increased sales.
For one, videos can effectively illustrate what a product does and explain why it matters. For another, video helps create emotional associations with your product. The medium’s ability to elicit emotional responses, such as excitement or fear of missing out, helps drive buying decisions.
Benefits of video marketing across different platforms
Video marketing will yield platform-specific benefits if you succeed in leveraging an understanding of each website’s specific culture. Below, we discuss the impact of video marketing on different social media platforms.
LinkedIn is part of the job board and part of the networking platform. Its primary purpose is to help companies and individuals create connections that will support their careers. Promoting a brand identity, be it for an individual or a business, is the norm on LinkedIn. Therefore, video marketing would not feel out of place on the platform. You get to distribute your content to an audience that is ready to receive it.
Text-based content currently dominates the platform. Video content can be a welcome disruption to a reading-heavy website. Creating video content will help you stand out and attract not just customers but also potential partners, contractors, or employees.
YouTube
YouTube is the most popular platform for long-form video distribution. While standing out in the sea of content can be challenging, the platform is still a great place to host your videos. Because the website is so popular, most other platforms let you share or embed YouTube content, increasing your distribution options.
Distributing videos on YouTube also helps you boost SEO. If you add target keywords to your tags, titles, and descriptions, people searching YouTube and Google will come across your content. This creates a positive feedback loop wherein the engagement you receive builds your authority in Google’s eyes, allowing you to rank higher and increase your visibility.
TikTok
If YouTube is a platform leader in long-form video content, TikTok is the platform leader for short-form video content. Compared to other social media websites, TikTok is relatively new, and has primarily attracted a user base of millennials, Gen Z, and younger. As a result of its format, which makes vertically-oriented content the default, informal videos made for mobile are the norm.
Posting videos on TikTok helps you tap into the Gen Z market. Because the platform is dominated by more informal, conversational, and humorous content, high-quality production is not a priority. You can study how to align your content with TikTok’s casual voice to save on production costs while delivering engaging content.
TikTok also allows you to leverage user-generated content. Features like duets, stitches, and hashtags let users build on your videos. You can leverage the mutual need for engagement to distribute your content across user networks and increase your reach.
Instagram is similar to TikTok in that it prioritizes short-form videos. The culture on Instagram Reels mirrors TikTok’s video catalog: informal, humorous, and conversational content are dominant. Therefore, whatever benefits you yield from marketing on TikTok will also apply to Instagram video marketing.
The main difference is the demographic. TikTok primarily consists of users in their mid-twenties and younger. Meanwhile, Instagram, which has a more extended history as a social media platform, comprises users in their mid-twenties and older. Instagram has also had a history of prioritizing aesthetically pleasing content, which means it’s the platform to choose if you have a strong visual identity.
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FAQs
Are videos more effective at communicating information than text?
An Elsevier study explains that videos are more effective at communicating information than reading because the ability to understand speech developed earlier in the course of human evolution than the ability to understand writing. Additionally, video provides simultaneous auditory and visual stimuli, engaging both verbal and visual memory for understanding.
Meanwhile, reading requires more cognitive load because it involves retrieving letter and word patterns from long-term memory. More work is involved, as opposed to the passive experience of having video engage your senses and memory.
How do you measure success in video marketing?
There are multiple metrics you can use to measure success in video marketing. If your aim is to attract leads, view count is a valuable metric. If you want to increase brand awareness, pay attention to watch time and engagement. Finally, if your video provides a call to action, you can check the click-through rate to determine its effectiveness at converting.
What type of marketing video is most popular?
A 2024 Statista report, which evaluated video popularity based on weekly usage reach, showed that music videos, comedy videos, video live streams, educational videos, and tutorial videos are the most popular types of videos online.
