As you start to develop your video marketing campaign, it’s important for you to avoid the common pitfalls that many video producers face. If you can figure out how to avoid these simple mistakes, your video marketing strategy will make a major leap in the right direction.
No Video Marketing Campaign
The biggest mistake you can make is to not even have a video campaign. Don’t make videos just to be making videos. If that’s the case, your videos won’t do a whole lot for your company. You need a plan, or your videos won’t get far.
Avoid It: Develop an overarching strategy that will tie all your videos together. Start by defining a clear business objective for your video campaign. It will be much more effective if you know your goals and mission. Ask yourself, “Why am I making this video?” If you know the answer to this question every time you produce a video, it will be a success.
Just Sticking It on Youtube
You can’t just put your video on YouTube and expect it to take care of itself. YouTube gets 72 hours of video uploads every single minute. All this means for you is that your video is being buried with hundreds of other videos in every minute that goes by. Even though YouTube is popular, you’re limiting your reach by not looking into other sites too.
Avoid It: You need to promote your video through social media. It’s also a great idea to place your video on other sites besides YouTube. Start with your website and then try your Facebook page and Vimeo. Remember to always respond to comments that follow your video–it’ll make people want to engage even more.
Too Promotional
Don’t think of your video as a commercial. Nobody likes commercials. Remember, when people find your video online, they’re not there to watch an ad–they’re there to be educated or entertained.
Avoid It: Instead of seeing your videos as advertisements, think of them as videos that will educate your audience and solve their problems. This will help you to not overdo the product promotion. The last thing you want to do is shove your products down your customers’ throats.
Not Promoting Yourself
Don’t spend so much time creating a cool video that you forget to promote yourself. Yes, promoting your products too much can be a huge mistake. But not promoting yourself enough can be just as bad. You never want to make a video that people may remember, but they don’t remember where it came from.
Avoid It: Like we mentioned earlier, your videos should always have a goal to be effective. The bottom line is that you’re focused on getting people to your services, so make sure they remember you, and not just your video. Little things like including your logo or website in the video will go a long way.
Too Long
There’s simply too much competition to afford to make a boring video. Few videos are interesting enough to be watched for large amounts of time. If it starts to get boring, they’re going to click away. People are in a hurry to get what they want and will likely have stopped watching your video after ten seconds. And unfortunately for many videos, that means that they’re missing some of the biggest points.
Avoid It: It’s safe to keep your video between 30 seconds and 2 minutes long. A good way to keep it from getting boring is by properly organizing the video. Instead of waiting until the end of your video to include your selling points, start with the good stuff and go from there. Major points should always be at the beginning.
Placing It in the Wrong Spot
It doesn’t matter if you’ve made the best video in the world if no one can see it. By deeply embedding your video in a little-seen page on your website, you’re pretty much guaranteeing a little-seen video.
Avoid It: Place your videos where they are pertinent and where they are going to be found. The safest place will usually be on the website’s homepage, but if it work somewhere else (for example, an “About Us” video on your “About Us” page just makes sense), then go for it. A good idea would be to analyze which are your most visited pages and use those.
Too Much Information
If the message is too complicated or contains too much information, it’s going to get boring fast. Even a short video will feel like it’s too long if the message is hard to understand. For example, if you’re using one video to feature a new product, a spotlight on the Employee of the Month, an upcoming event, and a new location, your viewers are going to have a hard time remembering anything.
Avoid It: Your video needs to be memorable, so it’s best to keep it to a single message that’s clear and direct. Cut out everything that’s not important.
Not Leaving a Call to Action
You’re losing leads if your videos don’t invite the viewers to do something about the great video you just made.
Avoid It: Try adding a “Visit our website” or a “Follow us on…” in your video to spur some action. The viewers should always know what to do next.
No Clear Audience
If you don’t know who you’re talking to, you’re talking to no one. Your message won’t resonate with the audience because it will likely be about things they don’t care about. In fact, have a broad audience (such as “everyone”) can be just as harmful as not knowing your audience at all.
Avoid It: Instead of trying to appeal to everyone, determine a target audience. Decide what they’re interested in viewing. If you do know them, you’ll also know their problems, needs, and what to give them. It’ll help you tailor a personal message and be much more successful.