We are experiencing a revolution in the way people get information and entertainment: online video.
This communication revolution provides small business with extraordinary opportunities to market themselves and levels the playing field between businesses with large advertising budgets and those with smaller advertising budgets. Cathleen Kane, of Modern Media Messaging, in Corrales, NM writes in about how new developments in digital video and online video can become the most important weapon in your business’ marketing arsenal.
Why Advertise with Video?
Video is and always has been among the most powerful ways to advertise. Video combines sight, movement and sound to create an emotive, more memorable connection with potential customers. People are bombarded every day with emails, text-laden web sites, and oftentimes annoying banner ads, online video has the ability to break through the clutter and communicate meaningfully.
Why online video?
Online video can reach a huge audience for a minimal investment, thus the ROI of online video marketing can be astounding. ComScore Video Metrix service, a leader in measuring the digital world, today recently reported that U.S. Internet users viewed 16.8 billion online videos during the month of April 2009, and 78.6 percent of the total U.S. Internet audience viewed online video, watching an average of 6.4 hours.
How does online video create a level playing field for small businesses?
Historically, when it comes to video, there’s been a series of unfair advantages in the favor of big companies: video production was expensive. Buying media was even more expensive.
Today, creating compelling video is very accessible to small businesses at a fraction of the cost. Instead of the traditional 30 second commercial spot that plays one or twice a week – often at odd times to make it affordable- now companies can create a piece with ten times the content at less than half the cost. By posting their videos in appropriate places, where their target audiences are likely to find them, their messages can be available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, across the world at a huge savings.
How does online video make my business stand out?
Here’s an example: a consumer searches on a search engine for a type of local business, say a restaurant or golf course. Chances are good they will naturally gravitate to a search result that has a video, where most others do not. They can just click on this, and rather than sift through the layers of text and photos, they can be entertained by a short, moving video. Viewers today are more attracted to video, and they remember it.
Also, search engine specialists believe that very soon the search engine algorhythms that determine your site’s ranking will be ranking websites with video higher than those without.
How does online video make my advertising campaign more flexible without exponentially increasing the budget?
The interactivity of video on the web leads to much more involvement and engagement by the consumer, which is exactly what marketers are trying to achieve. With online video, advertisers can do a much better job of story-telling This high engagement factor, combined with the Internet’s tracking and targeting capabilities potentially, offers advertisers a highly accountable method to sway the hearts and minds of their target audience.
Also, advances in digital technology have made it cost effective for businesses to compile a collection of “media assets” that can be changed, updated, and customized often to keep the advertising campaign fresh and noticeable.
What makes a successful online video campaign and how can it make me money?
The story still matters. And Quality matters. Viewers are increasingly sophisticated and demanding, they respond to a good story and they notice the quality of picture and sound.
The draw of the TV experience, combined with the interactivity and immediacy of the internet create engage and activate viewers.
The bottom line? Online video is the fastest growing medium in history and small businesses stand to be among the biggest beneficiaries of this exciting revolution.
