Video is a powerful marketing tool. Over 90% of people reported wanting to see more videos from brands in 2023. Marketers consider video as a very important part of their marketing strategy. If you’re a new business planning its internet marketing, you will have thought about making videos to build brand awareness and customer engagement. In this post, we discuss the steps to creating a video marketing strategy. 

1. Allocate resources

How much will a video production agency cost you? Is it more economical to add a videographer to your payroll? What are the benefits of hiring one over the other? Estimate the costs you can expect to bear and the pros and cons of each option to allocate resources. Here are some tips to help you get started. 

Costs of an in-house corporate videographer

The average annual salary of an in-house corporate videographer is $79,700.  Add to this the upfront cost of video equipment and editing tools. Equipment can range anywhere from $5,000 to $10,000 or more, depending on brand and quality. 

Outsourcing video production will cost you about $700 on the lower end and up to $5,000 per video on the higher end. The cost will depend on the length of the video and post-production time. 

Pros of an in-house videographer 

• Have a deep understanding of your brand 

• Flexibility in setting timelines 

• Can schedule reshoots easily

• Full creative control

Cons of an in-house videographer

• Difficult to have an unbiased perspective

• Usually a large upfront investment in equipment

• Output limited by team size

• In a smaller team, members must have multiple skills

Pros of outsourcing to a video production company 

• Experience working for a variety of clients

• Creative flair and technical expertise 

• More hands on deck, an advantage over a lone member or small in-house team

• Up to date with the latest video production and marketing trends and techniques

• No need to invest in equipment 

Cons of outsourcing to a video production company 

• Understanding of your brand runs less deep than in-house creatives

• Limited creative control

• No say over project timeline

Consider these factors in determining whether you’d like to keep production within your company or involve a professional agency. If outsourcing video production, review agencies and look at their portfolios to understand if they’re a good fit for you. 

2. Build your story

Every video tells a story. Think about the story you want to share with your audience and how you want to do it. Here are some timeless tips:

• Create a strong narrative arc: Modern stories follow a familiar narrative arc: the beginning, middle, rising action, and resolution, which create a clear, engaging path of a story. 

• Write for your target audience: Build your story with your target audience’s pain points, needs, and interests in mind. Pick a challenge, choose the main characters, create the narrative arc, and make modifications as needed.

• Use the 4 Ps of storytelling: Set the plot of your video. Choose the purpose of your story and the message you want viewers to take away. Decide the people (characters) of your story and their respective roles. Determine the place (location and background) of the story, i.e., where will the story take place?

• Show more, tell less: Along with a script that’s crisp and easy to understand, contextual and engaging visuals help convey the essence of your story. Keeping in mind that quite a bit of the work happens in post-production, it’s worth investing in video editing tools. 

• Make it short:  According to a survey by HubSpot Blog Research, 36% of video marketers believe that the optimal video length is 1-3 minutes. Aim for a short, snappy video, but make it long enough to include all the important points about your product. 

3. Share your videos on multiple channels

Your website apart, upload your videos to your social media pages. Consider these tips to attract more views:

• Make your video thumbnail stand out. Canva is an excellent platform to create a unique thumbnail by adding original, branded elements. A free version is available. 

• Get found more easily by adding a descriptive title and tags to your videos. Also write a detailed description of what your video is about. Add a catchy headline relevant to the video’s content. These efforts will help your video be found more easily through organic search. 

• A playlist grouping your videos together can help get more views for individual videos. For example, if you have a video series, you can add all the videos to the playlist to drive more views for each video in the series. 

• Promote your videos by embedding them in your blog posts and email newsletters. Share a short preview of your video on social media, with a link to the full video. 

• Create a video ad on YouTube that sends people to your website. 

• Reshare your videos. Check the times of day that attract higher engagement, and schedule shares to these times. Also re-promote your videos on specific days. 

• Reach out to industry bloggers and influencers requesting them to link to your video. 

• Encourage your team to share the video with their friends and family.

4. Track results

Measure the performance of your videos to know how your target is engaging with them, which will offer insights into the effectiveness of your video marketing strategy. Metrics to monitor include the engagement of each video, view count, click through, rate of play, and the conversion rate.

Measuring the conversion rate of videos is not straightforward, so you may want to engage an expert to know the right approach for it. References for performance data are the social media websites themselves - Facebook Insights and YouTube Analytics. You can also use video marketing analytics tools like Wave. video, SE Ranking, and Finteza for data. 

Parting tip: Build a social media calendar

A social media calendar states the content you plan to publish in the coming month. It generally has two types of video: organic and paid for different kinds of audiences and goals. With a calendar in place, you can plan your video content in a timely manner.