With video media becoming more and more popular, it only makes sense that video has become an integral part of viral marketing. However, few startups know how to use video to boost awareness and increase conversions, and even fewer know how to use video well. Luckily, Shawn Parrotte, Marketing Manager at Designli and friend of the Founder Institute, explains how startups can incorporate video into their marketing strategy.
When promoting your startup, chances are you’re looking for as many ways to increase the exposure of your company as possible. And while there are quite a few avenues to accomplish this, like press releases, content marketing, and digital ads, there are perhaps none as powerful as video. Let’s look at some ways to leverage video for your startup.
Explainer Videos
One of the best ways to familiarize your audience with the fundamentals of your startup is by creating an explainer video. These videos are most often short videos that give viewers an opportunity to learn about the product and/or services being offered. The short duration of the video means that there’s less chance that viewers will become disinterested, and with the right production it can be both entertaining and informative. These explainer videos act as the frontline for expressing the core ideas of your startup.
Success Stories
There's nothing more important to a startup than satisfied customers. A great way to show that your startup is being met with enthusiasm is by creating success story videos. Having actual clients or customers talk about the wonderful experience they’ve had with you will help entice others that may be considering your services. In addition, it shows that you are striving to meet the needs of consumers.
Company Founder Stories
People often start new companies because they’re passionate about a certain problem. For instance, a dog lover may decide that they’d like to form a startup to develop technologies for locating lost pets. Videos that feature the founder sharing their own personal story and the reasons they were compelled to start the company will help customers understand its underlying mission. If you’re comfortable on camera, you can really make authentic connections with your target audience.
Vlogging
While vlogging is less popular among startups than some other video formats, it does provide viewers with a more intimate understanding of what’s going on behind the scenes. Vlogging provides a means of updating the audience with the current happenings within the company and it could offer insight into any improvements that are being made. An advantage to vlogging is that business owners can choose to implement the videos at a set time so that customers will know when the next video will be available. Vlogs also allow companies to show off new products that are in the early stages of development so that viewers can get an idea of things to come.
Tutorials
If your startup offers products that require a bit of a learning curve before users can comfortably use all of its functions, then a tutorial video is just what you need to make. Tutorials are perfect for explaining all the functions of specific products. For example, if your company is developing a software platform aimed at helping you to keep track of your finances and investments, then through the use of a video tutorial, you can help walk customers through the steps that are involved in setting up the application and linking accounts. An added benefit of tutorials is that you can produce a video for each one of your products, and even multiple videos if the topic is in-depth.
Live-Streaming
Although, less common than many of the other ways to leverage videos for your startup, live-streaming is starting to gain traction within the startup community. Depending on the platform where the video is live-streamed, this type of video can allow viewers to ask questions and offer their own thoughts within the video feed. This can be great to generate conversation within the community. Furthermore, live-streaming also gives startups an opportunity to find out how much interest they’re generating by noting the number of viewers watching the live presentation.
In Summary
When you’re forming a startup, you’ll want to consider one of the many formats used to leverage video. With a plethora of options, it is important to decide on the ones that will meet the needs of your business, based on the products or services you’ve developed.
(Video marketing. Approaches, methods and measures to promote products and services based on video. For web construction, banners, corporate brochures, book covers, layouts etc. Raster version image from Shutterstock)
