A recent review of the most popular B2B marketing tactics clearly shows the growing popularity of the video format – as many as 76% of marketers admitted they like to use videos to engage their business audiences. Using video for promotional purposes has never been easier – marketers can use specialized apps and programs to create professionally-looking videos that showcase their product and clarify its value. Here are five most effective video formats compiled specifically for the needs of B2B marketing.
1. Interviews with industry influencers
Research your sector to identify key figures and influencers, focusing on those who have lots of followers and whose reputation will help you promote your content once you publish it. Schedule an interview with them, where you’ll ask about the overall industry trends, or their experiences and thoughts about the future of the sector.
Make sure that your video is information-rich, so industry publications will link to it. Creating a piece of viral content will help you in achieving greater visibility in search engines, but also build a reputation among your customer base.
2. Product demos
This kind of video is a perfect method for pitching your product to key decision-makers who have no time to spare for listening to salespeople or read long promotional descriptions. By providing engaging and informative product demos, you’ll be showing how your product can be used on the basis of clear examples. By optimizing the pages with your video, you can make them perform well in search, ensuring more exposure for your product in search engines.
3. Manufacturing tours
You’d be surprised how many people in your audience are curious about your production process. Even if you don’t have cool data centers like Google, you can show how you operate and what’s different about your manufacturing process. Being transparent in this way will help you build a stronger brand – a brand that simply can be trusted to deliver its promises.
4. Conference presentations
If your executive team is often out and about on conferences, workshops and industry events, it’s a great idea to record some of their presentations, lectures or chats and then divide them into small digestible portions of valuable commentary.
Cover topics on industry trends, innovative technologies or future predictions. They’re bound to attract the attention of your audience. If you haven’t done that already, you should have a look at what your target audience usually searches for – this will give you a clear idea about what their interests are, helping you to optimize your content.
5. Customer testimonials
If you had a couple of customers who were very happy with your product, you might be able to persuade them to share their feelings in front of a camera. The truth is that everyone loves to talk about their own success, so if your product played a part in it, customers will mention it while talking about themselves.
Prepare a Q&A focused on the success of your customers. They will share the video to their own social networks, ensuring a higher visibility for your brand. Moreover, you can use these videos later as referrals, which are far more credible than a couple of general comments on paper.
If you’ve got the budget and resources, consider outsourcing this task to professionals – portals like Gumtree are full of freelancers specializing in video creation. Choosing some of the video formats listed above, you’ll be able to effectively engage other businesses, promote your product, ensure that your content is displayed at the very top of search rankings and build your status in the online community.