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6 Ways to Market Your Business with Video

One of the most wonderful things about the Internet is that it opens up entirely new ways to advertise for products and services.  As the trend in television has gone for quite some time, the line between marketing and entertainment has continued to blur, and the ease with which somebody can get started means that people are looking for new and better ways to get potential customers watching them and their contributions online.  Even the technology has changed, making “video marketing” something that refers to a whole lot of different systems.  Here are only a few of the many choices out there.

1.  Free Sites

Often, just being able to create and post videos can be enough to garner attention to you or your website and start to bring in leads.  Free sites like YouTube or Dailymotion allow you to upload your videos quickly and easily.  Most can be produced with as little as a smart phone and hosted within minutes.  The best thing about free sites like this is that it’s easy to embed the video into your own website, so hosting becomes a breeze.

2.  Opt-in Sites

It’s possible now to either host or join websites that will make your videos available, but only after a free sign up by the person who wants to view it.  These are often reserved for longer videos, usually ones that cover important subjects in depth and would be interesting enough for people to take the time to actually fill out the form.  However, if you start to get a reputation for being knowledgeable in your field, more people will be willing to opt-in in order to hear what you have to say.

3.  Micro Videos

With the introduction of Instagram’s 15 second clips and Twitter’s Vine platform, it’s now possible to post very short, low quality videos.  These punchy little bursts of video are quick to make and easy to share, and have been embraced by companies like Nike to show off their product without investing too much effort into production.  President Obama even sent a message to Batkid through Vine when that happened.

4.  Webcasts

There are a number of different webcasting hosts out there that can help you upload your prerecorded videos and even create subscription services for them.  If you have a repeated web series that you want people to be able to watch, or one that comes out on a regular basis, finding a good way to host your webcast is a fantastic option in order to get more people to come to your website, share your videos, and associate your brand with expertise in your particular field.

5.  Hosting Webinars and Web Round tables

A great way to really utilize video to your advantage online is to host discussions using video conferencing either with select people or by opening up to a larger audience.  This can do a number of things, the most important being to humanize you and, by extension, your company.  It also makes you seem like a leader for organizing these sorts of discussions and increases the sense of your accessibility.  And if all of that wasn’t enough, you can have productive discussions with customers and colleagues to get a sense of what you can do to improve your company for the future.  These types of interactions can be done with software as simple as Google Hangouts for very small groups, or a number of hosts for groups as high as several hundred participants.

6.  Software Demos

Not every video presentation has to have your face in it.  It’s very easy with software like Jing and Screenflow to show what’s happening on your desktop.  It’s then very simple to make videos of how you go about engaging in social media, how a particular application works, how to create an effective workflow, or any number of other things.  Videos can be of anything that people are interested in enough to watch, so don’t be afraid to try something new or different.

These are only a few of the many ways that video marketing can be a boon to your business.  Try out a few and see how much more attention your company gets when you use video in your marketing.