With 87% of online marketers using video content, creating a video marketing strategy has become standard practice for many brands.
It doesn’t matter whether it’s your first time developing a strategy, or your hundredth, it can set a clear path for campaign success. It can also help you understand your budget, team responsibilities, and timelines for your campaigns.
More often than not, the creation of this strategy will bring to light some common challenges. Although it can be different for each brand, we’ve outlined a few obstacles that you can expect and how to overcome them.
1. Lack of direction and clarity on key messages
Many marketing and communications professionals know that video content is important, which leads to them choosing to create a video without considering its purpose. Put simply, you don’t want to have a video for the sake of keeping up with the Joneses.
A lack of direction or topic ideas means that you might talk about something that doesn’t add value to your brand’s core message.
This can ultimately confuse your target audience and affect your overall ROI. This means you’ve spent time and resources on something that might not contribute positively to your campaign or your business.
The solution
Although video content is important, don’t invest in it until you have a good reason to.
For example, investing in an explainer video that highlights your key product or service is a future proof piece of content to include in your strategy.
You can also consider investing in internal communications videos that will support learning and development. These often have a positive impact on the team’s long-term engagement.
Before you get started, here are some of the questions you should ask yourself:
– What is my key message?
– Does this message make sense with company goals and KPIs?
– Is this a message that makes sense for my target audience’s needs and wants?
– Does it have the potential to positively impact my company, such as brand awareness, generating leads or boosting company engagement?
– Is the video going to serve my brand for an acceptable amount of time?
2. Lack of creativity
In addition to a clear direction, your video content strategy should plan to have eye-catching content for your audience. You may manage to identify a clear and concise message, but if the video itself doesn’t inspire someone to keep watching, it’s not going to matter.
With shorter than ever attention spans, we have mere seconds to capture the interest of someone. So, the trick is finding a method that works for the message and your company’s image.
This is a common struggle for brands, as there is a fine line between remaining professional and being entertaining.
The solution
Animated video can be the ideal solution for this and a welcomed addition to your video content plan.
The very nature of animated video means that it can capture the attention of a view and keep it. However, you have the ability to maintain a professional appearance and even incorporate your branding in a better way compared to a live-action video.
Take this animated film we created for financial services broker Brooks Macdonald as an example. It showcases a unique and friendly design while exploring everyday scenarios that customers could relate to whilst connecting them back to investing.
3. Understanding and planning what metrics to track
If you are under a tight deadline to present a compelling strategy, you may not consider that you need to plan out what metrics to track ahead of time. Instead, it will be something that is considered during or after the campaign is finished.
It can also be challenging to understand what metrics to look out for before you get started, which can lead to this step being deprioritised.
Like any campaign, you need to be able to prove it works before continuing to invest in it. Video has proven to perform better across many platforms, but which platform works best for your brand may differ.
The solution
Before you launch any of your video campaigns, take some time to plan out what metrics matter to you, as well as metrics that give a clear indication of campaign success.
If you’re not sure where to start, then there are some metrics that tend to give a better indication of whether your video is working than others, which we covered in a previous article.
These included:
– Video view completion rates: understanding how many actually watched the video
– Shares and comments rather than post likes
– Your demographics or who is actually seeing your video during the campaign
– Click-through rates: the percentage of people who saw your video and clicked through to a landing page
– Conversion rates: the percentage of people who saw your video and took the desired action, such as a purchase or signed up for a newsletter.
Take time to understand these metrics and ensuring you have the right access before you start your campaign.
4. Knowing how video fits into your long-term strategy
This is one of the most important (and challenging) issues that marketing and communications professionals face when planning video content.
Busy schedules mean that many people are only reactive and create content for up-and-coming campaigns, but don’t consider that these videos could be part of a longer-term plan.
The solution
Although it can be nearly impossible to plan your video content far in advance, you can work suggestions into your current strategy about the different paths your branded film could take based on your key message in the video.
For example, if you are creating a learning and development video for your company, could it play a part in a series of videos that train your employees on different subjects?
If you choose to create a series of explainer videos, can you easily update them if your product or services changes in the next year or two?
If you aren’t sure where to start, you can contact a branded content agency, like Content Creatures, who can give you motion branding support and guidance.
Want to keep learning?
If you are interested in starting or expanding your video marketing strategy, we have a blog that can help guide you in the right direction: How to Create a Video Marketing Strategy That Drives Results