Nowadays most companies will either have a Facebook page, or be thinking about making one. However, whether you are a small start-up company or a well-established brand, you want to be posting stuff that not only advertises your products and services.. but is actually interesting to the people who have liked your page. Getting people to like your page is only the first step – now you have to try and keep them!
What is one of the most effective ways to engage your audience to promote your message? A video! (Evans. 2012)
And who knows, if it is interesting enough maybe… it could even go viral?!
The market for sharing videos is showing no signs of slowing down either – it is the fastest growing form of advertising, and is expected to grow by a quarter for the next five years in the U.K. alone. (Williams. 2014)
Almost 60% of video shares World wide occur on Facebook, so if you are going to create a video, this would be the best platform to post it on. (Gesenhues. 2014)
A lot of businesses have been incorporating videos into their online marketing strategies with the aim of ‘going viral’, and some have experienced unimaginable success rates. (Trimble. 2014)
Some Examples Of Successful Marketing Campaigns
Evian
Dove
Lay’s
So these are just a handful of examples… click here to see more I can see the idea behind the Dove video and the message it is promoting, but did not find it that interesting and thought it lasted a bit long to be honest. However the Evian one.. I think is hilarious, and definitely one of my favourite viral campaigns.
But what do these videos have in common?
The Evian video is humorous, the Dove video is not funny but more thought-provoking and the Lay’s video is trying to evoke some involvement with a crowdsourcing approach.
So there is no common theme here….
I was interested to see what makes people share videos on social media sites, if I can understand why people view and share videos, then I should be able to underpin what is required to make a successful video. After some primary and secondary research these are…
‘MY FIVE BE’S’
- Be Positive ! Positive content is more likely to be shared than negative (Berger and Milkman. 2012)
- Be Relevant ! If people are more likely to view and share things they can relate to and see relevant to themselves. (Luo et al. 2013)
- Be Emotional ! When content triggers an emotion in someone, they are more likely to engage with it. (Berger and Milkman. 2012)
- Be Aware ! People feel if they are raising awareness for a cause by sharing or liking something, they feel as though they are physically helping. (Grummas. 2014)
- Be Quick ! The first few days of shares tend to be when the video is most popular, be sure to promote your video as much as possible from early on the beginning (eMarketer. 2013)
So all ready to go and create a viral hit? … Not so fast
However no one ever said it was going to be easy to create a viral hit over night. Over an hour of video content is uploaded to YouTube every second (Seattle. 2013) and not every video ‘goes viral’… in fact only a tiny fraction of them do. (Evans. 2012)
I conducted a short survey of 100 people aged between 18 – 35, the results showed that videos advertising products or advertising services were actually the videos they were least likely to share.. bad news for our aims as a business.
The Winners
1 ) Funny Videos
2) Videos with friends or family in
3) News Stories or Political issues
Before creating a video there are also many practical considerations such as;
Timing
It is going to take you a considerable amount of time to create and edit a video before posting. With no guarantee the video will be a success, what is your opportunity cost? Is it a risk you can afford to take?
It is important to consider what your video involves when posting… check the news and see what is going on in the wider environment. Madonna posting this video, seen as glamorising guns, in the wake of the Sandy Hook School Massacre in 2013 did not go down too well and was condemned as being insensitive.
Cost
Creating a video can vary from either end of the scale depending on how you create it. You might want to pay actors, editors, editing software or Facebook to promote your post so more people see it. Again there is no promise your video will get seen by thousands or shared… A risk worth taking ? Or a waste of budget which could be spent on other elements of marketing for your business?
I like this Hi-Tec video… although the editing is quite sophisticated, the actual video itself features a lot of their products, but cost little to actually film and make.
Content Ownership
Copyright is always an issue with any type of marketing. Who owns the content you are sharing or creating? Copyright Laws differ between countries and must be abided by. (Baines et al. 2011)
Singer Rihanna sued Topshop for using her photo without permission, this video discusses some of the implications for businesses of this type of behaviour with regards to this landmark case.
If you think these are obstacles you can overcome, and you have a good idea for a video for your business, stick to the ‘5 Be’s” and hope for the best!!
References
Baines, P. Fill,C and Page, K. . (2011). Digital Marketing. In:Marketing. 3rd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press. p 625 – 629.
Berger,J & Milkman,K. (2012) What Makes Online Content Viral?. Journal of Marketing Research: April 2012, Vol. 49, No. 2, p192-205.
EMarketer. (2013). Video Ad’s success Hinges on Social Sharing in the Early Days . Available: http://www.emarketer.com/Article/Video-Ads-Success-Hinges-on-Social-Sharing-Early-Days/1009852. Last accessed 11th April 2015.
Evans, D. (2012). Week 3, Social Content – Text, Photos, Audio, and Video. In: Murphy, A. and Gaughan, P. Social Media Marketing. 2nd ed. Canada : John Wiley & Sons Inc. . p225-227. p70.
Gesenhues, A. (2014). Nearly 60% Of Video Shares Worldwide Occur On Facebook. Available: http://marketingland.com/report-60-video-shares-worldwide-happen-on-facebook-107931. Last accessed 11th April 2015.
Grummas, E. (2014). Likes don’t save lives – lessons from a social media campaign. Available: http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/likes-dont-save-lives-unicef-social-media. Last accessed 11th April 2015.
Luo, L et al . (2013). Marketing via social Media : a case study. Library Hi Tech. 31 (3), p455-466.
Seattle, M. (2013). Internet Epidemiology . Available: http://www.economist.com/node/21573237. Last accessed 11th April 2015.
Trimble, C. (2014). Why online video is the future of content marketing. Available: http://www.theguardian.com/small-business-network/2014/jan/14/video-content-marketing-media-online. Last accessed 11th April 2015.
Williams, C. (2014). Online video ads to lead UK media market growth. Available: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/mediatechnologyandtelecoms/digital-media/10873372/Online-video-ads-to-lead-UK-media-market-growth.html. Last accessed 11th April 2015.