In my ongoing efforts to provide you with the best news and tools for growing your business, I would like to bring your attention to an excellent article that recently appeared in the Canadian newspaper “The Globe and Mail.”
Penned by Dan Demsky “Ten Ways to Enhance Your Company’s Website with Video” contains several invaluable tips and points regarding the use of video on your professional website:
In 2010, 30 percent of all Internet traffic was video. In 2013, that number will increase to 90 per cent, according to research conducted by Cisco. The audience for video is growing rapidly, so what are you doing to make sure you aren’t hitting the gas in neutral?
If you’re an entrepreneur looking to develop video content for your company’s website, here are 10 tips for making your presence online most effective:
1. The TV approach doesn’t work.
Don’t make commercials, make content. People are not coming to your website to be sold on your product or service. They are there to learn more about your business. Once they are there they are looking to qualify your business and would be better served with video content that is informative, not ‘selly’. Provide content that shows what your business is all about. What kind of service do you offer? How does your product work? What are the core values of your company? Your goal is to provide the information that your audience wants and to make it easy for them to find.
2. Get your customers to do the speaking for you.
There is no better salesperson than a happy customer. As an entrepreneur you may know your business messaging inside out but you will never be as convincing as someone who has done business with you and loved the experience. If a customer has great things to say about you, why not have them share their sentiments on your website? A video testimonial will serve as the best salesperson you could ever have and will work for you 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
3. Optimize your video content for SEO.
The SEO opportunities that come with creating video content is one of the most exciting aspects. As Forrester Research reports, a video that is properly submitted (tags, descriptions) is 50 times more likely to hit the front page of Google when compared to standard SEO techniques. Also, the competition is far less fierce in almost all categories. There is a tremendous opportunity right now for many businesses to own Google page rankings without having to put up much of a fight. If you want to increase your websites traffic, video is the way to do it.
4. Invest in premium video content.
While it’s permissible to have a simple, low-budget look for blog videos, a company’s above-the-fold main page videos should look and feel professional. You wouldn’t have your little nephew produce your wedding video or do the interior design for your office so treat your video with the same respect. When a consumer lands on your website for the first time, you have one opportunity to make a lasting impression. The first video that is likely to be clicked should be produced to a standard that you feel best reflects your business. If it is ill considered and not produced professionally, what is a potential customer supposed to think about the rest of your company?
5. Share other companies’ videos.
There is nothing wrong with posting videos that were not produced by your company. Having a blog as part of your website is an excellent way to share information, updates about your company and great video content. If you were to come across a video online that would appeal to your customers, it’s likely in the best interest of both your company and the producer of the video for it to be shared on your site. This keeps your site interesting and valuable to your customers. A few things to consider when sharing other people’s content: never use someone else’s video to directly sell your own product or services (without permission), always give credit to the producer and only use their video to focus on something positive, flattering or informative about it.
6. Be consistent
Staying fresh with your content keeps your site alive. If you want to promote community and interaction around your business, you have to be constantly updating the content of your website. Simple video updates can go a long way. Whether it’s a short video message from the CEO or a sneak peek of a new development in your business, if you are known for constant updates with video you are creating a good reason for return visits to your site.
7. Take your customer behind the scenes.
Using video is an opportunity for all businesses to open the doors of their company to the public. Take people through a day at your office. People appreciate seeing what goes on behind the scenes and meeting your team. It’s a simple and genuine way to build trust with your customers.
8. Make it shareable.
Access to the entire social network of your customer is one click of a button away.
Use social share buttons to make it easy for people to post your content to their facebook, twitter and LinkedIN profiles or anywhere else you see fit. It’s helpful to consider this when developing your video content to assure that the video will make sense both on and off your website.
9. Have video on every page.
You can never assume what page on your site will be the landing page for your audience, so you have to treat every page like it’s the homepage. When someone lands on your website, if there’s a video present they are more likely to stay. The play button is the most compelling call to action on the Internet so use it to your advantage.
10. Use video as a customer service desk.
Use video to answer FAQ’s, give technical support or even provide tutorials on how to use your product or service. A digital customer service desk is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and is more useful to your customer than any manual or phone call can ever be. It doesn’t cost any money to run, and it never stops working for you. Most entrepreneurs can’t afford to not provide this service.
LastIy, I myself use 8 video marketing tools that have enabled me to boost my business. Take a look here: http://FunVideoMarketing.com
The thing I liked most from Oprah’s trip to Australia is
the discussion about the work-life balance. Here is a
quote from one of the guys she met:
“In America, people live to work. And in Australia,
people work to live.” That is quit a difference in attitude.
Not surprisingly, people are more relaxed in Australia
and are less stressed out. There is always something
we can learn from a different culture and country.
Communication is an essential and vital component of
any business, and email is the most familiar, efficient
and dependable communication channel of the Digital
Age, a tool used by virtually everyone with an Internet
connection, regardless of age or background. According
to a report by the Direct Marketing Association, it is also
one of the most profitable, offering a return on
investment of $43.62 – twice the ROI of the next most
profitable channel, search advertising.
While new social media platforms and other online
communication avenues continue to appear, email
marketing remains the top area of investment growth
among business leaders and marketers, ahead of
social media and search.
Consider This:
1.4 billion people use email – more than the
population of China, or of America and the
European Union combined (Email Marketing
Reports, 2009).
58% of consumers check their email immediately
after going online (Exact Target” “Email X-Factor
Study,” 2010).
Email is the most popular Internet activity for
users over the age of 64 (Pew Internet and
American Life Project, 2009).
U.S. Internet users engage with 11.8 brands via
email, compared to 9.4 via Facebook and 7.9 via
Twitter (Exact Target, “Subscribers, Fans and
Followers: The Social Profile,” 2010).
Email’s penetration and cost effectiveness make it
a major part of any marketing strategy, for ANY
business:
68% of respondents to a recent survey said that
they have made purchases online as a result of
receiving email (DoubleClick).
70% said a discount or coupon received via email
was the number one motivating factor in making
an immediate purchase (DoubleClick).
Email is particularly effective in maintaining existing relationships:
78% of customers said they would look forward”
to any email from a frequented business (AOL survey).
And remember, it’s cheaper and easier to sell to an
existing customer than to a new one, and repeat
customers consistently spend more money,
providing referrals at the same time (Bain & Co.).
And adding video to the channel only increases
email’s power, influence and attraction:
Video emails inspire response within 48 hours
80% of the time (Jupiter Research).
Video email marketing offers a return 280%
higher than traditional direct mail (Gartner Research).
Combining the appeal of video with email’s simplicity,
stability and reach creates a uniquely viable marketing
opportunity.
Talk Fusion’s innovative and easy-to-use Video Email
makes the most of that opportunity. And Video Email
is only one of 8 cutting-edge New Media marketing
tools Talk Fusion offers to provide your business with
the ability to realize the full potential of Digital Age
possibilities.
If you need to read many documents, articles
and books, here is a great handheld pen scanner
that will help you summarize the material and
save you lots of time.
Marketers are constantly asking “why mobile?” So here are the main reasons every marketer should consider mobile marketing and advertising:
There are currently 1.8 billion internet users.
How many millionaires are there from it?
As of right now, 5 billion people have cell phones.
51 million of them have smart phones.
People haven’t figured our mobile marketing and advertising yet.
The possibilities for those who now jump on the mobile bandwagon are endless!
There are few reasons why I know that mobile is the future. Google announced that they are focusing on mobile, Apple is now called a mobile company, Google bought the biggest mobile advertising platform – Admob and Apple started their own mobile advertising platform as well – iAD.
Even though there are currently 5 billion cell phone users, we should focus on 51 million of them. They are the ones that will convert the highest and therefore make us the most money.
Apple’s iPhones and Google’s Droids are pretty much little computers. On January 22, 2011, the 10th billion app was downloaded from Apple App Store. There are 300,000 applications ready to download. There are some apps that are averaging $10,000 per day from downloads. Now imagine being able to advertise on those apps that have all those eyeballs. That is huge money for any marketer.
Google brought out the Droid to be the competitor to the iPhone. Reports have actually shown that they have now sold more Droids to people than iPhones. Droid is growing fast every day which is of course good for us marketers.
Since you can be one of the first marketers to really get into mobile advertising, you need to understand how huge this is. This is like being told 12 years ago to start using Google Adwords for your business. People became millionaires literally overnight. And guess what? Mobile marketing is five times bigger.
I like Starbuck’s simplicity in their new logo. That’s
what Apple and Nike did to their logos during the
years. They took out their name and left the visual-
to become more than the name itself.
Here, Starbucks took out their name and the “coffee,”
to portray a bigger company beyond coffee. But why
did they take out the black color, which was so much
associated with Starbucks? I think their logo is now
too green and can be associated with nature, natural
and organic. Is that what they want to portray?
A new article I wrote with Doron
Marketers are constantly asking “why mobile?” So here are the main reasons every marketer should consider mobile marketing and advertising:
