Here at Creative Butter, our client projects often involve creating and managing video marketing campaigns. After much refining, we have put together our 11 Key Steps for Your Video Marketing Checklist:
1. DEFINE THE GOAL
What is the goal of your video? Is it a sales training video or a brand story interview-style video or a product description “product vs. solution” video?
2. DEFINE THE ACTION YOU WANT YOUR VIEWER TO TAKE
What you would like your viewer to do once they’ve watched? Be clear on the purpose of your video. Do you want them to buy a product on your website or subscribe to your channel or share your video with their friends or colleagues?
3. IDENTIFY MEDIA PLACEMENTS
Where will you post or run your video once it’s produced? Besides YouTube… Will you post it on Facebook or Instagram or Vimeo or on your own website? OR will you pay for ad space to run it on TV or streaming services as a paid commercial?
4. ADVERTISE YOUR AD
It might seem silly, but if you are not paying for airtime, how will you let people know that your new video exists, and where it can be found? Besides posting to Facebook, are you going to send an eBlast (with “video” in the subject line, of course) promoting it? Are you going to play it at an event or ask your friends to share it or run a Facebook giveaway for those who watch it? Are you willing to pin it to the top of your Twitter feed? Should you share it within your online communities, like on LinkedIn, Reddit and TweetChat?
5. SET UP POST-VIEW MARKETING TOOLS
How will you lifecycle market to those who view your video? Will you incentivize people to come to your website and opt-in to your emails? If so, you should be ready with an automated drip campaign that may include:
- Onboarding Emails
- Subscriber Emails
- Promotional Emails
- Transactional Emails
- Behavioral Emails
6. GATHER TECH GEAR FOR SHOOT
More-than-likely, you will need a camera, latop, lapel microphone, DAW hardware interface, 3-point soft-box lighting, iPad and teleprompter app. You will also need Logic Pro and Adobe Premiere Pro – or comparable software packages – and possibly background music.
7. WRITE A CALL-TO-ACTION
Make sure your video has a clear call-to-action. What do you want the viewer to do? Do you want them to speak directly to a sales person, sign up for emails, buy a product, “comment below”, subscribe to your YouTube channel, etc.?
8. WRITE OUT KEY POINTS
What key points you want to hit? Identify your main message – the one thing you want people to take away. Back it up with three positive points that support it. Never forget the W.I.I.F.M. or What’s-In-It-For-Me.
9. TONE
What emotions and feelings are you trying to convey in your video? Aim for educating, inspiring, motivating or informing your audience – not selling.
10. UPLOAD TO YOUTUBE
Come up with an original title (under 70 characters is best). Write a long description to improve your video’s chances of ranking better with Google. Make sure the first 150 characters of the description – that will be visible below the player without any clicking – is the most interesting part. Add at least 10 tags. Create an eye-catching, high-resolution (1280×720) thumbnail image.
11. WRITE A YOUTUBE CALL-TO-ACTION
Annotate your video with CTAs, a subscribe button and links to related content. Be sure to link back to your own website, too.
