Video marketing strategy: 7 Effective Ways to promote videos on the internet

At a time when content is the norm, I must also remind you how important video content is in your Digital marketing strategy.

To convince you, 87% of companies used video content marketing as a tool in 2019, an increase of 6% compared to 2018 (source SEMrush)

But posting video content isn’t just about the technical side of filming, or about writing and scripting the videos. Like a movie, you have to take the time to broadcast it, to promote it whether you are video marketing for a small business or bigger brands.

What is the point of promoting your video content outside the YouTube network alone?

YouTube is a very powerful Google tool. It’s the ultimate for promoting your video content. Other social networks allow you to increase your visibility. However, don’t just share the link to the video posted on YouTube. It has no added value. You must publish your videos natively.

By having an audience and a well-functioning site, is it possible to spend less time in video marketing content on Youtube or other channels?

It is a risk and a strategy that we may not bet on. Indeed, the algorithms of the networks evolve regularly, the engagement is reduced if you stick to only a YouTube video content marketing strategy for several months. Varying the media, the actions, and being creative to stand out are more than ever necessary with or without an audience.

How much time should you dedicate to promoting your video content on various social media?

It is customary to say that each element is worth one. In other words, if you spend an hour shooting a video, devote an hour to writing its screenplay, an hour to edit it, and therefore also an hour to promote it. And if you need to put in more effort, spend it on editing and promotion. Finally, it’s hard to spend less than half a day on all of the video content.

Once your video has been edited, exported and the additional elements finalized such as thumbnails in the adapted formats for YouTube, IGTV, and Facebook Watch… Here is where to put your energy on broadcasting videos.

Video Marketing Tips to Fuel Your Content Marketing Strategy:

1. The YouTube network itself

As you can imagine, a significant portion of the video traffic will be generated from the platforms on which you will publish your video. And the platform holding the crown is YouTube.

Plus, if it finds your video content relevant, YouTube will push your video to audiences searching for the specified keywords.

This is why when posting a video, it is important to pay special attention to these 4 points:

•       The title,

•       Tags that also serve as keywords,

•       The description in which you must add hashtags. The first 3 are then displayed just above the title of your video,

•       And especially the thumbnail of your video! The thumbnail is the showcase of your videos. This is the image that YouTube will display in search results.

However, since the volume of videos published is very high, if you do not carefully work on your thumbnail, you have no chance of obtaining visibility on YouTube.

Read: How to improve the SEO of your Youtube channel?

Respect your graphic charter and find a more catchy message.

Our advice: Even if these obligations seem clickbait-y, it is an essential way to develop your audience on the platform. Don’t overlook it as YouTube itself points out. This is one of the sure-fire tips for an effective video content marketing strategy.

2. Social networks

Publishing your video content natively on social media is another way to promote it without necessarily having to do a very different one.

Here are some social networks where videos are popular:

• Facebook (with Watch),

• Instagram (with IGTV),

• Pinterest,

• LinkedIn,

• And even on Google My Business.

Also, on these platforms, users are not fond of video content that is long. If your video is well over 2 minutes, I recommend that you select an excerpt and cross-reference the full video posted on YouTube.

Our advice: Find the place where the “watch time” is the longest to make your sample.

Watch Time is the average viewing time of a video by your audience. You find it in analytics data on YouTube. In addition to the duration, all these platforms offer different sizes for your visuals. It is, therefore, necessary to devote a little time to adapt the size of your images in order to look professional.

Finally, as a video marketing agency, we also determine the best time to post a video. This has helped us gain better visibility.

Our advice: Do not broadcast your videos simultaneously on Facebook and LinkedIn for example. Your audience is not there at the same time either.

Have you checked our detailed Social Media Marketing Guide for the perfect strategy?

3. Natural influencers

Faced with the versatility that currently exists on this network, it is always important to ensure an audience as soon as your video is published. And for that, nothing like going through “natural” influencers.

How to do it?

Here are some video marketing tips for LinkedIn:

• Post a teaser a few days before your first video,

• Record the names of people who have interacted with this teaser (liked, commented or shared). Since you’re starting up, there aren’t many,

• Contact these people to validate their interest,

• List these names in a file organized over time,

• On the day of the post, “tag them” in your post on LinkedIn for instance.

This way, you are sure to collect a few likes and even comments very quickly after posting. It is also a way to put the odds on your side with regard to the LinkedIn algorithm.

To test a campaign, it is always useful to go through “natural” influencers. This saves you from funding a paid influencer.

As a part of our video marketing services, to increase your visibility and check if the test campaign is well received, we guide you on choosing ‘real’ influencers that are recognized by your target audience.

4. Stories to promote your videos

On Instagram and now on Facebook and LinkedIn, it is also possible to publish stories. (Read: How to integrate stories perfectly in your content strategy?)

Why not promote your video content with a story, or even by mentioning potentially interested parties? If these are dynamic enough, they will also transfer your content to their audience, which will increase the number of views and perhaps open up new opportunities for growth.

Our advice: Consider adding your best hashtags to your story!

Note: Stories also exist on YouTube. However, they are currently only available for all channels with more than 10,000 subscribers.

5. Boosted publications

Engagement is shrinking across all social platforms. This is due to the strategy of these several platforms which seek to generate more turnover, but also to the diversity of video content creators and volume of content published daily.

To remedy this, there are only 2 solutions:

•       Increase the pace of your publications, which may affect their quality,

•       Or invest a little budget to boost your video content

In fact, it is possible to spend the budget on almost all social media platforms.

• Business Manager manages the boosted posts on Facebook, Instagram, and Messenger,

• Google Ads offers to push video content on YouTube,

• Linkedin allows you to sponsor content on company pages,

• And even Pinterest is getting started.

Advice: As a video marketing agency, we suggest that you plan a monthly online advertising budget to increase the distribution of your most popular content while controlling your costs.

6. Add video content to the articles on your business blog

Associating a video with an article increases your credibility in 2 ways:

• For your post on your business blog, a video reduces the bounce rate since people will watch it. In addition, it “humanizes” your articles.

• For your video, being in an article increases the number of views since it is de facto exposed to your most loyal readers.

If you’re shooting your video first, publish an article with the video transcript. In addition, it makes the job of the search engine crawlers easier and adds content to your professional blog.

In this way, your video is present on a URL address with your domain name which strengthens the authority of your channel on YouTube. In addition, with the right keywords in this URL address, your video content will help your article rank.

If you do the opposite of knowing how to start writing your article, then it’s easy to shoot a video on that topic.

Video Content Marketing Tip: Showing your video through a page of your website will help the SEO of that page while taking advantage of getting natural audiences with both the textual content and your video.

7. Other content platforms to distribute your videos

Video marketing on social media is the easiest. However, there are also many content platforms on which you can communicate your content. Medium, Reddit, or even Tumblr, to name a few. All of them allow you to distribute your content well to a different audience to find new opportunities. This is useful even if you’re not super active on it (if you are, of course, even better).

Medium works as a platform for research and provision of content. A search bar gives everyone the opportunity to make discoveries. In the free version, publications are limited to 3 per day. An already very active audience can provide good visibility.

Redditt works with a point system (collected on content and comments). It is, therefore, more difficult to find a place there (unless you are very active). However, the community being so large, it is a shame to do without.

Tumblr is both a micro-blogging platform and a social network. Hashtags are quite popular there. It’s much more relevant to post short content there and engage followers to discover the entire content via a link.

Imgur is also a blogging-type platform that favors the visual. This is another great reason to spend time visualizing your video content. You can also use video content creators to make your videos.

All of these platforms generate traffic, but also some no-follow backlinks.

Conclusion on planning your video content marketing strategy

Remember that you must optimize the video for each social platform and publish it natively. Of course, there are many other ways to promote your videos such as Email Marketing or push notifications. As a part of our video marketing services, MeDigit agency provides a well laid out strategy along with activities to all our clients.

Keep in mind that spending time promoting your videos is essential today. It must be a part of your Content Marketing Strategy.

How do you use YouTube or other video platforms to grow your business?