Video marketing has moved beyond being just a tool for brand awareness. Nick Dennis explores how it is being created to better engage with and educate prospects, maximising lead scoring, nurturing sales streams and boosting overall conversion rates.

Email marketing is a critical component of most modern marketing programs, but many marketers are starting to see diminishing returns and falling click-through rates as inboxes everywhere are inundated. A 2015 GetResponse study of one billion emails found:

• Those containing video had a 96% higher click-through rate,
• one-to-one personalised videos can boost click-through rates by 200%-1500%, and
• Only 7% used video embeds – providing a window of opportunity to stand out from the clutter

These results provide the opportunity for digital marketers to implement strategies that give their organisations the competitive edge. Strategies include:

Passive to interactive videos

Interactive videos are being incorporated in email campaigns to create two way conversations with digital audiences and to drive more engagement in content marketing programs.

These are proving to be particularly positive in business markets. Using embedded forms, questionnaires, surveys and other types of interactive elements pulls viewers into the story enabling marketers to gather additional interest and intent data. ‘Choose your own adventure’ style videos allow viewers to self-select their content journey and create a customised learning path without having to search for things that interest them.

Personalisation

Personalisation has been a significant trend in digital marketing. Personalising both the content itself and the content journey in a one to one video is having a significant impact on results. The opportunity now exists for organisations to weave in the viewer’s name, company logo or photo, from LinkedIn directly into a splash screen image in the video, drawing the consumer into the story and creating a unique and memorable experience.

Videos as sales tools

Sales teams supported by powerful video content are finding an easier path to proving the superiority of their solutions. Marketing videos which include customer testimonials, on-demand product demonstrations, webinars and tutorials, thought leader interviews, project reviews and case studies, video blogs, and event coverage are very powerful persuaders and empower the sales team to create customised and personalised videos, which when shared with prospects are the next best thing to being with someone in person.

Tracking interactions at a customer level

Perhaps the most exciting evolution in video analytics is the capability to capture not just what specific videos are consumed, but to capture what content each customer is viewing, for how long, when they viewed and on what device. Specialised video marketing platforms such as Vidyard and Brightcove (amongst many others) can help the savvy marketer to record these customer interactions and pass them in real time to your Marketing Automation platform.

This rich engagement data can trigger a plethora of highly valuable follow up activities such as engagement scoring, best next action campaign steps, personalised content based on viewing information, 360 degree reporting, and sales alerts. Video is a critical part of the customer lifecycle.

From outsourced video to in-house

Many businesses are finding it more economical to bring video marketing and video production capabilities in-house, to sit alongside writing, content marketing, PR and social media. By hiring creative directors to build modest video studios, content can be quickly and cost effectively delivered, at scale, to teams across the organisation.

Video has come a long way in the last few years. Content, both for information and entertainment, is getting better all the time. Organisations are becoming more strategic in how they use video.

Critically, they’re also taking advantage of the data that comes with it to see what works and what doesn’t. There is vast potential to be realised by sales and marketing teams that are innovative and creative and prepared to push the boundaries. 2016 is the year to press the fast forward button!

Nick Dennis is master principal consultant, Oracle Marketing Cloud.