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How Video Improves Your Content Marketing and SEO

20 Sep

Did you know that 300 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute?

Make no mistake, video is a HUGE deal nowadays. And when harnessed properly, it can be an extremely effective way of improving your business’ conversion rates.

Recently at iformat, we’ve been experimenting. In particular, we’ve been playing around with video, going to our clients and putting together short videos for some of our clients’ landing pages and websites.

Why?

Well, if I’m going to be honest it’s partially to live out my childhood dream of working in Hollywood.

But mostly, it’s because when it comes to conversions, video works. When used effectively, video can be a very powerful tool for:

  • Increasing your conversion rates
  • Building a stronger image for your brand
  • Improving your search engine optimisation strategy

Of course, it’s not enough to slap something onto YouTube and call it a day! Today, we’ll be going over how you can use video to gain conversions and get the most mileage out of your video content.

Why use video?

If a picture is worth a thousand words, then a video can easily be worth a million.

Between work and all your other commitments, you don’t have as much time as you used to. Reading through landing page copy takes minutes and your full attention – video on the other hand can be absorbed almost effortlessly.

According to some studies, adding video to your landing pages can boost your conversion rates by anywhere between 64-85% … and potentially even more!

film crew video filming seo

Use video in your landing pages

Talk to any digital agency and they’ll tell you the same thing: landing pages matter!

While ads might draw people into clicking, it’s your landing pages that get people to convert – naturally, you’ll want to make your landers as compelling as possible.

One way to boost the effectiveness of your landing pages is to film and embed a polished, informative video in your landing page. What are you more likely to pay attention to, a block of text or a video? We’re not gamblers, but we’d put $10 on the latter, easy!

Video attracts people’s attention – it’s easy to gloss over a paragraph or even a photo, but when users see that play button, there’s almost an impulse to click it. That’s why videos are so great for making conversions!

If you settle on using video in your landing pages, make sure each landing page has its own video. It’s easy to fall into the trap of filming one general landing page video and recycling it for each of your landers.

Needless to say, one size does NOT fit all!

The point of a landing page is to get people to call you for a specific product or service you offer. Every element of your landing page needs to “sell” what your landing page is pushing – including your video.

Use video on your website

At iformat, our mantra is “content is king”. Ideally, your website should be built around content. Your site’s content should be informative, relevant and most importantly, it should convey your expertise and knowledge.

And when it comes to content, video is undoubtedly at the top of the food chain.

Just like your landing pages, embedding videos into your website can also help you gain precious sales and phone calls. Just like with landing pages, embedding relevant and tailored videos for each site is an effective way of grabbing attention and telling visitors everything they need to know about your business.

Customers aren’t the only ones who lend more credibility to video content however – Google does too!

Search engine optimisation is all about convincing Google that your site has the most credible answers to your questions. One of the factors Google (and other search engines) use to evaluate this is the usage of multimedia.

If your site is plain text, Google is unlikely to present it to searchers. On the other hand, non-text media sends a signal to search engines that your site has had a lot of work put into it and is a credible source. We’re talking about photos, plug-ins, “rich” media and (you guessed it) video.

You can see what we’re getting at with this!

Does your site’s search engine optimisation strategy need a bit of a kick-start? Video might be the way to go!

How to optimise your videos

Of course, it’s not enough to simply upload a video to YouTube, embed it in your site and call it a day – your videos need to be good! Here are some of our tips for optimising your videos:

Make it relevant

According to houseware e-tailer Stacks and Stacks, customers who view product-specific videos on their online storefront are up to 144% more likely to add that product to their cart.

What’s the key phrase? Product-specific.

Your videos need to be tailored for the page they’re on. If a visitor comes to your site looking for information about your 30-minute swing dancing lessons, make sure your video talks about that swing dance, how your lessons work and the results you’ve obtained. That’s what they’re on your site for, after all!

Keep it short

Did you know: 20% of YouTube users click off a video after the first ten seconds? By the thirty second mark, you’ll have lost a third of your viewers. At a minute, 44% will be gone. And so it goes.

While there’s still a lot of active debate around whether humans really have a shorter attention span than goldfish, the stats don’t lie: only the really dedicated viewers tend to stick around for more than a minute or so. For maximum effectiveness, you’ll need to trim your message down to the most salient points and hit all of them within the first 30 seconds.

Even for content where viewers are more willing to stick around, it pays to be brief.

The takeaway? Keep things short!

Say cheese!

Human beings are wired to detect faces – that’s why we wind up with images such as these ones!

When it comes to increasing conversions, human faces can be very effective. We use heat maps to determine what people are looking at on our clients’ sites. And we’ve noticed that faces glow white hot!

Faces evoke an emotional response in our brains – that’s just human nature. When making videos for your site, don’t hide behind diagrams or graphics. Instead, show your face and whip out your most charming smile!

Presentation matters!

Your site does more than just list your products and services – ideally, your site should be conveying your competence and skill to your readers. Your wordsare just one part of the equation – presentation is just as important.

And as a visual medium, presentation is crucial to your videos.

Sure, smartphone cameras are becoming more and more impressive. But presentation goes further than image quality: lighting, audio quality, editing, visuals and more all play a role in conveying your competence to your customers.

So while a clip filmed on your phone might give your conversion rates a bit of a boost, it won’t reflect well on you and your services. You have eight seconds to make a good impression on your customers – you’ll want to make it as good as possible.

editing video for seo

In summation…

At iformat, we’re pretty convinced about video. Whether you want to further improve your stunning landing pages or want to improve your search engine optimisation strategy, video is one tool that you can’t ignore much longer.

In fact, you might be seeing videos pop up on a lot more of our clients’ landing pages and websites in the near future! If you’re interested in a conversion strategy that includes video, get in touch with iformat today or give us a call on 1300 88 64 50.

What do you think? Do you use video in your content marketing? We’d love to hear what’s worked (and what hasn’t) for you!