Melissa Lui

I came across with this article last day, How Retailer Are Boosting Sales With B2C Video Content, and it caught my attention since I wrote about Content Marketing a month ago.  So now, I would like to continue from there but today, we will look at a particular content – Video.

Video becomes a very popular online marketing tool in recent years. According to the article, YouTube is ranked as the 2nd popular search engine, just after Google. Moreover, there is a 200% increase of video usage as a content marketing tool in 2012 comparing to 2011.

Even though many companies are integrating the use of videos on their websites, but is video really effective?  Or are they just creating video because other companies do?

I think that many companies overlook one important factor.  48 hours of video are uploaded on YouTube in every minute, but only a small amount of those videos would catch the attention and share across social media. Just like the picture below, companies expect the sales to increase because of the integration of videos?  But in order to increase sales, your video has to “go viral” (circulated across the Internet) competing with the millions of videos being upload every hour.

Overall, to stand out from competitors, the content in the video is really important.  Just as I mentioned a month ago, the content has to be entertaining, creative, engaging, and yet relevant to your company’s products in some way.  But moreover, the quality of the video, the story line, and etc. would be critical if a video would be successful.  It can be a time consuming process.  Many companies are creating videos because it is the new trend; however, would the videos be able to reach your company’s targeted audience or consumers? And is the content of the video relevant to the company’s objective? These are questions that should be answered before you blindly invest your time and money into video marketing.

Just because it is a trend, it does not mean that it is a must.