Influencers and video marketing: How to grow your brand

According to the Animoto report, Social Video Trends: Consumer Insights For 2020, video ads were the number one way that customers learned about brands from which they made a subsequent purchase. In addition to this, in 2019, YouTube outpaced Facebook as the platform most influential over consumer behaviour. At this point, if you haven’t been using video marketing, you are losing out on great opportunities to connect with your audience.

Useful tips for growing your brand

Video marketing is a cost-effective and simple marketing method to improve your brand. Using video to market your business can help to improve your return on marketing investments.

1. Why is video so influential

There are several reasons for this. The first is that the video is more memorable. In addition to this, video content generally ranks higher on Google and is more likely to be seen. There’s also the fact that video engages, informs, and builds trust.

Finally, every major social media platform has adopted video in a major way. Whether it’s live-streaming or Facebook’s decision to autoplay videos in your feed, this medium is more in your face than ever.

If you haven’t jumped into video with both feet, what’s stopping you?

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2. Challenges to using video marketing

Brands who are struggling with video marketing are usually facing one of the following challenges:

• They are completely new to video, lack production experience, and haven’t built an audience.
• They’ve produced some content but aren’t sure how to use it to optimize and convert.
• They are actively using video in marketing but aren’t sure how to scale.

To overcome these challenges, many brands are using the power of influencers.

For example, at DCP we managed to grow our YouTube channel to over 42,000 subscribers in only a few years.

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3. Tips to use influencers to boost your brand via video marketing

Reputation matters. That’s what influencers bring, along with perceived expertise and insights. Think your audience isn’t interested in influencers? Think again. Replace the term with ‘industry expert’ or ‘thought leader’. An influencer is simply someone with an existing audience in your niche with enough clout to impact consumer behaviour. Find the right influencer and you can:

• Connect with a larger audience.
• Benefit from better content ideas.
• Boost your credibility.
• Lower your investment in video production as influencers already have these capabilities.

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4. Listing your goals

Connect your influencer marketing strategy to measurable business objectives like educating consumers about the benefits of your products. Make sure you have these goals solidified before you talk with influencers. They’ll want to know what you want to accomplish to determine if they can help you and how.

Of course, they may also have some helpful suggestions as to what you should be trying to get done, based on your current position. For example, if you are a newer business, top of funnel focused content can help create recognition.

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5. Find the influencer that fits your brand

How do you find the right influencer to help with your video marketing efforts? First, you have to create an influencer persona. This is similar to a customer persona, except you are defining the key characteristics of an influencer who will resonate with your audience.

Imagine that you own a project management consultancy. You’re interested in producing some informative content on topics such as purchasing online proposal software, project planning, and understanding agile methodology with the goal of connecting with top of funnel users. The businesses you are trying to reach are growing small businesses, generally owned by people under 40. Now, you have to determine who will be most influential in terms of providing this kind of instructional video content. You might identify the following attributes:

• More than 100K followers.
• Published author.
• Connected with the local technology sector.
• Name that is recognizable to the average CIO

Now that you have your list, you can begin searching for an influencer to work with. You can use platforms such as Klear to find influencers or use your own network connections. Once you do, ensure that they really meet your criteria. Nancy Howard, a content creator at the best cheap essay writing service, says, “Verify that they have real followers, not ones they have purchased. Then, watch their video content.

You want to pursue influencers who have the presentation, style, tone, and production values that will impress your audience. Finally, look at their engagement numbers.”

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6. Influencer outreach

When you seek out the influencer you’ve selected, remember that this is not an employer/employee or client/contractor relationship. Influencers must be very selective about the brands they work with. You could always connect using Social Bluebook, Klear, or other platforms. You can also handle the outreach on your own.

You do that by reaching out to them on social media and doing some relationship building. Leave meaningful comments on their content. Share their content on your social media pages.

Eventually, you’re going to have to communicate a bit more directly, but not too directly.

Basically, ‘My name is X, and I do _____________. I’m interested in achieving ___________. I’ve been sharing your content with my audience, and it’s really connecting with them. Furthermore, I’d love your insights.’

Now, every influencer is different. Some may reply directly and cut to the chase with a rejection or an offer of what they will do for you.  Others may want to carry on the conversation a bit longer and get to know your brand as well. This is not a fast process, but you’ll make the right connection soon enough.

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7. Making your project work for you

Again, don’t expect to direct the influencer and have them perform in a video for you. Remember that this is their area of expertise. Let them do what they are good at. However, that doesn’t mean you cannot establish any expectations. Both of you should agree to a deadline and a goal. Your influencers should also be able to communicate how they will achieve that. Finally, make plans to stay in contact throughout the process.

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8. Conclusion: examining the results

Eventually, the content will be published. The next step will be waiting to see how it plays out.  With your goals in mind, pay attention to factors such as your views, new followers, and engagement. This, along with changing conversion indicators, will let you know if the process was worthwhile.

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Article by Erica Sunarjo: DCP Web Designers in London