Like a heavyweight contender, video has been rising through the ranks of marketing media, waiting for its title shot.
In 2012, we learned that 76% of marketers plan to add video to their sites. In 2013, we learned that 93% of marketers were using video somewhere in their campaigns and 70% planned to increase their spend. At the end of 2013, that 93% was corroborated by another source, and a year later, MarketingProfs and Content Marketing Institute found that 76% of B2B content marketers were using video, and that it was highly effective for them.
Then, on the eve of 2015, writing on MarketingProfs, the CMO of Vidyard proclaimed 2015 the year of video marketing.
No arguments here. Don't have a video on your homepage? Your visitors will think they clicked a link from 2008.
Gentle teasing aside, I completely understand. Producing video is a pain. You're busy. Really busy. How can you cram a difficult, time-consuming, and expensive process like video production into your daily grind? Are you even comfortable booking crews and cast, scheduling around the weather, getting floors in your building or external streets closed for shooting? Can your budget even accommodate all the videos you wish you had?
Can your career take the risk that you commit major budget and time to a highly visible video and then... it doesn't turn out well?
Animated vs. Live Action
The answer is animated video.
In video marketing, the first key success factor is speed of engagement, which is where animated videos outperform. Most people are positively predisposed toward 2D animation. It reminds them of TV. More important, it's easier for viewers to immerse themselves in animation or bond with on-screen animated characters than it is for them to dive right into live-action video.
Somehow, that abstraction allows viewers to focus on the content, enjoy the visuals, and truly engage.
With live-action video, however, viewers get stuck on the trees, not the forest. The details about the people, places, and things in the video become a major issue, distracting from the message. Viewers wonder whether they like the person on the screen, whether the desk is right for the cube, whether the background characters are really talking of faking it, and so on.
Animated videos also allow for a greater degree of emphasis. Stories can be bigger, badder, bolder. Perspectives can be suddenly changed. The rules of physics—and camera viewfinders—no longer apply. Need a top view of a global logistics system? No problem. Need to demonstrate your new microprocessor architecture? No problem. Want to explain bitcoin in video? No problem.
Four Ways to Use Video
How should you use this friendly, engaging, flexible, and powerful medium to connect with your audience?
1. Homepage explainer videos
People understand the value of the homepage explainer video, but they get hung up on what to say. This video is about your value proposition: What problem did the customer have that led them to your homepage? Can you solve it? How? What is the value to the customer of your having solved the problem? What should they do for a next step?
In the "How" section, focus on high-level benefits. Do not get into a laundry list of features. You are essentially making an emotional appeal (relief from a problem) using a medium that excels at doing so. Do not bog it down with excessive detail.