YouTube is the world’s most popular video sharing site. YouTube allows anyone to upload and store video for free. Videos can be viewed by friends or to the public and viewers are welcome to leave comments. YouTube was created in February 2005 by three former PayPal employees. YouTube is owned by Google and is the second largest search engine behind Google. Video is a very powerful tool for businesses of any size, but the user friendly, mass-market audience makes YouTube an excellent choice for small businesses. But like any business tool, it has to be used effectively to generate results.
1. Create a Branded YouTube Channel
This step is often skipped by small businesses. Your YouTube channel is basically your house for the videos you create and upload, the videos you have selected as favorites, and those that you have organized into a playlist. A customized channel gives you the opportunity to add and showcase your company’s branding with specific colors, information and links to your website and/or relevant social media pages. A channel also gives viewers an option to subscribe to your content with the click of a button. Plus, it helps them easily search for only your content.
2. Make Sure Your Content Fills a Relevant Need
If you are a steak house, create a video on how to cook steaks or sharpen knives. A great example of this is with the Caminito Argentinean Steakhouse. They have one location and have made numerous videos teaching people how to do a variety of useful things from how to properly use a knife sharpening steel to how to properly pan sear salmon. By doing this you create valuable information and interest in you and your company thus generating loyalty and trust.
3. Develop Videos that are Quick, Simple, Engaging, and Professional
Decent video cameras are no longer expensive, so you can make a professional video without breaking the bank. Pay attention to lighting the area, sound quality and shakiness of the camera. Your best bet is to use a tripod. It is important to plan an outline and a script prior to making your video. Much like writing a story, you will want to include a beginning, middle and end. Make sure your video has a purpose. Keep it simple and short. We recommend 2-4 minutes for a video.
4. Optimize Your Video
According to Wikipedia, “In April 2011, James Zern, a YouTube software engineer, revealed that 30 percent of videos accounted for 99 percent of views on the site.” YouTube claims that more than 24 hours of video are uploaded every minute, so the number of specific videos on the site is constantly changing. It is important you do everything you can to make your video easily found. Utilize tags and keywords, choose a thumbnail that is enticing so people will want to immediately click and watch your video. The title of your video might be a “how to” and include keywords related to the video and your business, again, making sure your video fills a relevant need. For example, the “How to Properly Use A Knife Sharpening Steel” video by PrimeCuts TV and the Caminito Argentinean Steakhouse has over 18,600 views. They used the following tags:
• caminito
• cuts
• knife
• prime
• sharpening
• techniques
• tips
• tv
5. Consider Adding Subtitles
This can be particularly helpful for a “how to” video so that your viewers can easily take notes and follow along. Not to mention it is a huge asset for hearing impaired viewers. Demonstrate you care. Show you not only want to engage and entertain your viewers but also educate them.
6. Participate With Others on YouTube
Spend time looking around on YouTube and make “friends.” Visit the competition and see what they are doing well and not doing so well. Engage with others on YouTube and they will in turn engage with you and your brand, which helps spread your information.
7. Share Your Videos in Other Places
Share your videos on your website, blog, tweets and Facebook page. This is once again where your thumbnail, tags, title and keywords are important to further encourage interaction with your video and your brand. Videos are effective on Facebook landing pages welcoming people to your brand. Tweet the link of your newest video to your Twitter audience. Video blogs are becoming more and more popular. The possibilities are endless.
8. Call to Action
Always include your company’s website address in the video as you want to give the viewers additional reasons to engage with your brand. Other ideas for calls to action might include: offering a contest, discount coupons, or instructional guides. The Caminito Steakhouse might want to include something like, “Print out detailed written steps for how to properly use a sharpening steel and receive a free dessert at the Caminito Argentinean Steakhouse!” If you’re working on building your YouTube subscribers, your message might be “Subscribe to our YouTube channel and receive a free appetizer.”
9. Measure
YouTube offers free analytics tools that are simple to use, providing you with a quick snapshot look at the results of your video. The information is available with the Insights area. You can track the number of views, the demographics of the viewers, and also how people found your video. Again, these are free to use so don’t miss out on accessing this valuable information when measuring the success of your video.
These are just nine effective ways companies can use YouTube for business. Do you have other ways you have found successful? If so, please list them below in the comment section to share with others.
Showing posts with label Relevant. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Relevant. Show all posts
Sunday, 4 November 2012
Friday, 26 October 2012
Social Media Users – 10 Secrets of the Best Social Media Users
If you’re still waiting to see if social media marketing is worth your time, I have one question for you, what are you waiting for? Forget about all of the talk predicting social media marketing is going to play a big role in the future; it already is.
Forward-thinking web development companies are using social media to gain invaluable connections with their audience and to increase their online visibility. And they’re reaping the benefits of their marketing efforts.
Authority, inbound links, visibility, and trust are just a few of the things active online brands are earning through this form of marketing. So, are you ready to jump aboard the social media train? Here are 10 steps to creating a successful social media marketing strategy.
1. Do Your Research- Every successful marketing strategy is based on good research. You can’t just blindly go to a social media site to submit your content and expect immediate success. You need to find social media sites that fit your niche. For example, if you’re trying to promote your medical business, you should find sites where health related articles tend to be popular.
2. Interact with the Community- The biggest rookie mistake in social media marketing is to completely ignore the community. It’s called social media for a reason. Take advantage of the social platform by interacting with the community. The closer you become with community members, the more likely it is that they’ll help promote your content.
3. Write for Your Audience- This is Writing 101, but many people tend to ignore it. If you want your content to go hot, it has to be tailored toward the audience on the social media site. When you’re interacting with the community, get to know their likes and dislikes. Also, take note of what type of stories tend to get the most attention. You’ll see patterns develop in the types of themes and content that consistently go hot.
4. Be Relevant- Relevance is the key to social media marketing. Don’t believe me? Just go to the front page of Digg or any other social site. The vast majority of the top content is related to late-breaking news. Be the first to break a story in your industry; or, give your unique insight on a hot news item.
5. Keep it Short- Internet users don’t like reading long passages of text. They tend to scan online content rather than taking the time to fully read it. For this reason, you need to accommodate their reading habits by keeping your content short and easy to scan. Brief paragraphs and bold, descriptive headings are great ways to make your content more scanner-friendly.
6. Focus on Design- When users come to your page to read your content, are they greeted with a clean, welcoming website design? If not, they might just turn around and leave your site. Remember, it’s not just enough to have great content; how you present it is important as well. Use a design scheme that’s easy on the eyes and that assists the reader in scanning the content.
7. Stop Trying to Sell- Another social media marketing rookie mistake is to constantly try to sell your products. Sure, the ultimate goal of marketing is to promote your brand, but you’ll never gain any respect on these networks if you’re constantly pimping out your products. Instead, contribute useful content that the community can learn from.
8. Create Great Headlines- I don’t care if your article is good enough to be the cover story in Time Magazine. If it doesn’t have a great title, it won’t get any attention on these sites. Think about it- thousands of users are submitting content to these sites all day long. What makes someone click on a post to read more? An eye-catching title.
9. Help Out Others- This goes back to #2 and #7. If you want to become a top user on a certain social media site, you have to help others out. Don’t just submit and promote your own content. Find useful articles from different sources that your audience will enjoy. By promoting content that’s not yours, the community will begin to see you as a great resource for relevant information.
10. Convert Hot Content- One mistake many social media marketers make is to not capitalize on hot content. If you’re fortunate enough to have a piece rise to the top, you need to make that attention last. How can you do this? By creating another great post to follow the hot one. That way, when visitors come to your site to read the popular post, they’ll see you have new content. Ride that wave as long as you can!
The bottom line with social media marketing is there are no shortcuts to success. If you put in the time and effort, your brand will experience numerous benefits. Set realistic goals for your marketing campaign, and stick with it to the end.
Forward-thinking web development companies are using social media to gain invaluable connections with their audience and to increase their online visibility. And they’re reaping the benefits of their marketing efforts.
Authority, inbound links, visibility, and trust are just a few of the things active online brands are earning through this form of marketing. So, are you ready to jump aboard the social media train? Here are 10 steps to creating a successful social media marketing strategy.
1. Do Your Research- Every successful marketing strategy is based on good research. You can’t just blindly go to a social media site to submit your content and expect immediate success. You need to find social media sites that fit your niche. For example, if you’re trying to promote your medical business, you should find sites where health related articles tend to be popular.
2. Interact with the Community- The biggest rookie mistake in social media marketing is to completely ignore the community. It’s called social media for a reason. Take advantage of the social platform by interacting with the community. The closer you become with community members, the more likely it is that they’ll help promote your content.
3. Write for Your Audience- This is Writing 101, but many people tend to ignore it. If you want your content to go hot, it has to be tailored toward the audience on the social media site. When you’re interacting with the community, get to know their likes and dislikes. Also, take note of what type of stories tend to get the most attention. You’ll see patterns develop in the types of themes and content that consistently go hot.
4. Be Relevant- Relevance is the key to social media marketing. Don’t believe me? Just go to the front page of Digg or any other social site. The vast majority of the top content is related to late-breaking news. Be the first to break a story in your industry; or, give your unique insight on a hot news item.
5. Keep it Short- Internet users don’t like reading long passages of text. They tend to scan online content rather than taking the time to fully read it. For this reason, you need to accommodate their reading habits by keeping your content short and easy to scan. Brief paragraphs and bold, descriptive headings are great ways to make your content more scanner-friendly.
6. Focus on Design- When users come to your page to read your content, are they greeted with a clean, welcoming website design? If not, they might just turn around and leave your site. Remember, it’s not just enough to have great content; how you present it is important as well. Use a design scheme that’s easy on the eyes and that assists the reader in scanning the content.
7. Stop Trying to Sell- Another social media marketing rookie mistake is to constantly try to sell your products. Sure, the ultimate goal of marketing is to promote your brand, but you’ll never gain any respect on these networks if you’re constantly pimping out your products. Instead, contribute useful content that the community can learn from.
8. Create Great Headlines- I don’t care if your article is good enough to be the cover story in Time Magazine. If it doesn’t have a great title, it won’t get any attention on these sites. Think about it- thousands of users are submitting content to these sites all day long. What makes someone click on a post to read more? An eye-catching title.
9. Help Out Others- This goes back to #2 and #7. If you want to become a top user on a certain social media site, you have to help others out. Don’t just submit and promote your own content. Find useful articles from different sources that your audience will enjoy. By promoting content that’s not yours, the community will begin to see you as a great resource for relevant information.
10. Convert Hot Content- One mistake many social media marketers make is to not capitalize on hot content. If you’re fortunate enough to have a piece rise to the top, you need to make that attention last. How can you do this? By creating another great post to follow the hot one. That way, when visitors come to your site to read the popular post, they’ll see you have new content. Ride that wave as long as you can!
The bottom line with social media marketing is there are no shortcuts to success. If you put in the time and effort, your brand will experience numerous benefits. Set realistic goals for your marketing campaign, and stick with it to the end.
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