making money

Why Use Video Marketing for Your Small Business?

~ whiteknighthub ~ Leave a comment

Welcome to our first guest blog, written by Nicole Standish of Charm Digital Media. Enjoy this article and let us know what you learned in the comments below!

Videos are some of the most effective marketing tools today. Customers find them attractive, relatable, and relevant. They are highly effective at capturing and retaining the client’s attention. Small Businesses especially can benefit from the value and engagement that video provides.

So, how can this form of marketing be useful to your small business?

Boosting Conversion Rates and Sales

Using a targeted video content strategy, you will not struggle to boost your conversion rates and sales. Therefore, be ready to make serious money and become wildly popular. A landing page that contains a video is capable of increasing conversions by as much as 80 percent.

Amazing ROIs

Videos offer amazing returns on investment (ROI). They guarantee the best results based on what you spend. They are a worthy investment when done correctly. All it takes is a bit of planning, a great video marketing team, and a smartphone to begin seeing your conversions soar.

Research shows that businesses publish on average 18 videos per month according to this HubSpot Infographic. That is close to 1 video per work day. Do not, however, place too much emphasis on producing perfect videos. Instead, focus on the content and solving problems for your target audience.

Building Trust with Clients

Videos are perfect for building trust with your customers. Most times, clients find it easier to relate with brands that produce videos. Trust is the foundation of any business relationship, especially if you are a small business that is just getting acquainted with your buyers. To do this,  Use video to highlight your team, show your community involvement, outline your mission and vision as a company, and show off your well-earned testimonials. 

Search Engines Love Videos

Google – and all the other major search engines – love videos. They reward marketers who use videos to pass messages across. Visitors on your site tend to spend more time browsing through your pages while engaged in one of your videos, improving your reach and validating your relevance to search engines. 

The likelihood of showing on the first results page increases 53 times when you feature videos.

Popular with Mobile Phone Users

Mobile users love videos. Today, there is a 233% increase in mobile video views. Businesses can take advantage of this trend and reach people on their mobile devices, while they are at work or at leisure. Video is the easiest content to consume on a smartphone or smaller device.

Tip: Include text in your video as many viewers watch with the sound off.

Videos are Ideal for Explanations

You have a higher and better chance of reaching out to your customers with a message they understand when using videos to explain your product, service or process.Explainer videos are popular with more than 98% of all video viewers, meaning they value the effort that you are taking to produce the videos and provide the answers they are looking for.

There are many ways to create an entertaining explainer video. If your subject is difficult to explain and low on the likeability scale, you can easily narrate or animate your videos to add more emotion or pizzaz. Use emotion, drama or humor to draw in your audience and keep them engaged.

Popular with Lazy Buyers

Today, your business will engage with many lazy buyers. Such buyers are a difficult lot to market to without videos. They are not interested in your long-form content, they want to know quickly and easily how your product or service can solve their problems. Video allows them to listen or watch while they are multi-tasking. Additionally, video gives them a deeper glimpse into your businesses without needing to visit your about us page, removing another click in their buyers’ journey.

Vidoe Marketing For Small Businesses = Conversions & ROI

If you have small businesses or any business for that matter, video can work for you. Using a mix of written and video content, you will surely attract more customers and do so in the way they feel the most comfortable engaging with your brand. There really isn’t a down-side to video marketing. Video marketing is affordable, easy to produce and has outstanding ROI. 

Nicole Standish is the President of Charm Digital Media.  As a digital media consultant, Nicole helps businesses attract and convert online business.  Nicole evaluates existing digital resources and strategies; develops campaigns to reach targeted audiences, and optimizes marketing channels to reach and exceed sales goals. Follow Charm Digital Media on Facebook at Charm Digital Media and Twitter at @CharmThem

Interested in learning more about video marketing? Comment on this post or subscribe to our digital marketing blog – The Content Catch Up! 

 

Why Video Content Matters

~ whiteknighthub ~ Leave a comment

If you have a business of any kind chances are that you could benefit by engaging in conversation with your current and future customers. Anyone can start a blog or post on social media, but what’s a little trickier is coming up with a strategy around what you’re saying, and finding a way to make sure people are paying attention.

If you want to make sure that the odds of a successful campaign are in your favor then you may want to consider including video in your mix. While today’s consumers are looking for relevant and useful information, they are less likely than ever to want to actually read long blocks of text. You only have three seconds in which to capture someone’s attention, and video helps to stack the odds in your favor.

It also allows you to create a personal connection with your audience and to show – not tell – what your business is all about. People still like doing business with those who they connect with, like and trust, and with video your authentic and true self can shine through.

But don’t just take my word for it. The anecdotal evidence and statistics speak for themselves. Social media posts with video are 1200% more likely to be shared, and according to Wirebuzz, viewers retain 95% of the message when they watch it in a video as opposed to just 10% when reading it in text. “How to” searches on YouTube have grown by more than 70% in the past year and will continue to increase, according to projections. That’s pretty impressive, especially as YouTube is already the second largest search engine.

You probably don’t need to be convinced that video is relevant, but how can you use it to grow your business? The possibilities are endless, really. You can introduce your staff or product, give a behind-the-scenes tour of your offices or showcase client testimonials. And if you don’t like being in front of the camera, there are dozens of ways to create videos that can keep you safely behind the scenes.

Because of the nature of our business we see successes just about every single day. I have a client that didn’t even have a YouTube channel a few months ago, and now, after a couple of months of Video Crisps content, she is coming up number one in a YouTube search. It’s exciting and it proves that there’s no time like the present to get started in making video work for you.

Elin Barton is the President of White Knight Productions and the host of the podcast, Ready, Set, Grit.  Her first book, Ready, Set, Grit: How to Turn Your Daydream Into a Phenomenal Success, will be released in the Fall of 2017. To find out more about how you can use video to grow your business visit our website.

Adapt and Grow

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If you’re not always changing and adapting as a business, then your business is dying.

You have probably heard that idea before, but if you’re running a small business are you so caught up in the day to day that you’re forgetting to ask yourself how you can continue to do better, be better, and adapt to and ever-changing and often fickle marketplace?

Part of the solution to this issue is a commitment to education for leadership and employees of any organization. And the other part is a willingness to grow and change, to try new things and to let go of that which is no longer serving you.

In order to do this effectively you have to ask a lot of questions, which means listening to your customers, your employees and to peers and leaders in your field. And, when you do start getting feedback, you have to be willing to do something about it.

If you start hearing that your pricing is too high, for example, that could mean one of two things. Either you need to come up with a product or service that is more affordable to your customer base, or you need to court a different demographic because you’re probably not working with your ideal clients.

Obviously no business should want to jump on every trend that pops up, but being savvy enough to balance what your customers need and want with new advances and best practices in your business are a winning combination and one which we all should be striving for.

And even if achieving the perfect balance of innovation and consistency is tough, you don’t have to be perfect to be effective. In fact, any steps you can take towards intentionally creating an innovative and forward thinking company are going to serve you well and move your closer to your goals.

Tribe it Up

~ whiteknighthub ~ 2 Comments

The other day I had lunch with my friend and fellow entrepreneur. We spoke candidly about some of the challenges in our respective businesses, and as we were getting ready to leave the restaurant she said to me, “I’m so relieved that I’m not the only one who goes through this stuff.”

That statement struck a cord with me because so often as entrepreneurs and small business owners we do feel like we have to figure everything out on our own, and that can be a very lonely position to take. The truth of the matter is, we have more in common than we realize. Even though we may be running businesses in different industries with our own very specific challenges, on a slightly higher level we are all the same.

We face issues and questions around cash flow, sales, employee recruitment and retention. We have to pay attention to marketing, advertising, culture and reputation. As our companies grow we most likely have a team in place to assist with many of these items, but ultimately, as a small business owner, the buck does stop with us.

But that doesn’t mean we have to go it alone.

Taking the time to intentionally seek out and build a support network for yourself is, I believe, key for the success of a business. At a minimum you may want to consider hiring a business coach or a mentor, but beyond that setting up a “mastermind” group of trusted peers will help you to keep challenges – and successes – in perspective.

Elin Barton is the President of White Knight Productions and the host of the podcast, Ready, Set, Grit.  Her first book, Ready, Set, Grit: How to Turn Your Daydream Into a Phenomenal Success, will be released in the Fall of 2017.

How Does Your Money Flow?

~ whiteknighthub ~ Leave a comment

Money, in and of itself, has no value. In order to mean anything it has to circulate. It must flow.

I had an interesting conversation the other day that I want to share with you. I was talking with a woman who is a professional writer and she was telling me about her early career where she was a single mom struggling with money. She described how she was forced to buy the most basic necessities, and how, as a side effect of that, her kids learned the value of money and of working hard.

But what was really interesting about the conversation was when she told me that during that challenging time in her life she was always volunteering to bring food in for food drives or for church functions, how she’d bake brownies for school or donate to local charities. All of that from someone who had nothing, yet somehow they always had enough.

In fact, she told me that the only time she literally couldn’t make ends meet was after she started questioning her generosity and when she had made a decision to stop giving so much.

It’s ironic, but I’ve experienced the exact same thing, as have countless other people, I am sure. I know that for myself, every time I give (even when I feel like I can’t afford to be doing so), I always end up receiving more wealth in some form or another. I might pick up a new client who I wasn’t expecting to approach me, or I might get a forgotten about tax credit in the mail. However the money come back it happens, in one way or another, without fail, and I really do find it very interesting.

In order for money to come to you it also has to flow out. In order to experience being abundant or wealthy you also have to give, spend and act generously. Of course, you don’t always have to do this with money – time, expertise and even sharing a kind word are certainly other ways to give – and they leave you feeling good.

When you hold too tightly to money (or anything else for that matter), you never get to truly experience its goodness or full potential. And guess what? The same principles apply to business, too. On a very base level the whole purpose behind any business is to serve, to help support the employees and others who benefit in some way from the existence of the business. It is not only about (or should not be, anyway) getting the highest number in the bank account.

In my opinion it is bigger than that. And of course money and profits are hugely important, but they’re not as important as the lives that are impacted by the business and by the positivity that it has the power to spread. At the end of the day we are all in this thing called life together, at least at some level.

So, let the money flow for good causes, for helping your employees, vendors and others achieve financial freedom. Become prosperous so you can fully enjoy life, but share in that prosperity too because that is where the real value, joy and meaning ultimately comes from.