Video is fast becoming a powerful lead generation tool for marketers. Using video appropriately can easily shorten sales cycles and improve the nature of conversations you are having with your buyers. A study by the IT Business Edge showed that videos are used by B2B buyers throughout the buying cycle: from awareness to purchase; with more than 70% of B2B buyers relying on video product demonstrations before deciding on which product to buy.
But is it enough to just create videos? How can B2B marketers convert cold video viewers into warm leads?
Here are some tips to help you convert your viewers into returning visitors and convert your video channel or website into a lead generation machine:
Add Interactive Elements to Your Video
Take the engagement factor of your video a notch higher by adding interactive elements to your video that allow a viewer to engage with a video as opposed to just watching it. Some common interactive elements used for this purpose are video tags that link to websites, images, or other video clips. People can see your tags when they place their cursors over your video.
A free tool that is handy for adding interactive tags to videos hosted on YouTube is The Mad Video. You can also consider using contact forms or enquiry forms placed during the video that allows you to capture more information about a lead. If you are unsure of how to go about this, there are various solution providers with easy-to-integrate solutions. Video lead forms allow you to capture lead data directly from the video and integrate it to your CRM and Marketing automation for better lead nurturing.
Use Video Analytics to Enhance and Push Buyers Along the Buying Cycle
Video marketing should not just be restricted to creating and promoting videos. Marketers also need to analyze the performance of each of these videos in order to assess content preferred by their target demographic and tailor content accordingly. For instance, YouTube analytics allows marketers to discover sources of traffic, demographic of video viewers and importantly viewer drop-off.
These metrics not only enable marketers to measure if their message is resonating across the right target audience but to also analyze the quality of video content, internalize this feedback and make improvements to drive deeper engagements.
Include a Compelling CTA
It is essential for you to include a call to action leaving the viewers to engage with you further. This could be in the form of a screen that appears at the conclusion of a video asking users to download your white-paper or other related videos that appear at the end of your video. Another easy way of engaging your users is by providing annotations during the video asking viewers to subscribe to your channel, sign up for your newsletters, join your social networks, engage with your content by sharing or liking it and more.
If your YouTube account is Google AdWords enabled, you can also use an Ad Overlay for your videos that will link anywhere from your LinkedIn page to a dedicated landing page. Providing an apt call to action could make all the difference between cold viewers and engaged returning buyers.
Make Sure It Is Mobile Optimized
We do not have to stress the importance of mobile optimizing all your video content. With views on mobile devices having tripled from 2011 to 2012 and continuing to rise till today, marketers have to ensure that all their videos are optimized for viewing on mobile browsers and devices.
When streaming over-the-top content and video on demand, not all devices are able to process the specific size, type, and viewing rate of the video being streamed since video sessions are each granted the same amount of bandwidth. This bottlenecking of content results in longer buffering time and poor viewing quality. However, there are solutions that optimize over the top content.
Optimizing your video content for mobile also means ensuring that every video created by you will play on smartphones, tablets, phablets etc. Ensure that your code is updated to play the video in HTML5 and that your video sites support HTML5. The best way to check this is to test your videos using different mobile devices and operating systems. Ensure that your videos perform flawlessly on all devices.
