Paid and sponsored videos are an effective way to drive traffic. As part of your video marketing approach, it’s a good idea to include paid promotion. This tactic not only puts your content in front of more people, it puts it in front of more of the right people. The goal is to drive people to your website or other owned media channel to learn more. This makes the next step, conversion, that much more attainable.
Distribution
So you made a first-rate video that promotes your business or product and speaks to your target market—that’s great! You’ve posted on your website, social media channels and LinkedIn. But you still don’t seem to be getting a lot of traction. The truth is, a great video that nobody sees is worthless. Let’s talk about distribution.
Owned, Earned, Paid
There are three kinds of distribution: owned, earned, and paid. Owned distribution is free to use and includes your website, social media channels, and email lists. Earned distribution is having your video used in an article on your industry, posted on a blog, or aired in a news story. Paid distribution, a form of paid advertising, is the focus of this blog. You’re paying to have your video distributed. There are the obvious channels, like buying airtime with a television network. Another example you may see is a “paid” or “sponsored” ad on Facebook. These website and platform ads are what keeps a site running and gives you free access.
Paid Video: Get What You Pay For
Using paid advertising is kind of like using a headhunter. You’re paying to have your video matched with your target market. Whether you use Facebook, LinkedIn or any other platform, you have options for finding your customers and targeting them with your video. This is a terrific way to reach out to a new audience that otherwise may never hear about your business. Below are some of the options for paid video.
Social Media
Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and LinkedIn are all options for paid video. Facebook is one of the most popular places for paid content promotion, especially for B2B marketers. Think about your target market. What social media platform do they use most? Take the time to explore and compare the features and options offered by each platform to see what best fits your budget and your goals.
Search Ads
Search ads are things like Google Search and YouTube video ads. They use keywords to target and reach your audience. This ranks your ads above organic, or unpaid, results. In a Google search, these are the first few hits that show up on a results page. This research found that 75% of users never scroll past the first page of search results. That makes search engine marketing an important focus when you want people to find your business.
Sponsored Content
We’ve all fallen victim to sponsored content. You think something is part of a website or newspaper…then you see the “sponsored content” message. It’s a pretty tricky way to insert advertising into a publication, but it is very effective at targeting a market. The person who reads sponsored content is obviously interested in the topic, so it’s worth exploring for paid video.
Influencers
An influencer is someone you pay to talk about your service, product, or company. The advantage is that you get access to their audience. Let’s say they have a sizable online following—that influencer can expose your business to a new audience. The idea is to choose someone that has experience and clout in the arena of your product or service. That way, their endorsement makes sense, carries weight, and you’re accessing potential customers.
Native Advertising
This process embeds your ads into a third party website. Using a service like Outbrain or Taboola, native advertising will use a sponsored link to place your video where it makes the most sense. If you have a gym, native advertising could host your video on third-party health and fitness blogs around the web. This kind of paid video is meant to align with other information a reader would find on the host site. It’s positioned as relevant and useful information. However, it’s still a paid ad and should be labeled as such to avoid the perception of “fake news”.
Analytics
If you choose to use paid video for distribution, get the most out of your investment by paying attention to analytics. Test your options and take note of the results. What yields a good ROI and what’s not worth a second try? Stick with what works and keep refining your approach with new videos and changes in your business. Of course, it all starts with a video worth sharing! Call us today for a free quote.
