Pemberton Press

After twenty years as a marketer in print and online media I now produce video content for corporate, government and education sectors.  In this post I discuss the power of the medium, integration possibilities and the explosion in demand for video content on mobile/ social platforms.  I always knew video would become a huge part of the marketing mix – and in 2013 that time has come.

Demands on marketers have never been greater.  Quarter after quarter the need for high quality campaigns squeezed from ever-tightening budgets is unrelenting. Combine this with the proliferation of channels and the opportunity to interact with your audience through various devices and you have one hell of a challenge.  To meet and exceed the task, successful marketers realise that it’s not about working harder, but about working smarter.

Here’s why you need to employ video as a core part of your marketing mix:

1. The unmatched power of Audio Visual presentations
2. The campaign integration possibilities
3. The explosion in demand for video on mobile/ social
4. The falling barriers to high quality production values

Let’s look at each of these points and some relevant links you may be interested to see.

First, the power of the medium in delivering a value proposition, telling a story or explaining how something works is unparalleled.  It’s easy to say “seeing is believing”, but two decades of research by a world authority on the topic, Dr. Richard Mayer, concludes that people learn better from words and pictures than from words alone.  Video can also make you laugh, or cry. When have you have seen a whitepaper do that?  It’s the power to evoke emotion that can impact people profoundly.

Second, the extraordinary ease with which it can be integrated with online and print media coupled with its versatility across the sales cycle makes it a marketer’s dream.  Once you have a great story, you can spread it like honey across many of the other elements of your marketing and PR campaigns.  You can create stills, copy, different video versions for different audiences and easily turn it into email & web, print, slide decks and podcasts, all of which can be syndicated via social media or presented at live events, conferences and sales meetings.

Third, there is a huge and growing demand for more compelling content for video on mobiles and online.  In the past year, viewership of video content on smartphones increased nearly eight times, and tablets have become the most preferred device for viewing a video series.  Video is frictionless across Facebook & Twitter, allowing you to target your audience precisely, engage them with relevant content and drive your call to action.

Lastly, high quality video is no longer the preserve of a few large broadcasters. Extraordinary advances in the price/ performance in recording and production equipment has enabled the creation of broadcast quality content for a fraction of the cost compared to what it was even 10 years ago.  This means you can create extremely valuable, scalable assets which can generate demand by engaging, informing and entertaining your audience. The days of amature old-school corporate videos are over!

Don’t miss the biggest opportunity in 2013 to engage audiences with effective audiovisual communication!  If video isn’t on your radar yet, I encourage you to take a look at your options for how you can employ video in your next campaign, it’s easier than you think!

Andrew Forsyth, Producer/ Director