Using video in your social media posts can be easier than you think and is a good option for business owners, sole traders and entrepreneurs who have to manage their own social media accounts.
Sometimes it can be difficult to squeeze in some time to write fresh posts or articles for your blog or social platforms, so a quick 60 second video can often seem so appealing to shoot instead, especially if writing doesn’t come naturally to you.
Retail shops and warehouse stock settings are an ideal stage for a short video. You can shoot a quick update and showcase a new line that you have just taken delivery of and are very excited to introduce. If you are running a special flash sale or have limited stocks left of a certain item, then you can shoot a video of your warehouse shelves to say – “look! This is all we have left! Grab some now before they are all gone!”
A great example of this would be this video from Dan, the owner of Approved Foods. Dan is a natural in front of the camera and shoots regular updates for his social media accounts for new lines in, competitions and ideas about how to use some of the weird and wonderful stuff they get over the threshold.
Your video doesn’t have to be perfect – in fact the more human and natural you can make your video the better! People respond better to video that is more genuine and off the cuff than anything you may pay to have recorded in a studio with professional sound and lighting equipment.
Dan puts a real human face on his business, and as he started out as a market trader he carries a lot of experience in interacting with customers on a one-to-one level. Video makes a perfect medium in which to reach his many thousands of customers in a way that is not dissimilar to how he ran his market stall.
Social media makes using video easy for a small business and is accessible by anyone through their PC, laptop, tablet or smartphone. Video is one of the best ways to reach your customers wherever they may be: on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat or other platforms. Social media users love watching videos so using it for your business could be one of the best ways to connect and engage with customers and boost your brand awareness at the same time.
Videos can be great fun!
Forget the stuffy and highly polished sales adverts you see on TV or those staged infomercials that are played on shopping channels. Remember that you are not here to sell – so don’t make every video about selling something. You can inform and encourage your viewers with your videos, but cold-selling rarely works.
Even when you have nothing to say, you can still post up some fun videos to keep your customers entertained and connected with your company. Going back to Dan once again – here he is with a fine example of shooting a video just for fun.
Again, he is presenting the human side of his business and letting his customers get to know his staff. Even though there is nothing being promoted in this video, seeing how happy the staff are in their work is really great. If you are a buyer who cares about work ethics and how an employer treats their staff, then you would be more encouraged to buy from the company knowing their staff are happy and well-treated.
What to do with your videos
YouTube is the largest video-sharing site in the world, so it makes sense to open a channel on there for your business and load up your video clips to showcase. You can create your own customised channel for your business even using your company colour scheme and logos.
Don’t worry about setting up your channel – it is really easy to do and can be done in only a few short minutes. You can always go back to tweak it later as things change or you become more confident about using it.
There are no limits to how many videos you can upload, and those that receive the most shares and positive ratings will give you a good insight into what sort of video content people like to see from you. A great feature of YouTube is that anyone who subscribes to your channel will get an automatic notification whenever you upload a new video. This can be very encouraging for you because you know there are eager followers waiting for your new content.
Help with making your video
If you really are not confident that you will be able to make a good video, or you want to make the whole process of shooting videos a little easier, then you can download YouTube Director, a very handy app that has been created for the iPhone and iPad. The app allows you to follow a step by step process of shooting a quality video and even lets you overlay texts and add music too!
Creating a video is not as tough as it was some years back. Yes, there are some phone-friendly apps that you can use, but that will not give your video a professional look and feel. That can only happen if you are using a video editing software. You can either buy a subscription which can cost you a lot of money, or you can download a video editing software from proxy-rarbg. You will be able to get access to all the features and functionalities for video editing, adding music and adding text.
Again, as with any form of social media content – consistency is key. You should try to upload regular videos to provide fresh content for your followers to watch. You should also remember to interact with your followers by thanking them for their comments and answering their questions.
Remember to share your video links across your social media platforms and embed them into your posts.
