5 Ways to Promote Your Video Content
Once you have created your original video content, what should you do with it? It simply isn’t enough to upload it to one channel and hope people will watch it. The digital age is saturated with content, not just videos, but text graphics, GIFs, memes and more. If you want to be seen in the crowd of content available to users, you need to actively promote your videos. In this article, we will look at five simple ways to promote your video content.
1. Ask People to Share Your Video Content
This may sound simple, but have you tried asking people to share your videos? Ask your friends and family to share the video on their social media channels or in their messaging groups. Ask your employees, fellow colleagues, or people from different departments to share the content. It isn’t only up to the marketing department to promote content, it helps if the entire company chips in. Look beyond your intimate sphere and reach out to people in the industry who you have connections with. Ask them to share the video on their social media or to embed it with a relevant piece of their own content as a linkbuilding opportunity. Every share that your video receives will expand its reach to a larger audience.
2. Cross-Promote Your Video Content
Your video content may have been created specifically for a YouTube channel, or a particular webpage, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be seen anywhere else. Cross-promotion is extremely important in the current digital age. The majority of your audience will be members of numerous digital platforms, but the likelihood of them being equally active on all channels is low. So, if your content is only on one channel, you are limiting the audience you can reach.
Something to remember when cross-promoting your video is how the content appears differently on each channel. The various algorithms on different sites are designed to serve attractive content to the viewers. This means, it is important to ensure you have an appealing, high quality thumbnail paired with a title that is relevant to the topic of the video. When posting to social media, it is better to post natively to the platform, rather than just adding a link. For instance, native LinkedIn videos have 10 times higher reach than links—you can read this useful article on LinkedIn video marketing here that explains more.
3. Paid Video Posts on Social Media
If you want your video to reach a new audience, it may be worth spending money on digital advertising. For small businesses, paid promotional content is rarely on the agenda because they generally have small budgets. The good news is, sponsored posts aren’t as expensive as many people imagine. However, you need to be aware of the difference in cost if your campaign is pay-per-click (PPC) or cost-per-click (CPC.) Here is a thorough breakdown of the difference between PPC vs CPC to help guide you. The amount you set for paid campaigns and posts is generally up to you—but the lower the amount, the fewer people you will reach. However, you shouldn’t focus on getting millions of viewers and clicks from one video promotion campaign. You can start small, test the waters, and see what works for you and your audience, and then budget accordingly.
4. Promote Video Content Offline
Your video may have been created with online audiences in mind, but you can still promote it offline. Are you, or a co-worker giving a presentation? Struggling to brainstorm engaging presentation ideas? Playing a video during a presentation will break the monotony of listening to one person speak, and will help people retain information better. You can also display the video on looped screens at a company event or trade-show, so your guests have something to look at while they’re waiting for the snacks to come around.
5. Repurpose Your Video Content
Create shorter versions of your video that can be shared easily on social media platforms as teasers or trailers with a prompt to go watch the full video. Use Facebook or Instagram Story features to discuss the content of the video with your audience. Learn how to optimize your original video to adhere to the Instagram Story size requirements here.
You want people to see your content, but that doesn’t mean that it only has to come in video form. Repurpose your video content as a blog, infographic, GIF, etc. and include the video as a part of your email marketing strategy by embedding it in your newsletter (like in the example below) – don’t just add a link back to the original video posting. Repurposing your video content will not only let you reach wider audiences, but will also give you a wealth of content to use over time.
Source: Venngage (https://venngage.com/templates/newsletters) Twitter: @Venngage
Key Takeaways
Promoting your video content doesn’t have to break the bank. You can start by asking people close to you to share the video with their network. To broaden your audience, ensure that your video exists online in more than one digital location and cross-promote as widely as possible. You may consider paid advertising to help your video gain traction. Your video may be intended for online, but you can still take your video offline to events and presentations. Finally, repurpose your original video as other kinds of content to reach audiences who may have not engaged with the video already. By following these five simple methods, you can begin promoting your video content to the audiences who want to see it.
Author: Ronita Mohan
Ronita Mohan is a content marketer at Venngage, the online infographic and design platform. She writes about varied topics, such as marketing, being productive, pop culture news and opinions, management, and diversity.