Did you know YouTube is considered to be the second most popular search engine in the world behind Google? That means video content is a highly effective way to boost brand awareness and drive targeted audiences of consumers (both B2C and B2B) to your website where they can look around, get to know you, and consider doing business with you.
But search engine optimization (SEO) isn’t the only way that video marketing can build a business working in or with the cannabis industry. Video content that you publish on YouTube can also be embedded on your own website giving you valuable content to promote to new and existing audiences.
You can fill the page (or blog post) where the video is embedded on your website with relevant search-optimized text content (e.g., an accompanying article or video transcript), which will not only boost search engine traffic from Google and other search engines to your website, but it will also give you content that you can share through your social media channels and email marketing that links directly back to your website.
Video content is highly shareable and very popular today, so publishing videos on YouTube and embedding them on your website with value-added text content can drive incremental traffic to your website and boost sales and revenue.
And yes, cannabis businesses and ancillary businesses can create a YouTube channel and publish videos. Search YouTube for other businesses in the cannabis industry, and you’ll find many well-known brands and companies publishing video content. Just be sure to follow the YouTube Creator Policies and Guidelines.
To get started with video marketing so you can build your business in the cannabis industry (or to take your existing video marketing to the next level), here are some important steps to follow:
Invest in the Right Equipment
Believe it or not, you don’t need to invest in expensive equipment to create video content that reflects your brand reputation and resonates with your target audience. The truth is, many people are turned off by overly-produced video content because they consider it to be inauthentic and impersonal.
The power of video content comes from the personal connection it creates between brands and viewers. That’s why so many businesses create video content with nothing more than a smartphone camera.
Of course, there are times when the camera on your smartphone won’t be good enough to capture all of the action and sound in your video adequately. In those instances, you’ll need better equipment. There are a number of different types of microphones and video cameras that you can use that aren’t overly expensive. With so many people creating video content on sites like TikTok these days, prices for great equipment are far more reasonable than they were five years ago.
In addition to recording equipment, you’ll need to invest in video editing software because you’ll likely make mistakes as you’re recording that you’ll need to fix in post-production. It’s also a good idea to add a branded intro and outro to your video with your logo, website URL, and contact information. Video editing software makes it easy to stitch multiple videos (e.g., your intro, video content, and your outro) together into a single video..
You can find video editing software online for free or inexpensive fees, but you may find that free and cheap editing software doesn’t include all of the features you need. Fortunately, video editing software like Camtasia from TechSmith and Adobe Premiere are not excessively expensive and both are excellent editing tools.
Match Your Video Content to the Marketing Funnel
You’ll need to create a variety of videos to meet people where they are in the buyer journey and marketing funnel. For example, at the top of the funnel, viewers will be most interested in content that builds awareness about your business and the types of solutions that are available to address their problems (i.e., the problems you can help consumers solve with your products or services). How-to videos work very well for people in the awareness stage.
In the middle of the funnel, you need to build brand trust. People in the middle stages of the buyer journey are researching solutions to their problems, so educational content that helps them solve their problems or reach their goals is typically best for this audience.
At the bottom of the funnel, consumers have likely narrowed down product or service choices that solve their problem and are trying to make a final decision on which one to buy. Therefore, videos that compare products (including your competitors’ products), demonstrate how to use your product, and explain how specific features work are very effective for consumers who are almost ready to make a purchase decision. The goal at this stage is to show them exactly why they should choose your brand over all the rest.
Consider SEO
If people can’t find your videos, then your videos won’t help to drive traffic to your website (and increase views on YouTube). With that in mind, you should follow some search engine optimization best practices for video content to boost search traffic to your videos.
First, make sure the title of each video is highly relevant. Think about the search queries that people would type into Google or YouTube to find content like your video, and use those keywords to craft your video title. Similarly, write a video description for YouTube that includes keywords and phrases that answer questions for people who would be looking for content like your video. Another great trick is to include the transcript of each video in the video description section on YouTube when you upload and publish them.
When it comes to embedding your videos on your website, your blog is a great place to do it. You can also create a resources section or a video library on your website where all of your video content is published. Just make sure that each video gets its own page with its own description and text content to generate the most search engine traffic to it.
To add your videos to your website, copy the embed code from each video on YouTube and paste the code into the page where you want the video to be published on your own website. You’ll need to make sure that the embed option is turned on when you upload your videos to YouTube in order to access the embed feature for published videos. You can use the tools in YouTube’s embed feature to stylize each video so it matches your website for a fully branded user experience.
Promote Your Videos
As with all online content, if you build it (i.e., publish it), they won’t come – unless you promote it. Therefore, when you publish a new video and embed it on your website, you need to promote the video (embedded on your website, not on YouTube), to your audience in order to drive more people to your website. You can do this by sharing the video on your social media channels, such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, and so on. Ask your employees to share your videos on their social media accounts as well to extend your brand’s reach.
Email marketing is another great way to spread the word about your new video content. Create an email marketing campaign for your subscriber audience that explains why the video is useful and meaningful to them, and include a call-to-action in the message that links to the video on your website.
Take a screenshot of your video and add the image to the email campaign. You shouldn’t embed a video into an email marketing campaign (it’s a spam trigger), but you can include an image of the video in your message that links to the actual video on your website.
Key Takeaways about How to Use Video Marketing to Build a Business in the Cannabis Industry
Video marketing represents a significant opportunity for cannabis businesses and ancillary businesses that develop a video strategy and prioritize the implementation of that strategy with a comprehensive video marketing plan. It’s an opportunity that not a lot of businesses in the cannabis industry are leveraging yet, which means it’s wide open for your business to dominate. You just need to get started, and it won’t take long for you to see positive results.
The post How to Use Video Marketing to Build a Business in the Cannabis Industry appeared first on Cannabis Business Executive – Cannabis and Marijuana industry news.
