Creating a video marketing strategy for Facebook
There is no doubt that Facebook is the largest social network.
Facebook has 1.65 billion monthly active users, with nearly one billion accessing the network on their mobile phones every day. As avid Facebook users scroll through their newsfeeds on both desktop and phone, brands face an ever-evolving challenge of creating thumb-stopping content.
Videos are shown to get more reach than any other post on Facebook, and the network is rapidly evolving into a video-centric platform. According to TechCrunch, Facebook has reached 8 billion video views a day and viewership continues to grow.
At their very best, videos can create experiences that are memorable, moving, and inspiring – experiences that brands and businesses can bank on.
Why brands should start making Facebook-friendly videos
On Facebook, video content has more power to increase brand awareness.
Video can speak on a level that text posts can’t. It can educate and entertain an audience easily and quickly through storytelling. Through creative and engaging video content, your brand or business has a higher chance of attracting attention and engagement. According to HubSpot, 80% of customers remember a video they watched in the last month.
Video content performs well on all devices.
Videos perform well regardless of which device is used to view Facebook. The responsive design ensures that your audience will see your video the exact same way every time. Simply Measured found that 60% of viewers engage in a video post in preference to a text post, so you want to make sure you get it right first!
Video has the ability to build greater social connectivity.
Using video correctly in your marketing strategy enables you to increase engagement with your direct target audience and their extended personal network. Forbes estimates that 92% of people who consume mobile videos share them with others, so a small amount of engagement can reach a larger audience and potentially go viral.
Without the right video marketing strategy you’re going in blind
Video content made only for Facebook requires a different focus than in normal video production. It’s essential you start with a video marketing strategy to determine the best approach.
You need a video that creates impact and results through the right balance of emotion, creativity, and knowledge of your target audience. Your strategy should involve targeting the varying audiences your business has, and creating a formula to engage and direct the audience into a customer journey.
One video shouldn’t be treated as a “one size fits all”. Ideally you should create a video for every Facebook ad campaign that is targeting a different activity or customer.
Tips for creating successful Facebook videos
Use the first few seconds wisely
You need to bring your story to life quickly. You want your video ad to quickly pique the interest of people scrolling through their Facebook feeds looking for content.
Consider showing brand or product imagery in the first few seconds so the viewer knows what your video is about as soon as possible.
Focus on storytelling
Video length is less important than telling a cohesive and concise story. Your video ad shouldn’t be longer or shorter than it takes to tell your story well, so create a storytelling arc from the first frame to the last that keeps your audience interested along the way.
Make sure you tell your story with and without sound
Videos on Facebook auto play with sound off, so it’s important to make sure your video ads entice viewers even when muted.
When sound is off, great imagery and on-screen text can help tell your story. When enabled, your video’s sound should offer additional value to viewers and further bring your story to life.
A long video (over 3 minutes) that showcases your background and founder story to a cold audience is not the right type of video to use in this format.
How to utilise the Facebook advertising platform
Most people are aware that you can “boost” a post to get engagement and views on your branded content.
But boosting a video posted on your Facebook page is a really costly and ineffective strategy to build brand awareness.
When you chose to boost a post, Facebook shows your ad to people who are most likely to engage with it. But not all engagement is equally useful to your business. Some users will simply click “like” and never engage with you outside of Facebook.
This kind of engagement is a waste of your time. You need a strategy that entices users to move from Facebook to your website, where they are more likely to convert.
Clearly, boosting a post isn’t the right metric that you want to choose to optimise your ad. So, what is?
We recommend creating a “video views” strategy. With this strategy, you share content with the people on Facebook who are ready to hear your message and are more likely to take the actions you want.
What is the video views strategy?
Firstly, target your video to a broad Facebook audience of your general demographic of potential customers.
Once the video has reached at least 1000 views, you create a second remarketing ad campaign to target those who watched at least 50% of the video. This advertising will invite them to learn more about your service or offer, usually with some sort of special promotion.
Running these ads continuously creates a funnel of viewers, who by watching your video are self-identifying to you that they’re interested in your product. This is the group of viewers who are ready to hear your brand message, and you can effectively target them with your business offer.
Where to now?
If you want to enter deep into Facebook marketing, there are many more strategies and remarketing steps that can be set up to further drive engagement and views.
Speak to us at Creative Content to find out more about how we can help you promote your videos on Facebook. We can get you set up with the right video marketing strategy for your business.