Author: Abhi Dwivedi

You no longer need to cross your fingers and hope that your videos will engage your target audience.  Interactive videos are here to save the day!

Businesses are using interactive videos to accomplish their marketing goals, from increasing sales and driving brand awareness to boosting web traffic. Interactive videos are common on the world’s second-largest engine – YouTube.

These videos are becoming increasingly popular due to many great reasons. Interactive videos are powerful tools for engaging your target audience and finding out what your target audience is looking for.

What is an Interactive Video?

Some of you might have viewed an interactive video on YouTube. But for those who don’t know, interactive video is a type of digital video that allows users to click, swipe, scroll, and drag video content and it’s aimed at creating a unique and fun video experience.

Interactive videos may include hotspots,360-videos, branching, or annotations. Hotspots are clickable areas within a video, whereas, as in branching, the content is customized based on viewer preferences and decisions. 360 interactive video offers an immersive experience where viewers can look up, down, right, and left in a video.

Since the audience can interact with these videos, they won’t be traversing through a boring journey of skip, play, and pause. Instead, users will be able to navigate as per their own preference.

Interactive videos have several different paths. In fact, some brands have created multiple endings to a video. But it depends on the viewer what kind of decisions he/she makes to have an ending they want.

The Rise of YouTube Interactive Videos

While most people think that interactive videos are a new form of media, but that is not the truth. The first-ever interactive video was created back in 2005. Thus, interactive videos have been around for more than a decade.

Back then, Flash was the most popular platform for developing interactive digital experiences. Later in 2008, YouTube started adding Annotations to their platform, considering all those benefits that interactive videos present.

The clickable elements of YouTube interactive videos allow you to layer text bubbles and graphics over the video content for creating a more engaging video experience. Now, several interactive features are only available with paid campaigns on YouTube.

But you can use YouTube’s Cards and End Screens to create hotspots and branching for free. Besides, YouTube also supports 360-video. YouTube also allows brands to utilize interactive video ads. The results of a survey show that interactive video ads bring a 47% increase in viewing times compared to linear video ads.

How YouTube Interactive Videos Benefit Your Business

Interactive videos present businesses with a unique way to track consumer behavior, test products, and collect audience analytics. Interactive videos have embedded surveys and quizzes, which enable brands to track their target audience’s preferences and behaviors.

You can easily add annotations during the post-production process. Moreover, they can be easily updated and changed. YouTube interactive videos are fun to watch, and they increase views. These videos can help a business attain its marketing goals in a unique way.

In the world of information overload, video is becoming more and more popular. It’s easy to digest and one of the best ways to engage your target audience. So, it’s not shocking that almost a billion hours of videos are watched on YouTube every day.

Still, some people believe that video marketing is a huge commitment. But in the increasingly competitive marketplace of today, it’s emerging as the future of content marketing.

Video marketing offers a unique and immersive way of getting your product or service in front of your target audience. It’s convenient for consumers and presents marketers with an extremely shareable and versatile medium to reach their audiences.

Why is Video Marketing so Effective?

Videos can be used to teach complex concepts in an easy way. You can share your story, answer questions about your products, offer solutions and other useful information via videos.

Due to this, the video holds a central position in a content marketing strategy. Everyone is busy. And chances are they won’t read your lengthy blog posts. But if you present all the necessary information in a short and engaging video, your audience will understand your message in a better way.

Since videos are small, memorable, and measurable, video marketing becomes a highly effective form of content marketing, offering plenty of benefits for marketers.

Benefits of Video Marketing

Take a look at some of the benefits of video marketing:

1. Videos are More Engaging

Our brain can process visuals 60,000 times faster compared to text. Also, around 90% of the information transmitted to our brain is visual.

Considering these facts, it’s clear that video is an incredibly powerful tool in marketing. Videos can engage your audience within seconds and are easy to post and share across various social media platforms.

• Search Engines Love Videos

Search engines, especially Google, see videos as high-quality content, and they love videos. According to research from Forrester, websites that make effective use of video are 53 times more likely to be ranked on the first page of Google results.

You can use videos in different types of content, including your main web pages. It’ll work wonders for your SEO.

• Videos Incite Urgency

Videos allow you to evoke strong emotions in your audience. You can easily persuade them to take action immediately with the help of videos. Other types of content can’t compete with the sheer number of valuable leads that videos can generate.

Great videos can bring a sense of urgency that gets people to take your call to action and buy your products.

• Boosts Conversions and Sales

A study revealed that 65 to 84% of buyers are more likely to make an online purchase after watching a demo product video. Thus, videos can dramatically boost conversion rates and sales.

Explainer videos give a product overview in real-time. You can explain the qualities of your products and services with the help of videos. It’ll clear all doubts and answer questions related to your products and services that may be in your audience’s mind.

• Video Provides Great ROI

According to a survey, about 83% of businesses say that video provides a good return on investment (ROI). So, if you haven’t included video in your content strategy because it’s expensive than other types of content, you don’t have to worry anymore.

Videos ensure a great return on investment. Besides, the video editing tools are constantly improving. They’ll become more affordable in the future.

Some videos spread across the internet like wildfire, dominate the feeds and catch almost everyone’s attention. Videos are among the most engaging forms of digital marketing.

A viral video is the dream of every producer. But the reality is that getting your videos to go viral is not exactly a piece of cake. Business owners are always striving to gain huge publicity from just one video and become the next viral sensation.

Viral videos are highly sharable content that can give your business a lift, bring lots of new people to your site, and increase conversions. But how does a video go viral?

There is no single way that can guarantee that a video will go viral. Viral videos result from a combination of elements ranging from perfect timing and off-the-wall creativity to relevance and internet sharing habits.

Here are some elements that make a video go viral:

• Emotion

Emotions are the core of any viral content. People are drawn to videos that evoke strong emotions and motivate them to connect at a deeper level. Emotions like happiness, anger, disgust, joy, nostalgia, and amusement can play an important role in making a video go viral.

• Style

The style in which the message is presented is also essential. All great videos have a purpose, and there’s always a strong message they want to share with the world. Viral videos are presented in a distinctive sensory style that engages the viewers.

• Surprise

It’s a fact that we only pay attention to things that violate our expectations. Viral videos have the element of surprise that quickly grabs the attention of viewers and compels them to share the videos with their loved ones.

• Timing

Timing is everything. In most cases, the virality of a video totally depends on what is happening at the time of its release. By using an existing Internet meme or popular topic, you can also increase the odds of your videos going viral.

• Relevance

The message in viral videos is reframed in such a way that it’s directly relevant to the audience. Viral videos are conversation starters due to their off-the-wall creativity and relevance. The key element in making a video go viral is to think about the audience’s perspective instead of focusing solely on the message you want to put out there.

So, how can my Video Go Viral?

As a business owner, viral videos are the ultimate form of success for you. But there is no secret strategy to make your video go viral. You should not make a video with the goal of making it go viral.

Before creating the video, determine what it is you want the video to accomplish and what message you want to convey. You have to remember that no viral video was created with the specific intention of Going Viral.

So, if you’re creating videos as a part of your marketing strategy, focus on the message and strategy. Your videos should help you achieve your business goals.

Whether you’re planning a complete website redesign or launching a new website, you’ll need an excellent content strategy.

Web content creation, if done correctly, can help you to achieve your key marketing goals. Content is the reason the audience visits your website. Hence, the new web content you’re going to create should be engaging enough to attract your target audience.

A good content strategy allows you to create relevant web content. It includes everything from setting your goals and creating a buyer persona to eventually creating new web content.

Set your Goals

The first step is to set your marketing goals. Your goal can be building brand awareness, generating more leads, attracting more visitors, or anything in between. But keep in mind that all of your goals should be SMART goals.

Your content strategy will be centered on your marketing goals. Once you determine your goals, all of the web content you create will be aligned with those goals.

Create Buyer Persona

Web content creation doesn’t only include creating web content. Most marketers assume that their buyers are just like them. Thus, they end up creating content they like, which is usually not relevant to the interests of their audience.

So, it’s essential to create buyer personas in order to know what type of people you’re trying to reach, what’s the best way to speak to them, and where you can find them. It helps you better understand the buyers’ behavior and create personalized content that can answer their questions, educate them, and address their pain points.

You’ll have to do a bit of research. But in the end, you’ll get a clear picture of the people you want to market to.

The Web Content Creation Process

The web content creation process involves the following steps:

1. SEO Research

SEO research or keyword research is incredibly helpful in determining what type of content you should create for your audience. Although creating a buyer persona probably gave you some ideas about what topics to write about, SEO research lets you find out the topics which are worth the investment.

SEO research shows you the search volume of specific keyword phrases. By doing so, you can confirm whether your chosen content ideas can apply on a bigger scale and to a larger audience.

• Ideation

After the SEO research, you’ll have a list of important keywords that you can target. You should create your web content using the important keywords to attain your goals. You can brainstorm some content ideas by yourself.

However, content ideas can come from a variety of places. Your content team, customers, or other stakeholders in your company can also help to generate awesome content ideas.

• Creating

Now that you have content ideas, you have to decide how you will present the content. Some topics are best suited for text, such as blog posts, articles, or maybe eBooks, while others become more compelling when represented visually.

Some pieces of content might need an infographic or video to convey the intended message. But remember that you have to create something unique. The web content creation process should be fluid.

If it seems that something is wrong with the content format you decided on, don’t be afraid to take a step back and choose another format.

In this digital era, visual content has become an essential part of the content marketing strategy. It’s helping businesses to stay ahead of the marketing game.

Since 90% of information transmitted to the brain is visual, our brains process visuals faster. This makes visual content more persuasive. You can use different types of visual content to encourage the audience to discover more about your brand.

Visual content creation is an effective way to make your business stand out. It makes your messages more compelling and more memorable. Creating and promoting high-quality visual content that truly resonates with your audience can dramatically improve brand awareness and reputation.

What is Visual Content?

According to the latest report of Content Marketing Institute, 55% of content creators focus on creating more visual content this year. But what is visual content?

Visual content includes images, infographics, videos, memes, screenshots, diagrams, charts, and presentations that appeal to the eye and attract a clearly defined target audience. The ultimate goal of visual content creation is to convert the target audience into customers.

Visual marketing strategies can help you engage your audience, get more exposure, and drive more conversions.

Here are some statistics:

• Online content with images gets more views and more shares.
• Images help to increase conversions and signups by as much as 329%.
• Videos can also help to boost customer retention and have been found to have a 60% returning customer rate.
• It’s also predicted that about 82% of online traffic will be video by the end of 2021.
• More than 37% of marketers cite visual content as the most important type of content.

Types of Visual Content

1. Images

Visual content creation can help you attract more customers. And images can take your marketing campaign to the next level. Why? Because the human brain can process an image in just 13 milliseconds, which is 60,000 times faster than text.

When you add some compelling images with text, people will be more inclined to finish reading what you’ve written.

• Infographics

You can use stunning visualizations to create engaging content. If you want to present complex data and statistics, infographics are an excellent tool.  This form of visual content allows you to combine the complex data and display it in an easily understandable manner.

Be sure to use an impactful design and layout using the right fonts and colors to convey the important data.

• Videos

Videos can boost traffic, attract more leads, increase overall sales, and provide a good return on investment. You can use how-to videos, demonstrations, or animated explainer videos to enhance your business.

Most marketers use videos to present common problems and show the solutions that their products can offer.

• Presentations

If you have to present a lot of information, you can use presentations instead of infographics. Like infographics, presentations also focus on attractive designs and layouts. They can keep your audience engaged.

Keep in mind that you have to remain consistent with fonts and colors throughout your presentations.

Visual content creation can help marketers get more likes, shares, followers, visits, clients, and revenue. There are so many platforms to create visual content for, that it becomes difficult to keep up. But the important thing is to try.

By displaying visuals across various platforms, you can truly reap the benefits of visual content creation. 

The goal of YouTube video promotion is to make sure that your content gets out there. It helps you attain your business goals and offers you exciting opportunities to help you grow your business.

Millions of channels are competing for the attention of viewers on YouTube. While your videos might spread on their own, but going out of your way to promote your content each time, is surely rewarding.

Fortunately, there are many websites where you can promote your YouTube videos.

Facebook

Facebook is a powerful platform, boasting more than 2 billion active users. Statistics show that over 80% of people around the world have a Facebook account. The Facebook users visit the platform for at least 32 minutes daily.

A survey revealed that around 32% of people engage with brands on Facebook on a daily basis. You can post your videos on Facebook or add links to your YouTube videos. Being the third most popular social media site in the world, Facebook helps you promote your content and generate valuable leads.

Twitter

Twitter is another great social media site that can help to promote your YouTube videos. All you have to do is to use hashtags that are applicable to your content. Next, you have to tag your post along with a short link to your video.

Since Twitter has a limited character space, you can use the remaining space to add a title or maybe a description that can grab the attention of your target audience. When you use the right tags and words, you’ll be able to get your products and services in front of the right audience.

Instagram

Posting videos or links to your Instagram account usually engages the audience that already follows you on the platform. Instagram – the most popular social media site in the world – is the home of brands, influencers, small business owners, and bloggers.

If you have lots of followers on Instagram, you should use it to your benefit. You can post tidbits of your YouTube videos on Instagram Stories and provide links to your videos. Your followers will share your Instagram stories with their friends and family, and you’ll be able to catch the attention of your potential customers.  

Reddit

Reddit is also included among the best places to promote YouTube videos. But Reddit works a bit differently. Instead of simply posting your videos and using tags, you have to take part in subreddits. These are Reddit subcommunities.

You can find subreddits relevant to your YouTube videos and actively engage with the community to promote your YouTube videos. Be sure not to use this platform solely for self-promotion. You should engage with people of similar interests, upvote, and downvote content, and comment regularly.

Tumblr

Just like Twitter, Tumbler is also tag-based. The only difference is that you can use unlimited tags on Tumbler. You can even copy your description and complete titles from your YouTube videos.

There is even room for adding links and extra details in your Tumblr blog post. It will help you promote your YouTube videos by boosting engagement.  

Do you know that 300 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute?

There are so many videos on YouTube that it becomes tough to get your products and services in front of the right audience. But knowing the right way to promote your YouTube videos can help you get the traffic you want.

Below are five proven tips to promote your YouTube videos:

1. Choose the Right Keywords

You can leverage the YouTube search algorithm to promote your videos without spending a lot of money. Great SEO is required to grow a YouTube channel. And you’ll have to do a bit of research to find out what your target audience is searching for.

Choosing Google-friendly keywords can help your videos rank higher in searches. With helpful tools like Google Ads Keyword Planner, you can identify the best keywords to use in your videos. Additionally, you can scan the Search Engine Results Page (SERP) for all of your keywords.

• Pay Attention to Titles

The most popular videos have killer titles that instantly grab the attention of the audience. You should write engaging titles to promote your video, as the title is the first thing users see when they find your content.

Keep them short and sweet. Don’t include more than 60 characters, or else some of your titles will get cut off when displayed. Also, include your keywords in the first half of the titles.

But remember that engaging doesn’t mean you should resort to clickbait headlines. While it might be tempting, but clickbait will damage your channel’s reputation.

• Use tags

You can use your keywords for tags. YouTube tags act as guides for the algorithm and help your video get delivered as related content next to other YouTube videos. Moreover, tags play an important part in YouTube search results.

By choosing the relevant tags, you can rank higher in searches. But you should never use misleading tags unless you want to see YouTube and Google make your videos invisible to searchers.

In many cases, YouTubers try to trick YouTube and rank high by using irrelevant keywords. You should not do it unless you want to face a penalty.

• Optimize Descriptions

Write good descriptions of your videos. Be sure to stick to the 5000-characters limit and create a content page with timestamps to help viewers find what they’re looking for. You can also add links to relevant playlists and, of course, add relevant hashtags.

Use keywords during the intro for best results. Viewers lose attention quickly, so it’s best to add keywords during the brief introduction.

• Content Quality Matters

The quality of your content matters. Make sure your videos are useful, informative, and relevant. You should also make sure your video quality is good. If you want your videos to reach your target audience, you have to create high-quality and meaningful content.

If your content is not worthy, promoting your YouTube videos on various social media platforms will make no difference. You will only end up with a pool of unengaged viewers who won’t come back for more probably.

Where to Promote Your YouTube Video?

On places like Reddit, Quora, and Stack Overflow, people ask questions and share their interests. These online sites can be used to promote your YouTube videos for free. You can either create a conversation or join the relevant discussions and inform other users about your YouTube video on that topic.

Another amazing way to grow your YouTube channel is to promote your YouTube videos on other social media platforms, including Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and Snapchat.

Successful brands use various marketing tools to captivate their target audience. Among all those marketing tools, videos are emerging as an integral part of a brand’s marketing strategy. Whether you have a small business or a large enterprise, marketing video production can significantly benefit you.

A study revealed that about 81% of businesses are using video as an effective marketing tool. Besides, 99% of these companies agreed they would continue to use marketing videos to promote their business.

Videos include creative and highly engaging visuals. You can use videos to communicate your message, tell a compelling story, or speak directly to your target audience. Thus, marketing video production complements any kind of digital marketing campaign.

Importance of Marketing Video Production

A marketing video refers to a type of video that is used to promote a product, brand, company, or service. Businesses may invest in different kindsof videos, including product videos, tutorials, social media videos, lifestyle videos, documentary videos, and explainer videos.

All these videos enhance the marketing efforts of a business. The ultimate aim of a marketing video production is to raise awareness about your products and services, acquire new leads, and increase conversions.

Since video content accounts for about 80% of all customer internet traffic, you can no longer afford to ignore the potential of marketing video production for your business. To produce a marketing video, you have to brainstorm and finalize an idea or topic first. It is usually followed by video shooting, editing, and delivering the video.

Benefits of Marketing Video Production

Here are some benefits of marketing video production for your business:

• Boosts Traffic

The biggest advantage of marketing video production is that it boosts online traffic. According to a survey, businesses that use video have 41% more web traffic compared to the ones that don’t use video marketing. By using videos, more traffic will visit your page, and you’ll get a massive increase in sales.

• Creates brand awareness

People are tired of reading long blog posts and articles about your products and services. If you want viewers’ attention, videos are a powerful tool. Adding marketing videos in your strategy, creates and enhances your brand awareness. If you want to attract valuable customers, your content should be appealing to your target audience.

• Better SEO ranking

Videos help you rank higher in search engines. It’s advisable to publish videos regularly on your website and other social media platforms to be sure that your page stays among the top results.

• Video sharing

Videos are highly shareable content. Your site visitors will share your videos with their friends when your videos deliver a strong message, along with creativity and quality. When you share your videos on social media platforms, they will reach potential customers who will be interested in buying your products.

• Endless Possibilities

Marketing video production offers endless possibilities and increases your chances of success. Plus! Creating your own videos is a fun experience. You can present your brand the way you want and let the audience know who you truly are.

YouTube has become a powerful online marketing tool for businesses. Most people focus on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram for social media promotion. But if you’re not using YouTube to promote your business, you’re seriously missing out.

Videos offer a great way to differentiate a business and help it stand out among the competitors. Being the world’s second-largest search engine, YouTube presents businesses with endless opportunities. 

YouTube is a cost-effective way to grow your business. When used correctly, it can help boost brand awareness, establish a following, drive more traffic, and generate more leads.

Due to over 2 billion monthly users, YouTube has a huge reach, which can benefit small businesses greatly. Now, YouTube is not just an entertainment site. It has grown into a useful business resource.

Top Benefits of Using YouTube for Business

1. Huge Audience

YouTube is a platform that is used by people of all ages. YouTube’s audience is extremely varied because everyone uses this platform for various purposes.

Statistics reveal that YouTube gets more than about 30 million daily visitors, who watch an estimated 5 billion videos. People use YouTube for many reasons, including entertainment, education, and learning a new skill.

However, using YouTube for business is also a good idea. YouTube is the second biggest search engine, yet only a few small businesses use this powerful platform.

YouTube will help your business by boosting brand awareness and helping you get your products in front of a much wider audience.

• People Prefer Watching Videos

A lot of people prefer watching videos over reading an article. In the upcoming years, it is estimated that videos will be responsible for more than 82% of consumer internet traffic. It is 15 times higher compared to 2017.

As videos make information easier to understand, a study found that 59% of executives prefer videos over texts. Another amazing fact is that viewers retain up to 95% of the presented information if they watch a video.

Also, video generates up to 1200% more shares than text and images combined. Besides, YouTube makes it a lot easier to share your content on other platforms like Twitter, Facebook, and various other websites as well.

• More Valuable Leads

You can gain more valuable leads by promoting your products and services on YouTube. YouTube is a great platform that boasts two billion monthly users. Your product can be seen and shared by many viewers on YouTube.

This makes YouTube a powerful medium to promote your products. Research shows that around 76% of users buy products after watching videos on YouTube. Since each video has a specific set of keywords and tags associated with it, your video can be found by the people looking for you and your products.

• Reach Your Target Audience

YouTube offers you amazing opportunities to reach your target audience. As Google owns YouTube, using the best SEO practices on YouTube can help you rank higher in search on YouTube as well as Google.

As a marketer, it is your responsibility to find out the online habits of your target audience. After that, you have to make sure your YouTube videos get seen by your targeted audience. And for that, you have to employ the SEO best practices along with an excellent strategy in mind.

Video games are engaging, challenging, and fun. They transport you to an entirely new world and present unique challenges that help strengthen your brain and force it to learn and adapt.

Yes, you read that right! Video games are good for you, and scientific research confirms it.

Many people think that video games make you more violent, hinder your ability to learn, and even affect your health. But you have to keep in mind that anything in excess can be harmful.

Video games have amazing benefits for both your brain and your body. But that doesn’t justify playing video games all day.

Here are the five benefits of playing video games:

1. Mental Workout

Hippocampus is a part of our brain that plays a significant role in memory and learning. A 2015 study showed that people who play video games have better hippocampal memory than non-gamers.

Since you need intellectual and motor skills to win, playing video games gives your brain a mental workout.

The study by Max Planck Institute for Human Development and Charité University Medicine St. Hedwig-Krankenhaus revealed that playing video games increases your brain’s gray matter.

Thus, video games positively impact the regions of your brain responsible for memory, information organization, spatial orientation, and motor skills.

• Better Problem-Solving Skills

Video games teach you various strategies, including resource management and planning. These strategies can be directly applicable to the real-world as well.

Some mission-based and multi-level video games can take several hours to solve. While in other games, you have to strategize quickly as the time is running out. Hence, gamers develop better problem-solving skills.

A study published in 2013 revealed that kids who played strategy-based games showed an improvement in problem-solving skills. That also helped them get better grades in school.

• Improves your Vision

It might be hard to wrap your head around such a fact, but playing video games can improve your vision. A recent study by the University of Rochester proved that gamers are more responsive to different shades of color.

People who play action games have better contrast sensitivity function. It’s an ability that helps you discern between changes in shades of different colors. This is also beneficial when you’re driving at night.

So, as long as you’re not staring at the screen for hours, playing video games can actually enhance your vision.

• Makes you Less Anti-Social

Contrary to popular belief, gamers are not anti-social, shy people who use video games as a way to escape. Instead, gamers form strong friendships compared to non-gamers as they have a matching love of video games.

Another research conducted on children found that kids who played more video games were more likely to have good social skills. Also, those kids performed better academically and built better relationships with other students due to the social and collaborative nature of some types of games.

• Enhances Hand-Eye Coordination and Learning Ability

As per the PLOS One study, people who play video games become better surgeons. The reason is that playing video games improve the hand-eye coordination and precise muscle movement, which are essential skills for their practice.

People who play video games have better cognitive flexibility as these games require constant thinking and user input. So, video games also improve the learning ability.

But the most important thing is to set limits. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends playing video games for 30-60 minutes per day on school days. While, on non-school days, it should be 2 hours or less.