Angle Media Group

November 9th, 2011

We wanted to give you some practical advice in the world of video. We can across some interesting advice from Mashable Business that you may find worthwhile:

1. Don’t expect your video to go viral.
YouTube proselytize, Jeffery Harmon, suggest to re-evaluate expectations in hitting it big on YouTube. Businesses should focus on base hits and making sure the right customers see their videos, not reaching a million views.

2. Buy some Ads.
Purchasing ads can be beneficial to a small business promoting on YouTube. Since it’s not very likely that a video will go viral, buying search ads, promoted videos, or ads that pop up when a YouTube search is done can lead you to the right customers. Just make sure the content is relevant to the search term.

3. Use comments, hot spots, and A/B testing as your focus group.
• Comments – Watcher’s comments on videos is a great, free way to obtain feedback on products or services a business is offering.
• Hot Spots – YouTube offers some great tools in terms on how your video is being received. With this, a company is able to have better insight to when people are tuning in and out of videos.
• A/B Testing – A business can post two different versions of videos, have them listed as “Unlisted video”, and back them up by search ads. They can then see which one receives a more positive review.
• Google Analytics – By using this, a business is able to tell how much referral traffic their videos are getting on YouTube. In addition, people who are led to their website through YouTube spend more time there than people who come across their website in another way.

4. Watch a lot of YouTube.
Spend a few hours a day on Youtube to research what is trending. This can help a company recognize good ideas.

5. Track that ROI.
Ed Davis is the president of Ceilume, a company which manufactures ceiling tiles in California. Their YouTube Channel has over a million views. They rely greatly on a more improvisational and analog form of tracking. They do the following:
• Count the number of views on videos and the combined total on their YouTube Channel.
• Traffic to their website from videos.
• Feedback given to their customer service representatives from clients.

6. Find your niche.
There are thousands of ads out there. In order to stand out, you need to create spectacular ads or position your company differently. You can refer yourself as an expert in your field or attach your brand to a particular lifestyle. It is about creating things that help people, that people connect to and allows them to explore, not advertising.

Source:
Wasserman, Todd. “6 Best Practices For Small Business YouTube Marketing.” Mashable Business.