Visual marketing is one of the most effective ways you can give your business a voice online. According to Science Blogs, “Pictures were correctly recalled about 1.5 times as often as printed words.” Not only are images easier to recall, they also cause a more emotional response from the viewer, which in turn causes them to engage more. If you want to test this, in a practical way, try this: go on Facebook and update with text, then an hour or so later update with a picture or even better a picture with a quote. I am willing to bet, more times than not, within 10 minutes the picture will have at least two to three times the engagement the text did. Today we are going to take a look at three visual marketing platforms and give you three powerful tips on engaging potential fans and customers.
YouTube
First off if you are not currently utilizing YouTube’s service as a piece of your overall marketing strategy, I believe you are making a huge mistake. Using YouTube for visual marketing is so painfully obvious. “In 2011 YouTube had more than 1 trillion views or more than 140 views for every person on earth.” If this startling statistic doesn’t convince you that your business needs a presence on YouTube then I think we need to check your pulse.
YouTube Tip
While the above stats serve as a reason to enter this arena, they also serve as a warning. If your content is not relevant, thought-provoking or helpful it will be lost in a sea of content.
There are two main objectives I am trying to accomplish when using YouTube:
1. Cutting through the noise
This is the trickiest one and there are many factors. The effective one to use when first starting off is finding other YouTube channels that are actively making videos and seeing which videos get the most engagement and traction. This will give you a good idea of which topics within your niche have the most potential to cut through the noise.
2. Providing helpful information to my current community
The best way to find out what your community wants to see is to ask them. With Coffee Cup News, I will post an update to our Forum, Twitter or Facebook and ask, “How can I help you today? or Are there any questions about coffee that I can help answer?” I will then take those questions and try my best to answer them in a video. (Quick Tip: Make sure to mention the person who asked the question by name in your video – this encourages more questions and further engagement with your fans.)
I am going to assume that your business has its own page on Facebook. (If you don’t, stop reading this immediately and go get one.) In September of 2012 Facebook crossed an unprecedented line and announced that they had over 1 billion users.
Here are two tips that will help you engage this massive Facebook community visually:
Post pictures frequently (with text)
According to Simply Measured, posting pictures to your Facebook will increase engagement by over 65%. In my experience I have noticed adding text to that same photo can increase engagement another 10-20%. Remember to make if fun and get creative.
Upload (short) videos directly to Facebook
I have done extensive testing on uploading short videos vs. long videos, and uploading videos vs. linking to videos.
Here are 3 things I found out:
1) People are more likely to engage with a direct upload to Facebook than a (YouTube) link to a video
2) When I keep my video under 30 seconds this has increased engagement, 9 times out of 10.
3) Including the occasional personal update (ex: puppy, kids, nature photos) created a new depth to community intimacy which in turn increased fan engagement on future updates.
Vine App
On January 26th, 2013 Twitter announced their new app Vine. It allows you to create 6 second clips. You might be thinking, “Six seconds doesn’t really seem like enough time to do anything significant…” I am here to break that preconceived notion.
Vine is such a new platform that instead of giving you a list of reasons to use it, I am going to give you homework.
Vine App Tip and Homework
Step 1: Download the app, create an account, and record your first vine using the #firstpost tag
Step 2: Watch videos on the “Popular” and “Editors Picks” pages to see what people enjoy consuming on Vine (this also gives you a pulse on the community).
Step 3: Post a Vine and try something new and fun with the information you gathered in Step 2. Take note of the results and report back with what you learned.
Do you have a Visual Marketing Tip? Share it in the comments below.
Jason Coffee
@jasoncoffee
Latest posts by Jason Coffee (see all)
- 3 Tips for Vine App Users - April 6, 2013
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Great post, but please fix the two glaringly obvious typos in your bio, Jason.
tips are really helped me, thank you for sharing…