No Video For Your Personal Brand? Maybe No Visibility Either.
Since the barriers to entry for creating video have decreased so precipitously, it may be time for you to give video a try as a medium to take your personal brand to the next level.
Video is, quite simply, dominating brand marketing. Cisco in a recent study shared that by 2019 the global consumer internet video traffic will be around 80 percent, which was 64 percent in 2014. Another piece of research by Hubspot found that over 51 percent of marketing professionals believe video to be the best medium for generating Return on Investment (ROI). So the question is: how can you leverage this trend and use video to help build your personal brand?
The idea would be to share video to showcase and amplify your brand identity. Video is a high bandwidth kind of communication, which means it can carry more information, be more engaging, and convey the finer elements of your story in an manner that we humans naturally relate to. Video communications are proven to have greater ‘connecting’ impact, raising the 'human connection' quotient by fulfilling our insatiable thirst for visual stimuli.
The increase in sensory stimulation alone creates deeper impressions, adding the impact of the visual to the audio. Think about it -- if you could buy the same amount of advertising for the same amount of money for a campaign, would you purchase a live commentary on a radio station or a live telecast someone can watch on a superior OLED screen?
Since the barriers to entry for creating video have decreased precipitously, it may be time for you to give video a try. Below are some more examples and strategies for using video as a medium to take your personal brand to the next level.
Make Your Profile Introductions More Human
How engaging is your profile summary on LinkedIn? If you’re like most people then it’s flat at best, or embarrassing at worst. But it’s difficult to get your whole self to come across in just a few words, right? Now consider if you could have a video bio embedded in your LinkedIn profile page and you could introduce yourself like you normally would. Wouldn’t that be easier? It’s just talking to someone about yourself (which is something we know we have to get very good at).
You can instruct people about how to navigate your profile, or highlight specific accomplishments or skills – it’s like you’re guiding them through your profile. And they don’t even have to scroll down to experience it.
Make Your Meetings More Productive
Video meetings used to be all hi-tech, with expensive conference room installations and complicated dialing modules. But now they’re commonplace and mostly run from your browser. With the rise in easy virtualization and cheap (sometimes free) video conferencing, we are using video meetings for discussions, reviews, interviews, sales presentations, and so many other things using Adobe Connect, WebEx, GoToMeeting, Lync and Skype etc. And the loosening of this barrier to communicate enables real-time work that can be more effective and powerfully bonding.
It’s not without pitfalls, however. In 2013, I was on a video call at my home office with a Spanish client, using Google+ hangout. I was pretty chuffed that I was using such a new technology, and was feeling a little full of myself. Unbeknownst to me, I had forgotten to lock my office door and my pet decided to barge into the room and jump around and bark during my quite professional presentation. And if that wasn’t embarrassing enough, while I was coaxing him out of the room, I had stood up and revealed to my client that my crisp blue dress shirt and tie did not match my pajamas. Yep – I had only half-dressed for the call. That’s a mistake you never make twice.
But if you can manage to dress correctly for the occasion, video meetings can bring greater focus and attention for your meetings. After all, on a telephone conference call your callers could be doodling, returning emails, or daydreaming, but for video meetings, they have to be looking at the other person, which increases the level of connection and discourages multitasking. Just be sure you are paying your other callers the same respect.
Increase Your Impact by Sharing Your Expertise
With influencer marketing on the rise in 2016 and emerging as a medium of effective advertising and brand promotion, you can imagine that video could be a powerful tool to build a strong brand identity. Sharing your expertise on a topic of your interest or taking a stand on a discussion via video can get your ideas out into the marketplace, and carry the force of your personality and humanness along with them. You don’t have to become a full-fledged YouTube Star, but you can create your own content and help it spread by linking your videos from YouTube or Vimeo to your other social media profiles and sites. Just be sure that your content remains ridiculously helpful to your network and encourage your connections to share it, just like you should be reaching out and sharing their best content.
Increase Conversions and Connect With Customers
Video streaming apps like Blab, Meerkat and Periscope can make it beyond easy to give product demonstrations and host discussions and Q&A sessions. In many cases viewers can also record these sessions for future reference – further increasing the impact you have with them. You want to use the platform for getting detailed feedback on your ideas, like a live customer support hotline. Most people on these platforms use them for discussions about current events and hot trending topics. To stand out, you’ll want to avoid just, excuse the term, blathering on mindlessly about recent events, however, and instead focus on amplifying your brand and helping you nurture relationships with your prospects and targets. Be sure to put your sights on attracting the right audience for your message, and put less emphasis on just getting more eyeballs. Quality counts here.
Get Started and Get Creative!
Start with your own computer’s video camera, or buy a simple one to start with. YouTube has a simple functioning video editor that you can use for free. Find innovative ways to get attention in your videos. Record in cool locations, or use props or interesting guests or controversial topics. Video must be engaging to have lasting impact, and time spent in upping the quality and thoughtfulness of your video will increase its stickiness and share-ability.
Where’s the best place to hide a dead body?
On page 2 of Google search results.
No one will ever find it.
One stat to keep in mind is that 75% of Google users click on the first page of search results and never scroll to the second page. So you obviously want to rank as high as you can with any content you create. But when you consider that webpages with relevant videos can rank higher on the first page then you have to consider that video could increase your visibility.
And what good is your personal brand if it doesn’t show up?
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Yooniko (a brand of Metamorph Corporation) is dedicated to creating the future of unique, personal branding. Find out more here.