Youtube: 5 Ways To Help Small Business Win At Video Marketing

Almost all of us know that YouTube is the second ranking search engine in the web today when it comes to query volume terms. This is an impressive number which is second to Google, yet what exactly does this mean for small businesses that are finding ways on how to reach their customers?
 

As it turns out and that many of the views in YouTube are for entertainment purposes, there are also a substantial amount of videos that people are watching in order to get information or seek advice. As a matter of fact, there are more than 35 million searches being made in YouTube each month with regards to “how to” videos. This is at least 35 million opportunities that businesses can take advantage of in order to reach their prospect clients which may be in need of their products and services.

 

Yet how exactly can local and small businesses make use of this trend for their benefits? Here are some ways on how YouTube video marketing can affect these businesses positively.

 

Produce Content That Meets the Needs

In order to reach the targets that are in need of your products and services, you should be able to create content that attracts these people to you. By simply uploading a walkthrough of your business is not going to grab the attention or create buzz on your shop. It is going to help of you keep the old marketing acronym in mind, which in this case is AIDA or Attention, Interest, Desire and Action. Grab the attention of your audience and start generating interest by meeting their needs when it comes to information.

 

Keep an Eye Out on Production Value

For your videos, you do not need to aim in producing one just like Spielberg, but they should be easy to watch and professional. Videos that have poor audio quality, shaky camera work, horrible lighting and lack of coherence in the story will all lead to the viewer’s shifting channels.

 
That is why you should pay attention to the lighting as much as you can. Utilize a tripod in order to provide a smoother viewing experience. Pay attention to the audio output and use microphones if you must. Tell a story that is easy to understand for viewers. If you are able to pay attention to the basics in video production, you will be able to stand out amongst the massive amounts of user-made videos that are of poor quality. This will lead to more interest being generated to your channel as well.

 

Enhance and Optimize for Search in YouTube

There are a lot of videos being uploaded every minute and every day in the website. For you to be found, you will need to optimize the video that you have uploaded in YouTube. Start including keywords that are important in the title and make sure that your tags will also include the keywords you are using as well. Select a thumbnail that is appealing and one that will clearly show viewers what the video is about.

 

Provide Follow-Up Action for Viewers

As you follow the AIDA model in marketing, you would want to generate desire for viewers for them to make follow up actions. If you have made an information video about your product or service, you would want to give your viewers a reason to follow up and a clear way in doing so. A good way to start doing this is by providing them with a special offer and a web address that they can go to in the video.

 

A good example for a call to action is “Follow the instructions given in the video and you will receive a 10% discount on the product by visiting our website”, and this will provide an actionable step for your viewers that have a clear value on it. The discount and the unique address that you have provided to your viewers are ways on how you can measure the successfulness of your YouTube video.

 

Let Your Viewers Know About You

Do not hesitate in letting your viewers know who you are and what you do in the business world. It is important that the people know who is providing them with valuable information. Encourage users in taking in steps in building a relationship with your company by letting them subscribe to its YouTube channel.
 

Building up the subscriber base that you have in YouTube, you will then be able to automatically reach into a steady audience that can be potential customers that have decided in seeing the videos that you will be uploading.

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Why an Increasing Number of Doctors is Using Social Media

There have been a lot of physicians today who are doing follow ups on their patients using modern ways of communications like social media. Whether testing their patients regarding health messages, keeping track of disease trends, communicating with patients through email or identifying new medical problems, these technology-inclined doctors seem to be increasing nowadays.

As far as they are all concerned, the numbers given are not that high as of yet. There are still a lot of doctors who rely on paper and pen when prescribing meds or other agendas related to their patients and are more comfortable communicating with each other when using technology. Yet acquiring information coming from the top public health agencies in the nation up to the smaller medical clinics, it has been discovered that many patients want to spend more than just a 15-minute visit in the office and callbacks from their physicians at the end of the day.

Away from the high tech hubs of the East Coast and Silicon Valley, the pediatrician from Kansas City Natasha Burgert provides tips on rearing up children in her blog, Twitter and Facebook pages, as well as answers the questions of patients through text and email messages.

She stated that the tools that she use are all embedded within her normal work day and that she does all of these in between the checkups that she gets. Burgert said that it is much easier for her to send an email or show a blog post to a patient than it is for her to call them. The pediatrician mentioned that this is what the physicians of the old school usually do, allocating some time before the day ends to return calls to their patients.

Burgert has just received an email from her patient recently which was coming from a new mother who was asking how to wean her 2 year old child using a pacifier. In just a few clicks of the index finger, the pediatrician was able to share a blog post which provides tips on how to handle this topic.

A mother of two young daughters who are patients of Burgert, Sarah Hartley, stated that she finds it practical to have e-access with her doctor, with emails even late at night getting a response quickly. She said that it is very useful and helpful at the same time, that most parents will get concerned regarding a lot of things which may not be that big of a deal to be scheduling a personal appointment. Hartley said that it also gives her fast reassurances from her doctor which will ease off her worries the next day.

At 36 years old, Burgert does not charge her patients for communications via the virtual world, yet there are some doctors who do. She just stated that this way of communication only enhances the personal contact but in no way does it replace office visits with patients.

She said that most of her colleagues look at her and shake their heads whenever she tells them what she does. These doctors do not understand the use of these tools which is why they do this, but the doctor believes the upcoming generation that will be coming behind her will think this to be much more common.

Dr. Steven Nissen, a cardiologist from the Cleveland Clinic, comes from an older generation but has started to work with e-technology and mentions that he is a member of the Twitterati. Yet with the help of staffs from the clinic, the cardiologist who was in his 60s was able to lead a live chat in Twitter regarding topics such as cholesterol problems and heart failure and found the experience to be exhilarating.

The doctor stated that this different way of communication opens up an opportunity to talk to an audience which can be located anywhere in the world regarding heart health. He said that the downside in this is that it is challenging for physicians because the messages that they provide to interested people are not conducive in just a few characters. Nissen said that asking him a question regarding heart health will give the asker a five minute answer at least.

But with a lot of young people today that are facing obesity, which is one of the factors that contribute to having heart problems, Nissen believes that Twitter will be an effective way in reaching his target audience and he even plans to utilize the platform even more. He thinks it is great if he is able to get through the people that need to hear his message.

Acknowledging the benefits in using social media today, the American Medical Association however warns the doctors to put an emphasis in protecting the privacy of their patients and also to keep appropriate boundaries between them.

During a case that has been publicized, the state disciplinary board has just reprimanded Rhode Island emergency medicine physician Alexandra Thran for being unprofessional last year and has also fined her at least $500. This was after she has made comments on her page in Facebook about an injury of one of her patients. Although Thran did not mention any names, some people were able to figure out the identity. The doctor declined to respond to the requests for her to give comment.

The number of doctors who are using virtual and social media communication has been expected to increase under the Accountable Care Act. This act encourages the documenting of health records as well as exchanges electronically of health information to be made.

There was a study that was published online last March which found about 60 percent of public health departments of the state are using Twitter or other social media networks in order to send out information to people rather than communicate with patients.

Through Facebook, YouTube and Twitter, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention spreads their messages in these social websites. The other services that it features involve 12 texts per month which includes automatic tips when it comes to obesity prevention and healthy eating advice. CDC has over 2 million followers on its social media websites as of today.

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Comparison of Life Before Social Media and Today

How Social Media Is To People?

People living in this so called “information era” has already embraced the importance of social media to their daily lives. Who would never recognize Facebook or Twitter? Many for sure have browsed over and over again their favorite videos via content communities like that of YouTube or perhaps consulted the Wikipedia for some undefined words or phrases. Social Media this day has become more and more natural.

With all these technologies and more of it to come in the coming years, has anyone ever thought how life was when all these stuffs that we now usually do, did not exist? As for people who have seen the transition of simple living to a more edgy and convenient style that we are today, life before wasn’t that complicated.

What is Life Before Social Media

Before, students and professionals would buy magazines, encyclopedias or newspapers to get the latest news or have the freshest digest for a research project. Today, there are e-magazines that are free to browse and read, the latest news is way fresher than on print and encyclopedias are now turned to Wikipedia.

Before, being connected to someone distant from you would mean mailing letters and handling it to Mr. Postman or a telegram for a faster delivery of message. Today, communication is within reach with Facebook’s chat and video calls and emails.

Before, stardom means auditioning or being scouted from unlikely places. Today, the road to becoming a star is easier with just a minute or an hour upload of recorded singing, acting or dancing videos. Before, sharing pictures would mean sending it via mail to let other see it, today, picture sharing is just a single click away.

Before, expressing thoughts and feelings are sometimes hindered and are forever silenced. Today, anyone can put a shout-out in their status in Facebook, Twitter or any social networking sites.

Before, playing would mean getting outside your house and actually play. Today, playing may be done virtually like that in the World of Warcraft.

How Social Media Help People In Their Lives

The technological era has indeed changed the world for better. Social media has allowed anyone to reach audiences be it big or small. It has made almost everything accessible as it is free to use for the public. It doesn’t require special skills for one to use it; it just needs a little navigation and a bit of orientation for one to utilize it. Social media’s immediacy is only a matter of seconds or minutes. Social media may change, revise or even remove any contents that may be deemed inappropriate or outdated. Social media is an open arena where people get to freely express emotions, ideas, products, buy and sell goods and services.

While it is undeniably true that social media has brought distance closer, more convenience for our daily lives, more edgy and sophisticated. But if you were to choose, which way of living would you prefer? The simpler or the much convenient but complicated?

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How Partnerships Through Social Media Works

Social media continues to play important roles for the success of every online marketing campaign. Companies that do not promote their business goods and services in social networking websites such as Twitter and Facebook do not have an edge against competitors. This is because they do not get the perks that social media has to offer marketing, but also due to the fact that the business does not have any influence in what other companies or people are saying about them online.

Even though these websites are the top trending social media marketing places to go for, they are not enough anymore unfortunately. One of the ways in order to establish an innovative and successful marketing campaign online is by building relationships with the niche audiences. These audiences though can be targeted easily at social networking websites that are focused in using a specific theme. There are many of these theme-specific networking communities available for gays, women, parents, blacks and even movie lovers.

Since there are a lot of these social networking sites nowadays, this means that a company which does their research thoroughly will find their target customers eventually. Things such as what they are marketing and how they market them will not matter anymore. A lot of people may question about the advantages that social media marketing has to offer but there are just many factors that convince people in the long run.

One of the benefits that social media has to offer is giving a company the visibility they need online. The content of the company will come out in various online platforms which are solely based on how the elements of the partnership are made. Elements such as the development of a profile for the product, customization of homepages, participating in a newsletter or email marketing are some of the aspects that help promote the company.

Another advantage that social media has to offer is that it allows targeted marketing to be engaged in. Once a social networking website has been identified to suit the target audience profile, it will be safe to assume that the members within this online community will more likely respond to the product or brand of the company. The presence of the company profile will not be seen as intrusive by other members of the community as long as proper etiquette is being followed.

Engaging in partnerships through social media is a great way to improve brand management in the future. As the company starts to build their relationship with target customers, they will know that the company is truly interested in learning about them and giving them what they need. For web savvy audiences, it is a big plus for companies to let them know that they understand the ins and outs of digital media.

These partnerships also do not cost a lot. A social networking community may be willing to trade opportunities with the company wherein they will endorse the product while the company promotes the social network in their campaign. The company can save money on advertising if these types of deals are made with the social networking sites.

Deciding on building partnerships through social media is not a bad idea but certain things should be noted before delving in. One thing is that not every social networking site out there is the right choice for companies. It is important that marketers conduct thorough research on the site beforehand, gathering data such as the amount of unique visitors and community members registered. The reputation of the networking site is also important as companies would not want to be affiliated with ones that have a bad image.