Strategies for Using Video in Your Marketing Funnel
What, exactly, is the ‘marketing funnel?’ Essentially, it’s a model that helps us visualize and understand customers’ place on their sales journey with your brand.
Traditionally, it has three stages: Awareness, Consideration, and Decision (respectively, the Top, Middle, and Bottom of the funnel). When video is part of the equation, though, another step should be added: retention. Let’s take a look at how else video can move people through your marketing funnel, and how you can incorporate it.
Awareness
When you produce video for the top of your funnel, your goal is to attract prospects to your brand. Or, to track the model directly, raise Awareness. To do so, you’ll want engaging videos with broad appeal. And you will need introductory materials for people who haven’t heard of your brand. Michael Litt suggests a few types of video for this stage:
- how-to content,
- webinars,
- thought leader interviews, and
- company culture videos.
How-to content can help your SEO (Search Engine Optimization) by ranking your business higher on relevant search results. It can also provide a chance to “showcase your expertise” as a company when it comes to your field.
Webinars can take prospects inside high-profile events or intimate discussions, giving viewers a front-row seat to insightful discussions.
Thought leader interviews provide valuable information and perspective, reinforcing your credibility by showing the wisdom of your leaders and/or affiliates.
And company culture videos attract prospects with fun, upbeat glimpses into your team’s personality and values.
Consideration
For the middle of your funnel (the Consideration stage), your videos should be produced with the intent to show prospects that you understand their needs and have the best solution for them. It’s the time to trumpet your product as the answer, so produce explainer videos and product videos.
Product and explainer videos don’t need to be live action, so explore other options. Viewers who have followed you from the top to the middle will be happy to see variety. Choosing another mode of presentation can make your message even stronger. The middle of the funnel is great for whiteboard.
Whiteboard video can make explainer and product videos more engaging, and just as importantly, more retainable. Hand-drawn visuals reinforce the message of a well-voiced script. That can make even the most complex parts of your explainer videos digestible.
Decision
By the time you reach the bottom level of your funnel, the Decision stage, your goal is to convince prospects to buy. You’ve gotten their interest and shown you understand their buying needs; now, “prospects need to trust your brand in order to make that final decision.”
Think about client testimonials, FAQ videos, and personalized videos at this stage. Since trust and purchase are the goals, increase your credibility. Use videos that make you relatable. Your prospective clients will be more certain that yours is the best solution to their needs.
Client testimonials are great for this, as real people just like the prospect (with similar needs and desires) are likely to influence them to purchase.
FAQ videos can serve as deeper dives into your product and “address any remaining doubts and fears providing a barrier to purchase.”
And personalized videos show your willingness to customize and go the extra mile for a prospect.
Retention
That covers the three most commonly-discussed stages of the funnel. As described earlier, video adds another stage to the journey: client retention. It’s far more cost-effective to maintain a relationship with a client than to convert a new one. So investment at this level of the funnel might be the most important.
The key to retention-based video use at this stage is twofold: consistency and regularity.
In terms of consistency, you’ll want to provide your viewers with the kind of content that took them to this point of the journey already. If thought leadership videos, webinars, and similarly educational/fact-based value dominated the videos that convinced prospects to buy from you, then you know what they find relevant; keep it up. Don’t switch to slapstick comedy just because you haven’t tried it yet—your audience has spoken with their wallets and told you what they liked.
Regularity simply means to create more content on a regular schedule to give clients an incentive to revisit your website. Evergreen content—content that’s lastingly useful and rewatchable—is great, but for retention, you’ll want to focus on frequency over permanence.
Practice a little design thinking and put yourself in the client’s shoes: if you were happy with a purchase, would you come back to the brand’s website to rewatch a great video? Probably, once or twice, and you might share it.
Now, would you come back to a brand you liked if you knew that they posted new videos every week? For most people, the answer is a strong “yes.”
Key Takeaways
Regularly produced and distributed content increases the chance that your converted prospects will share your videos and attract friends and peers, as well as the chance that your new client will purchase from you again.
When video is added to your marketing funnel, the benefits come fast and furious.
- Heighten interest and engagement in your brand with top-of-funnel videos on company culture and thought leadership.
- Deepen their interest and show you understand their needs with middle-of-funnel videos like product and explainer videos.
- Secure their decision with bottom-of-funnel videos like client testimonials, and personalized videos that show you really care about your prospects.
Finally, you’ll enjoy the fourth stage of the funnel that video provides: retention.
Keep clients coming back with consistent, regular video content that makes them want to buy again—and share. When video is added to your funnel, you don’t just get a longer funnel: you get better results at every stage.
Does your company involve video in its marketing funnel?
Do you think it’s a worthwhile strategy?
What kinds of videos do you think you might use to drive attention and conversion?