Top three mistakes video marketers make.

Marketing with video and has seen an enormous jump recently and video production companies are working together with marketing companies to produce amazing videos for business marketing.
Video production companies in Johannesburg are moving more and more towards online marketing and away from broadcast video adverts. The problem is that many newcomers are taking short cuts and making bad decisions with video.

In this article I am going to look at some of the most common mistakes businesses make with marketing with video.
It is important to understand that there has been a divide between professional and non professional video creation. Many small time marketers like multi level marketers and affiliate marketers have pushed the message of self filming. This has brought a slew of bad ideas and bad productions.
So lets look at the three top ways that video marketing is being done badly.

Video Marketing mistake number 1:

One size fits all:                                 

With many online marketers there is a sense of video being a grudge purchase. Too many people see video as an obstacle to overcome so they want a fix-all solution that has worked for other people so they can do the same.
This approach has not worked in the off line marketing world and will certainly not work online.
Just because a video idea works amazingly for one company does not mean it will work for yours.
Simply copying and pasting ideas from one industry to another often falls flat.Even copying an idea within an industry can end badly because many of your potential customers will think you simply copied your competitor which doesn't say good things about your company.
While there are tried and tested techniques such as the flow of the advert, or marketing video, and a good call to action, simply copying a video verbatim is a really bad idea.This is especially the case where you may go the cheap route and make a cheap knock off of a video done by a professional video production company.
The question you should ask is "what is the problem or pain point that your customer has?"  and "how can you speak to that?" This way your message is targeted and way more effective.

Video Marketing mistake number 2:

Viral video

The myth of viral video has probably done some of the most harm to small businesses compared to anything else. Firstly, viral video will not bring more customers. It will simply bring more viewers from which you will probably gain nothing. The classic funny cat videos, can garner multiple millions of viewers and result in zero sales. This is because the entertainment factor is high and the shareability is high but the business message is exceptionally weak or non existent. The only people who make money from viral videos are content creators who post the videos on platforms like YouTube and make money from YouTube's advertising.
An effective video is not a viral video. An effective video targets your potential clients and gets them to follow through with a call to action. The approach of getting as many views as possible and then praying that it converts to sales is a really bad idea. Effective targeted video is what has helped many businesses grow.


Video Marketing mistake number 3:

Poor quality.

While newcomers are always looking for more cost effective ways to market their business, the short cuts have many pitfalls. The all too common mistake is to buy a camera or even worse grab your cell phone and begin shooting. This idea was possibly birthed by the affiliate and multi level marketing industry where personal interaction is gold. This approach can be very effective in a very specific niche. If you want to convince people that you are real and want them to connect to you personally then a shaky cell phone video can work.
The problem is that many small business think that this approach translates into business marketing. Nothing could be further from the truth. If your potential clients see you doing that sort of thing, their sense may be that you are a fly-by-night sort of a business and there is no trust whatsoever.
The video work, and overcoming being in front of the camera, can result in damage to your company image instead of boosting it. This is money badly spent and even worse, can damage your company in the eye of the viewer.
There is a place and a time for "low quality" video but it does not work in every situation, especially if you have high paying clients who expect quality, value and trust.


While there are many other mistakes that newcomers make with marketing with video, avoiding these three could make a huge difference for you. It is important to remember that there are no guarantees in marketing of any kind, even video. Many people have seen success with their video marketing but that does not guarantee that it will work for you and your business. That is why it is important to get professional advice when embarking on a video marketing campaign.
Online video marketing can be way more affordable compared to the old way of broadcast advertising but that does not mean that it is cheap, free or guaranteed to bring your business any results. Be sure that you understand your industry and get good solid advice on how to market your business.

Advertising With Video Production Companies in Johannesburg.

For all the types of on line marketing, there is the use of video to boost viewers and attract buyers. With the amount of on line marketing focusing on "free marketing" some have lost sight of the fact that paid for advertising still works.

While social media really does some amazing things to bring in an audience, advertising goes straight to it. The social media and other forms of on line marketing are essentially creating an audience of some kind. This audience is then targeted for sales. There are, however, a large section of your potential buyers/clients who will not become part of your audience. These people can simply be advertised to. It has been seen by many that advertising is "old school" and ineffective. This is not the case. If done wisely can be the most effective way of getting sales.

It is important to remember that it is the ROI (return on investment) that counts. If you spend $1000 on advertising and get $10 000 in sales with a profit margin of 20% Then your profit is $1000 after the advertising costs are factored in. If you spend three weeks doing a social media campaign which results in $10 000 sales your profit is $2 000 but you have to factor in time spent. If over the three weeks you spend 100 hours working on the campaign then the difference of $1 000 is at a rate of $10 per hour. Is it worth working for $10 an hour?

Although you may have paid out less money, the cost in time is important. This is where many people see the difference. Yes you will need the money to start off with, but the difference can be spectacular. There are many who sell on line products who see a 3 to 1 return (ROI). Places like Facebook have shown many on line sellers this kind of return. They invest around $30 000 in adverts and get $90 000 in sales. If you only have a profit margin of 20% then this will not work. That is because 20% of $90 000 is $18 000. So spending $30 000 on advertising means you lost $12 000 after doing all the sales. However many sales on line have an almost 100% profit margin because they are electronic products. These are things like training programs and information. They can be duplicated with no extra cost. The only thing used up is band width which is cheap for most people.

In this way, although going the free route could bring you sales, if you advertised instead you could focus on the sales. The ROI is lower but the time spent is less. It comes down to what you value most.
What is important is to keep in mind that advertising still works. What is also important is to keep in mind that there are production costs to be added to the advertising costs. Going the advertising route and not paying for an advert or commercial to be made is a bit strange. You are going the route of spending money, over that of time, so D.I.Y. is not the most brilliant choice. Advertising is more expensive so needs to be more effective. The quality of the commercial can affect the response rate to it. With all the money spent on the advertising, it makes sense to use a professional video production company to make the video. The cost factor is minimal in big advertising budgets. A good quality advert or commercial can cost as low as $1000 or $2000 if you find the right company. There are video production companies who charge over $10 000 and even $100 000 for a commercial but they are not needed in this case. Unless you are trying to launch a new soda drink into the market, these are an over-kill.

Most targeted advertising just need to be good, not the best. This is where most corporate video production companies come in. They may not be winning awards for their production work but that is not what matters. What matters is the quality of work they can supply. At this point it is also good to mention that a good voice over artist can go along way to making your video pop.
It is important to remember though, that video production companies are not marketing companies.

The marketing companies or online marketing companies come up with the concept for the advertising campaign and the video production companies create the advert. Some marketing companies even work out the best platform, and repetition rate etc, for the most effective use of the advert. The marketing company however ads more cost of investment. That means lower ROI. Or does it? If your advertising is not effective it may cost you more than you get back. Using a marketing company, can in many cases, not only improve your chances of being effective with your marketing campaign but can often help it not to be a total failure. Many people are working on the idea that all advertising campaigns are effective and its just about being the most effective.This is not always the case.Many advertising campaigns fall flat and have next to no return.This can result in all the advertising spend resulting in just about no return.That is just like throwing the money away.

Unless you don't have any money to invest in a proper marketing campaign it helps to get the experts in. At the same time it is also important to remember that even the experts get it wrong sometimes. There have been advertising companies who have got it spectacularly wrong at times. These campaigns have not only not resulted in more sales but have damaged the brand in the process. There are some well known soda commercials that come to mind. Some companies have even been boycotted after a marketing campaign. These spectacular failures by marketing companies are not the norm though. The marketing companies would not be in business for long if their campaigns were always failing.

So where to begin? First figure out how much you can spend and comfortably effort to lose without any return. Advertising. although not as addictive is still a gamble but in the case of business a very necessary one.
Then if your budget affords, chose a marketing and branding company. If that is not in the budget find the best video production company you can afford. If that is not in the budget, begin a campaign of prayer. If that doesn't suit you just go with wishful thinking. Jokes aside. Marketing is serious business and should have have the money spent on it.

If you seriously want to market your business you need to get over the idea that it is cheap and easy.
The most successful businesses have the best marketing campaigns. It's a simple as that. So you need to choose. Is it a risk worth taking? Only you can decide that.

Did Video Kill the TV star as well?

Its been long accepted that video killed the radio star but the question is : Did video kill the TV star too? Truth be told video did not kill the radio star at all.Radio is as strong as ever, just in a different way. If the United States is the only consideration, then its actually syndication that did the most to kill the radio star as we know it. The saying actually comes from when MTV came to life. It was believed that people would flood to music videos over music on its own.This belief exploded MTV into a super channel known world wide. As you may know MTV however is not a music TV station anymore. Its seems radio made a comeback. To really understand what the future holds you simply have to look at how people love convenience. Its not the music video versus the music but the convenience versus past systems. Satellite radio made an initial dent on radio because of the ability to listen to a wide range of services and to have music without advertising.

This however was not really the final nail as streaming became the greatest threat to all forms of broadcasting. Some thought that it meant simply putting the existing broadcast onto online streams as a new delivery system for the same programming. This turned out to be far from the truth. The public became instead a consumer of sound bites and video clips. The world seems to be spinning faster everyday and most people just don't have the time to listen to a full news broadcast and music or talk shows.
If you look outside the United States, the picture is quite different. Many countries don't have satellite radio and many have very poor streaming if you are moving. This makes listening to streaming radio problematic because the signal often breaks down as the signal jumps from one cell tower to another.

With all things, technology will change over time. This means that when signals are clear and stable for a high percentage of the time across the planet, the full change from broadcast will most likely happen. That discussion however does not address the question of video.
Many thought websites like YouTube would be mild distractions at best with silly cat videos and illegal low quality copies of movies, being just another piece of junk TV.
Those in the know, like Google, realized otherwise. After Google took over YouTube the platform become a real contender for news, music, entertainment and a platform for people to voice their opinions on subjects ranging from fashion to politics, dating to global affairs.

A place to put your home video became not only another form of entertainment but a massive new business platform. The potential for advertising was suddenly realised in a way most could never have foreseen.

One type of star that has appeared is the YouTube star. Self made celebrities have begun competing with broadcast TV and movie stars. Some have termed them "Internet famous" vs "really famous".Oddly many of the "Internet famous" have more followers than traditional stars.Many of them are also self made millionaires.




The question then was : Do businesses take YouTube advertising seriously? Would companies reputation be tarnished in anyway by being associated with what many might see as unprofessional ?
At first all went well and many companies took full advantage of the cheap exposure and made huge leaps in their marketing. The fairytale however was short lived. For what ever reason many companies found that their adverts were played on channels not flattering to their image.They banded together, according to mainstream news, and demanded that YouTube control better, how and where the adverts were placed and what channels were acceptable. Many successful YouTube channels quickly became demonetised.
The question hung in the air of "what does this mean for online video marketing?" Just as marketers got to grips with the world of video commercials online, they had to rethink their strategy.

The changes not only affected YouTube channels and companies but also video production companies who had changed their services from broadcast advertising to online video marketing. The changes were not just technical as with the format and compatibility but also in understanding the diverse audience. Unlike TV channels of old, it was found that if the wrong target market was chosen, the marketing became pointless. Video marketing was no longer about making a pretty 30 second commercial and pounding it over and over on broadcast TV.The marketing with video now had to be more focused. Luckily, the algorithms that Google has been working on, have been able to help marketers to direct marketing to the appropriate audiences. Video production companies also had to come to terms with the idea that many of the video platforms were becoming more and more "live". With Periscope, Facebook Live and other services making it possible for individuals to "broadcast", the standard ideas of  advertising changed. Many people believe that the video production companies in Johannesburg and around the world have a handle on the changes happening but in fact it is such a fast changing industry that even marketing companies along with video production companies are trying to get to grips with the changes. While many of the changes have made it more viable to target a niche market, the terrain is still unknown. Many mistakes will be made and hopefully lessons learned from them. The many casualties along the way might not care too much about the lessons learned when they see their income disappear. Many YouTube channels have had to turn to outside sources for income besides advertising.These ranged from donations through many services and even printing T shirts and other merchandising for their followers to purchase.

One of the biggest problems is that their is no official broadcast authority. YouTube and Google have began monitoring and attempting to filter content for what is more "appropriate". Some have argued that the choices are wildly biased in political and social spheres. While cat videos are still considered by many as "acceptable" , independent news channels claim that they can be demonetised for holding the "wrong opinion".



While it has always been the responsibility of marketing companies to navigate the industry, video production companies have become the first contact for small and medium sized businesses. This means that corporate video production companies in Johannesburg are expected to not only understand the online industry but be experts. They are expected to have  an inside knowledge of how to market video correctly that best helps the businesses. Although it shouldn't be the video companies responsibilities, if the clients think it is, then it is.

With all this chaotic changing of the rules, online marketing has begun to look like a "loose cannon".
TV broadcasting of old suddenly looks appealing because of stability. The truth is though that the sheer expense of broadcast TV simply makes it out of the question for most marketers. This means that no matter how rough it gets, the price factor will keep small and medium sized businesses looking to corporate video production companies to make it work for them. So did Video kill the TV star? Clearly not ...well not yet. Only time will tell how video changes, how its delivered and how it will be used for entertainment, news and marketing.