How to Do Video Prospecting to Generate More Leads
What is video prospecting and how can it supercharge your lead generation strategy?
Traditional sales prospecting has transformed in recent years. While emails and even phone calls still have their value, video prospecting is the new must-have for businesses of all sizes and sectors.
When it comes to engagement and sales boosts, video prospecting is hard to beat.
For both incoming and outgoing sales outreach, the modern marketer and sales team have plenty of content types to choose from.
Of them all, video is fast becoming the essential format that shouldn’t be overlooked.
Video Prospecting
With more people watching videos online than ever, and younger audiences particularly keen on video content, it simply makes sense to integrate video into your lead generation and prospecting strategy.
More than 31% of surveyed marketers claim that their video marketing strategy is extremely important.
Using video content on your website, in your emails, and on your social media pages has clear value. And when it comes to prospecting, the results can be more powerful than you might think.
How to Use Videos as a Lead Generation Tool
If your prospecting is falling flat, here’s how to use videos to supercharge your lead generation strategy.
Use Your Customer Data
Like most modern marketing methods, everything starts with data. By collecting and studying your data, you can gain high-value insights into your target audience.
Whatever tools you’re already using for your marketing strategy, the fact is that targeted and personalized video content can be key to brand growth.
Use resources like Google Analytics to collect as much data as possible about your current customers and social media followers as possible.
Learn their ages, genders, where they are in the world, and what their online behaviors are like.
Think about platforms, too. Creating engaging videos for Instagram is not the same as making email newsletter videos.
The more that you understand what your existing customers are looking for and engaging with, the easier it will be to highlight the necessary video content that will attract new leads.
Your videos can then be tailored to entice those prospects, and can even be used to land a sale you might otherwise have lost.
Audience Segmentation
Even if your target audience is large of the same demographic, they’re still individuals with their own needs.
That’s where segmentation comes in.
For example, if you’re a restaurant with a good email newsletter list, and you have a special offer on steaks, there’s little point in sending out a video about your meat quality to the vegetarians on your newsletter list.
Audience segmentation is critical. Develop audience personas and start creating personalized videos designed specifically for each segment.
Personalized videos are extremely powerful, but you don’t need to create 100s of unique videos for every single customer or sales lead.
Instead, create videos that appeal to different segments of your audience.
Once a lead is identified through your video, you can then begin the sales strategy more specifically.
Use outbound dialer software to contact those leads that need a little encouragement from your sales team, springboarding from where they are in the sales journey and how much they responded to your video prospecting videos.
Use Video Prospecting at the Right Time
One of the reasons why some brands don’t experience a good ROI on their video outreach is because they deliver their video messages at the wrong time.
The sales funnel should be a clearly defined map that is constantly monitored for leads.
To use video prospecting more effectively, look at that sales funnel map.
Then, identify the stages of the buyer journey where a face-to-face interaction would be of benefit.
It’s at those points where video content can and should be used. Video has replaced the face-to-face in-person sales meeting.
Yet, video still allows for face-to-face interactions, meaning you can build stronger connections without the hassle.
Start with the obvious points where video content can enhance the buyer journey, and test constantly to see what’s working (and what’s not).
With constant adjustments, you’ll find that cold email prospecting strategies are going to be less potent than your video prospecting.
Download FREE e-Book: Using Videos Outside of YouTube for Lead Generation
Choose the Right Types of Video
There’s a massive range of video types to use as part of your video prospecting.
When and where to use each type will depend on your customer experience KPIs, and your overall lead generation goals.
To begin your video outreach, consider first using these types of video:
- Tutorials: These are one of the most-watched kinds of videos on the internet. The more tutorial videos you create, the faster you’ll end up with a video roadmap that can complement your lead generation and boost your sales team.
- Demonstration videos: Often confused with tutorials, a demo video tends to be significantly longer and will be a detailed look at your products and everything they can and will do. Aim for about five minutes per video to ensure viewers don’t get distracted.
- Testimonials: One of the most powerful tools for prospecting, testimonials are amazing for building brand trust and are the perfect endpoint for customers doing their research. Video testimonials from satisfied customers can have a dramatic effect on your sales figures.
Read more: 8 Types of Video Content Every Business Needs to Create
When your different types of videos make an impact on your sales leads, your sales team can then use their phone system to reach out.
Using VoIP phone systems streamlines this stage of outreach and shouldn’t be overlooked. What’s a VoIP caller? It’s a simple way to make communication easier, ensuring those leads are not missed.
Track and Analyze
You won’t know how well your video prospecting is performing if you’re not tracking and measuring it.
That’s true of all digital marketing strategies, from mail retargeting to social media campaigns.
When analyzing your videos, your first step is to monitor the right metrics.
Start with the basics, such as video views.
This is about as basic as it gets, and it’s an easy number to follow.
However, it’s important to remember that page views aren’t the be-all and end-all.
In fact, if you’re posting your videos on some platforms like Facebook, even a video play of a few seconds can be counted confusingly as a video view.
So your next step should be to measure your Average View Duration. It’s important to remember that the vast majority of people who click on a video will not watch it all the way to the end.
However, if you see that there’s a common jumping-off point (most of your views end at the 20-second point, for instance), that’s a good sign that there’s something on the video that’s causing viewers to bounce.
Alongside views and view duration, always monitor your CTRs and conversion rates.
Those will be the big indicators that you’re on the right (or wrong) track with your video prospecting and customer onboarding.
Think in Terms of Value
The concept of SEO has changed the way that the internet is used.
Too many businesses focus on SEO and create content that is designed to appeal only to search engine algorithms.
Now, while SEO is (of course) essential, it will only be beneficial if it’s aligned with the need to provide value to real people.
Value is becoming the most important element of SEO.
If your video doesn’t provide value to your target audience then your bounce rate will be higher. That will harm your SEO.
To provide value, you need to ensure that you understand your audience. Head back to your customer data and evaluate your existing audience segmentation.
What value are those segments looking for? Tailor videos that will match user intent and resolve pain points.
The more you understand who your customers are, what they need, and when they need it, the easier it will be to identify and create the video prospecting content that will supercharge your lead generation.
Use Smart Copy
Video is an extremely vibrant marketing tool, but it doesn’t have to work in isolation.
Text is always going to be useful to include alongside your video prospecting content.
If you’re using video as part of your email marketing campaign, you need to ensure that the copy is as valuable and actionable as the video itself.
Aim for clarity while sticking to your brand’s established tone of voice (TOV). If you’re answering a question in your video like “what is IP calling?” make sure that your copy matches that content.
The challenge here is ensuring that the dialog of your video matches the tone of voice of your copy.
It’s damaging to have a more formal copy alongside more casual video content.
Video provides a face and a humanization element to all of your marketing efforts.
Take the time to align your TOV and your video style, so there’s less risk of misalignment that puts those leads off.
Start Supercharging Your Lead Generation With Video Prospecting
When it’s backed up by analysis, an understanding of audiences, and value, video prospecting is a powerhouse of lead generation.
While many digital marketing strategies are dreary and can often be counterproductive, video content is the energetic must-have in today’s fast-based and consumer-focused business landscape.
From providing more brand authenticity to resolving the challenges of your target audience, video prospecting is fast becoming one of the best ways to boost your sales figures.
Take the time to design the best plan and ensure that you’re always measuring and monitoring the impact of every video you publish.
Get it right and your sales reps could end up being the busiest members of your team.
Author: John Allen is the Director of SEO for 8x8, a leading PBX business phone systems platform with integrated contact center, voice, video, and chat functionality. John is a marketing professional with over 14 years of experience in the field, and an extensive background in building and optimizing digital marketing programs across SEM, SEO, and a myriad of services. This is his LinkedIn.
