by Steve Peter
Small business owners need to know the Tech Trends of 2021 to keep up with the current market and beyond.
As a local Phoenix video marketing company, Financial Potion, we’ve shown you at length what types of video can help your small business grow and thrive, and how you can get there with our expert help. Video itself, however, comes in many different forms, from long to short, from educational to purely fun, and from viral to almost completely unseen – depending on the platform that it lives on and who uses that platform for what. For instance, YouTube is clearly the most watched video upload service in our new technological ecosystem, but there are literally billions of videos uploaded there that have zero (0) views. So where’s the best place for your small business to upload your video – well, it depends on what’s in the video and what you’re looking to achieve with it.
A video that’s more straightforward, that simply highlights your business and perhaps a few aspects of it, can either be short or long, depending on how much needs to be explained. A good general rule is the shorter the better, after all, how much do you enjoy sitting through longer videos that don’t keep your interest? If your video can be a minute in length or less, a great place to upload it would be to YouTube and use their new feature #Shorts. #Shorts, is a new service that highlights and promotes videos less than a minute in runtime. YouTube has largely modeled this format on TikTok, a platform where going viral is almost always the goal. YouTube is a more generalized website to find videos of all sorts, but TikTok is definitely more of a youthful platform that moves very quickly and can be off-putting to those not familiar with current trends in the internet. This is not to say that just because one may not be at the forefront of trendiness, that it isn’t a good idea to post on TikTok – it’s always a good idea to post your videos everywhere that you can, to make sure that no matter what platform an individual uses, they’ll have access to information about your business.
Another useful place to post those shorter videos is Reels, which is a feature on both Twitter and Instagram – in addition to a ‘regular’ post on either of these services, Reels are designed to focus on shorter videos, and come with the added bonus of being able to easily use filters, stickers, colorful text and more to spruce up your video – these ‘additions’ to videos like text and .gifs are almost standard on social media platforms like these, and can help to get your businesses message across in a much easier and often more fun way than just the video itself.
The key to these types of videos is their length, being one minute or less keeps the information you’re putting across more bite-sized, and once people see it (and hopefully remember it) they can move on with their day. A different way to approach video marketing would be to create longer videos – half an hour, to an hour plus that really delve into specific content – perhaps things that people need to know about your business that you can’t boil down to a quick message. Zoom or podcast style interviews or conversations work wonderfully to reach deep into specific topics and can give listeners and watchers real insight into every aspect of your business, and maybe allow for recommendations or testimonials that show very specifically what your business can do for your customers. TikTok, of course, is not a great place for these types of videos but YouTube, or even hosting a video on your business’ website itself, can really grab viewers/listeners and give them a greater understanding of you and your business, and what it can do for them.
One Pro Tip that remains the same for each and every one of these videos, be they long or short, one one platform or another, which is to make sure to use captions in each and every video. They can look however you want them to – large or smaller, different colors, fonts etc. – as long as people can read along with the video that they’re watching you’re doing the right thing. Captions are not just for hearing impaired people, although they of course need these captions in order to get the full picture of the video, but people who aren’t impaired also use these captions. Think, for instance, of your usage of social media: do you stop and watch every video and turn up the volume to pay full attention each and every time there’s a video on your timeline ? No, of course not – your eye has to be “caught” so to speak, by a video – and here’s where closed captions can really help catch eyes as well as ears when viewing videos. There are also times when viewers are unable to listen to videos – maybe they’re at work, or in a public place where volume is frowned upon, but reading along to good CCs is just one more way for prospective customers to get the information you want them to have.
Lastly, as we like to do, we look to the future to surmise what might be next in the wide world of video that will help you and your business be the best all around. AR, or augmented reality, and various other similar tech like VR (virtual reality) and 3D (which has been around in various forms for more than 60 years) are being worked into different videos and advertising on various platforms to differing effects. If your business is a highly visual one (i.e architecture, or artwork) AR and VR can take your advertising via video to a whole new level – picture being able to show off 360 degrees of a new building with added notation and imagery that users can click on to learn more, or engaging with customers and their smartphones by showing off special ads that move and talk (with an AR assist) once people are in-store at your place of business.
Technology these days seems truly limitless, and video is currently the easiest way to engage with potential customers across the board, especially with smartphones in our lives the way that they currently are. Contact us today by visiting our website at www.FinancialPotion.com to learn more about how we can help you integrate the cutting edge of video into your business plan, and the many different ways in which we assist business owners of all types to grow their business organically !
