How to get more video views

If you’re reading this then the chances are you’ve already gone through the entire production stage of getting a video produced and you’re now the proud owner of an animated video that you’re happy with.  Now what?

 

Well, in many ways the hard work starts here, because it’s no good investing your time and money into creating something if no one will see it, or react to.  Getting your video watched by as many relevant people as possible is crucial if you want to see a return on your investment.

 

The first mistake people make is to simply upload it to YouTube and let it gather dust, hoping that eventually people will stumble across it, watch it and respond to it.  This is a pretty poor tactic to adopt.  Sure, YouTube is by quite a considerably margin the biggest video sharing site on the internet, but it’s sheer size also makes it extremely challenging to get yourself noticed.  100 hours of video is uploaded to YouTube every minute, so you need to do a few things to stand out:

Give your video a title that will stand out.  Simply calling your video the name of your company or product is unlikely to attract anyone’s attention. It needs to be something that stands out and will relate to the searches people look for when they type into the search bar, and it also needs to be fairly unique so it has less competition from other videos.  Think of the popular YouTube series ‘Will it Blend’, the title draws you in and makes you want to watch it.  If it was called ‘man puts things in blender’ it wouldn’t have nearly the same impact.

Give your video tags.  A tag is a word or phrase you can attach to your video that makes it easier for YouTube to figure out what the video contains, and makes it appear next to relevant searches.  Using the example of ‘Will it blend’ the obvious tags would be ‘blender’, ‘iPhone’ etc.  But try and include other more subtle or indirect tags like ‘funny’ or ‘do not try this at home’ that could also point people to your video

Write a description.  Your video should also contain a brief description underneath the title so people can read a bit more information about the video.  Try and make it informative but also eye catching, include the keywords you use for your SEO purposes but don’t repeat them too much, try and write it for people rather than search engines.  Crucially, include your web address in there too so people can click directly through after watching the video, and remember to include the https:// prefix so it appears as a live link and not just text.

Make your video watchable on mobile.  It’s as simple as clicking a tick box, but unless you do your video won’t be able to be watched on mobile devices or tablets, and as this is a huge part of your audience then you’ll miss out.  Double check that you’re enabled this feature when you upload, and check it for yourself to see how it looks on your phone or tablet.

 

Once you’ve done the above you’ve given yourself a much greater chance of getting noticed on YouTube, but the work doesn’t stop there.  There are countless other video sharing sites out there such as Vimeo, Daily Motion, Metacafe and you should take the time to upload your video to as many as possible, using the same method as above.  The chances are there will be some industry specific video sites that directly relate to your business, and getting your animated video onto these sites should also be a priority.

 

The next big area you need to focus on is social media.  The power of social media is huge, and posts containing video content are the posts that get interacted with the most, so you can potentially reach a huge audience.  Facebook is an obvious place to start, so post your video on there with a good title and description to get peoples attention.  Share it on your personal page with your network of friends and politely ask them to share it too, and also post it to your company’s page to reach your existing followers.  You’ll likely get a few shares and reach people outside your immediate network, and if you want to promote it further you can boost the post using Facebook’s paid marketing system.  It’s good at narrowing down a target audience so consider spending what you can afford to try and reach as many people as possible.

 

Tweet your animated video with a link to it.  Use some good wordplay to grab attention and give a hint as to what the video is about.  Ask a question or phrase it in a tempting way.  A tweet saying ‘please watch my company video at www’¦.’ is much less likely to get attention or be interacted with than a tweet saying ‘want to know how to’¦.?’  Shorten your url as well.  Studies have shown these links get more clicks than their long for equivalent.

 

You should also post your video on Google+, which is growing in popularity, partly because of its importance in Google search results and also because of its massive audience.  Every android phone comes with a Google+ account so a huge chunk of the population of the planet has one, and now boasts a bigger user base than Twitter or Linked in.  You might be on various other social media sites such as LinkedIn, Whatsapp, Myspace etc. so get your video distributed amongst all of them.

 

As with most social media try and time your post to when you think you’ll get most people attention.  Either first thing in the morning is good or towards the end of the working day is best as this is the time most people check their feeds and you want to be as close to the top as possible.  Each audience is different so do a bit of research on who you’re trying to target, but research has shown that 7am-9am and 5pm-7pm are the best times to post if you want to reach the maximum number of people.

 

Put a link to your animated video in your email signature so people can click through direct off an email, and consider doing a dedicated email campaign to people on your contact list to make them aware of your video.  These will all result in more views and shares so don’t neglect this more traditional form of marketing.  Similarly press releases can attract a wide audience as well.

 

And finally, get your video on your own company website.  An obvious step that some people forget to do!  It’s one of the main reasons most people get an animated video produced, to engage people on their own site and increase their sales, but don’t hide it away in a blog post that gradually gets forgotten about.  Have it on your homepage where its easy to see, or at the very least at the top of one of your most visited pages.  If it requires a minor shuffle around of the layout of your page then try and accommodate this.  It will pay dividends in terms of your bounce rate, and the time people stay on your site, and this all leads to increases sales and enquiries.

 

Hopefully with the information provided here you’ll maximise the potential of your animated video and reach the widest possible audience.  Video is a fantastic medium and one that is growing exponentially online so arm yourself with the knowledge needed to stay at the front of the pack.