Over the past few years, the Internet landscape has changed tremendously. People are steadily moving away from their desktop and laptops computers and are now more than ever consuming content on the internet via their mobile phones and tablets. What does this imply for your content marketing drive in 2018?

The world of internet marketing has also experienced changes. Now, content can only sell if they are delivered how and when the consumer wants it.

For several years, we’ve been hearing that the future of content marketing is videos. If we consider that video is currently one of the most popular ways to provide relevant content to consumers, then it is safe to conclude that the future is here.

A 2017 state of video marketing report shows that, for the fourth year in a row, more than 90% of participants in a survey agree that video is becoming increasingly significant as a medium for marketing content. One reason for this is its ability to be used across a variety of platforms. Videos are used on websites, emails, and social media platforms and can serve an array of purposes.

Video as a tool for marketing is no longer something to look out for; it has become an already established vehicle, powerful enough to build your brand, drive your value proposition and create valuable customer engagements. It opens up content marketing to a veritable world of opportunities. The above statistics alone show how significant video has become and the influence it has in marketing.

While traditional marketing is still relevant and highly effective, it sometimes fails to create that much-needed connection between brands and their customers. Video, on the other hand, makes it easy for brands to engage with their customers with very little effort.

Not only is it easy to catch the consumer’s interest, but videos can also make visitors spend longer time on your website, boost your brand’s visibility through the ease of sharing and make your content easier to consume.

While this doesn’t mean you should abandon regular text-based marketing, it is important that video marketing is a part of your marketing strategy for 2018.

The Case for Video

Customers would rather watch a video about a product or service than read about it. This is enough compelling reason to consider a video marketing plan.

However, there are also a number of other good reasons why businesses should invest in video.

More traffic – The number of video content on the internet, especially mobile video has greatly increased in the last couple of years. More and more users are consuming videos online, thereby shooting up web traffic for sites that include a relevant and engaging video on their platform.

A typical internet user spends more than 80% of his or her time on a website with video content and by 2020, video content will account for more than 85% of the total internet traffic. This provides a killer opportunity for smart businesses to capture their market.

Better return on investment – Using a video on your landing page can boost your conversion rate by as much as 80%. Studies suggest that 50% of internet users will look for a video relating to the product they are interested in before visiting a business and 64% of customers are more likely to buy a product or service after seeing a video about it.

What this means is that the number of sales your business will experience will more than compensate for the investment spent on your video marketing strategy.

Better SEO – While text-based content still remains important, people prefer search results that produce video content because it is easier to consume.

Internet users find it difficult to spend time reading a lengthy write-up. They would rather watch it in video form. Not only is this more engaging, but video content is also easier to understand and remember.

If your brand or website has enough video content that is relevant to searches people are making, it will create a significant improvement in your search engine page rankings.

However, the title and description of your videos have to contain keywords that users search for before this strategy can be effective. While it is not exactly difficult to implement the relevant keywords in your video, you may need SEO expertise to ensure your title matches how people search for your content.

More clicks – Studies suggests that including a video in an email can increase the click-through rate up to 300%. Users are always interested in engaging content which is why text and HTML emails are rapidly being overtaken by simple but engaging videos.

However, simply including video in your email is not enough to guarantee that it will be opened; you have to add “video” in the subject line.

Wider reach – While the majority of visitors will never read up to half of text-based content, 60% of video viewers will finish a 3-minute video. This shows that video is the more preferred method for consuming content on the Internet.

If your video content is interesting, it will be easily shared and have a high chance of going viral, where it will be viewed by millions of people. In a recent survey, 76% of participants say that they would be willing to share a video with their friends as long as it was interesting.

It is becoming increasingly popular for brands to reach and engage customers with video content. The truth is that videos help businesses get incredible results — results that they won’t get with any other form of content. A well-placed call-to-action within or at the end of a video will guarantee more results than a regular CTA in a landing page with no video.

One of the interesting things about video marketing is that it doesn’t have to be time-consuming. You can create a video campaign and run it on multiple channels in many related categories. You can then sit back and enjoy the payoffs such as improved user engagement and increase in conversion rates.

Making a case for a video marketing strategy shouldn’t be too tough. The statistics are there for all to see. While smart businesses are taking advantage of the trend, others are waiting to see what the future will bring. The future is here already, and it is video.