(First written 12/30/09, updated 2/21/16.)
Google bought YouTube in 2006 for $1.6 billion for a reason. They knew how important video marketing was going to be and they were right.
YouTube is now the #2 search engine in the world, behind Google, but since it's owned by Google, it's basically one in the same...except it's VIDEO!
According to Cisco, global consumer internet video traffic will be 80% of all consumer Internet traffic in 2019, up from 64% in 2014.
Do you think it's an accident I've had a YouTube channel since March 29, 2007?
It's why I publish The Sales Podcast as both an audio-only and a video podcast.
It's why I publish videos straight to The Sales Whisperer® Facebook page and my personal profile.
To get found quicker, to rank higher, to cut through the clutter and to get your point across you need to master video marketing.
As I was updating this post I did a quick search for "how to fix" and Google suggested "a zipper."
In selecting that search you can see the results above.
Google has indexed 1,270,000 results and 50% of the first four suggested links are not only videos, but YouTube videos. Since Google owns 65.44% of the search engine space, it's safe to focus there for now.
So how are you at video marketing? How are you at making videos in general? Do you still think you need a high-dollar camera, green screens, boom mics, and professional lighting to make a video that gets you traffic and clients?
Think again.
I've used everything from Kodak Zi-8s to high-dollar DSLRs (I have the Nikon D5200, and I won a Canon EOS Rebel T3i...both are sweet) to my favorite—the iPhone—for nearly a decade.
Oh dear, I almost forgot to mention the screen-sharing programs like Jing—which was free—as well as ScreenFlow and iMovie on my Mac, which I use to create not only software tutorials but general "talking head" videos where I just want to speak into the camera and include captions or call-outs or links in the video.
For those videos, I invested a whopping $69 for a Logitech HD Pro Webcam C920, which hasn't changed in at least five years.
But with the quality HD cameras smartphones offer today combined with the free video editing YouTube offers, there is absolutely no reason whatsoever not to be making videos to promote your business.
If you'd like to discuss video marketing, inbound marketing, sales training, private consulting or any other way my team and I here at The Sales Whisperer® can help you grow, please contact me here to schedule your free consultation.
If you need more help growing your sales, check out the following resources scattered around this site and a few others I operate, such as:
Good Selling.