Video marketing can generate huge traffic and great conversions, or… it can suck the life right out of your message.
Today’s post will tell you how to set up a great, low-cost video marketing campaign that (if it’s done right) can really help move your business forward.
In this post I’ll show you how to add video to your InvestorCarrot sites, plus give you a great example of a video to watch right now… and tell you what *not* to do.
First, why does video marketing matter to real estate investors?
Video marketing is particularly important for real estate investors, because when you use it properly, it can really help to grow your business.
Think of your video like an automated salesperson for your business… once you record that video, it can be played again and again to anyone who is looking for your services, day or night, on weekends and holidays… without the bother of an interrupting phone call, while eliminating the hassle of having to say the same thing again and again.
A great video is more than just a commercial for your business – it builds trust for a great beginning to your relationship with a new client.
A great marketing video sets the stage for negotiations by showing off your credibility and describing how you do business.
A truly great marketing video helps the viewer to trust you, like you, and want to do business with you.
On the flip side, a bad video can really turn people off.
If you’re showing your potential clients a cheesy video that’s heavily scripted with obvious sales language, loaded with stock photography and drowning in clip art, what are they supposed to think about you and your business?
To put it another way…
If you never show someone your own voice and use your own face, how are they supposed to trust you?
See, here’s where real estate investment is very different from a household product that’s advertised on the television.
If you’re selling something like shampoo or root beer, you don’t have to convince the consumer that you’re trustworthy or credible… just that the shampoo will bring you that silky, luxurious hair you’ve been wanting, or that this root beer will deliver more delicious flavor than any root beer they’ve ever had.
When you’re selling products, trust can really help… but it’s not essential.
But when you’re trying to convince someone to let you buy their property or sell them an investment, trust is utterly critical. It’s everything. Without trust, you don’t have a deal.
And yet I see so many real estate investment companies using these terrible little $5 videos they bought online, probably late at night after a few drinks… and now they’re probably wondering why no one is watching and why their business isn’t growing.
Would you want a $5 salesperson to represent your business?
In most big companies, the top salesperson is the second-highest-paid in the company… right after the CEO.
Sales is the life blood of businesses. Without sales, there is no revenue, and without revenue, your company will die.
Exactly why would you trust a $5 sales video with the life blood of your business?
Don’t get me wrong… I don’t think you need to spend a ton of money on making a video in order for it to be effective.
In fact, we’ve found that most real estate customers are turned off by flashy marketing loaded with gimmicks. They really are just looking for a credible, trustworthy person to help them take care of business.
You really don’t need to do more than just talk into a webcam to make a decent sales video.
These few things will help you to make a great video marketing piece:
- High quality audio (i.e. a great microphone)
- High quality video (i.e. a decent camera)
- Good lighting
- Nice setting
- Clean editing
You can find someone in most cities who already has the equipment and pay them for a few hours of help… generally under $500 can get you a handful of pretty good short videos.
If you’ve got the budget you should definitely be hiring great people to make your videos even better.
Want to see an example of a decent low-cost marketing video?
Check this out:
They’ve got almost 10,000 views on that video, wow!
Their other video has a more reasonable view count – 352.
What I like about this couple is that they’re showing off themselves – sure, they’ve dressed up to film the video and put on their best smiles, but it’s genuine and authentic.
Side note – I checked out their site, and there are a lot of reasons their site won’t get very many conversions… it’s got good credibility, but it makes it hard for folks to sign up for the offer… those folks need to Watch the InvestorCarrot Demo and make the switch! Any of our affiliates know these folks and want to sign them up? :~)
But they did the smart thing of actually using the description on YouTube to pull traffic over to their site by using links and a lot of the most commonly used search terms. Since Google owns YouTube, the videos will show up in the top of the search (even if their site isn’t ranked that high), so this can be a great way to get traffic to your site:
Plus, it looks like they got a few of their friends to comment and share the video (which helps to boost credibility):
Those are all really great video marketing practices! Great job, Greg & Laura!
Now let me show you how easy it is to add video to your InvestorCarrot site from YouTube.
First, get the video up on YouTube and copy the link to the video.
In another window, open up the post or page where you want to embed the video.
Then click the snazzy little “Embed Video” button.
This nifty little window will pop up, and just paste the YouTube (or Vimeo) link into the form.
That’s it! How simple was that?
