How Does Social Media Affect Video Marketing?

Social media and video marketing work really well together.

All major social platforms support multiple video formats, as well as a variety features for sharing video content. This makes it easy for marketers to put their skills into practice and create effective video marketing campaigns.

If you plan on using video in your next social media marketing campaign, we would advise you learn more about the ways social media affects video marketing. You can start by checking out our guide on the topic in the remainder of this article.

10 Ways Social Media Affects Video Marketing

Social media affects marketing in a number of ways, some obvious, some more subtle. Here are the 10 most important ones you should know about.

1. Video Improves Social Media SEO

Social media search engines prioritize video on result pages. This makes it much easier to rank for high-volume keywords, allowing you to compete with pages and profiles many times your size. This is more evident on YouTube thanks to its integration with Google Search, but Facebook (and by extension Instagram) has also expanded its video search capabilities. Video SEO works along the same lines as regular SEO – tagging, tactical use of keywords, and meta-descriptions will go a long way towards improving the ranking of your video content.

2. Video Provides Value to Social Media Users

Video is an excellent means of value to social media users. The majority of content on social media is ephemeral, so anything that provides value will tend to stand out by default. Video is unique in this regard thanks to its ability to encapsulate information. A 3-minute video can teach users more than a whole series of text-only posts.

3. Video Encourages Sharing

Social media users enjoy sharing any cool content they find with their followers. This includes their friends and family, two groups which are more likely to engage with the content, as well as share it further. Video content encourages this further, as it’s typically more engaging than text or image-based posts. This is especially noticeable on platforms like Twitter, where videos typically get more shares than regular tweets.

4. Video Has Potential to Go Viral

One of the most powerful tools in the social media marketer’s arsenal is the viral video. Viral videos tend to spread like wildfire on social, giving your brand a boost of attention that would otherwise take years to reach. Creating viral videos is more art than science, but you can get a lot of mileage by watching popular meme videos, and extrapolating for there. Pro-tip: keep it under 10 seconds, include obscure pop-culture references, and don’t try to censor yourself.

5. Video Enhances Branding

Social platforms excel at creating an intimate environment for sharing web content. This makes them excellent for all forms of branding, though leadership, and authority building. The key lies in the commenting feature. Social media users can freely express their opinions on brands they follow, making it easy for organizations to figure out what works and what doesn’t, and adjust their messaging accordingly.

6. Video Has Long Shelf-Life

Video is more memorable compared to other forms of social media content. This higher retention rate is one of the reasons video has such long shelf-life. Even the best text-based post will only remain relevant for a short while, whereas a video can keep accumulating views for years after being published. In fact, sharing old videos is often a more viable marketing tactic than creating new posts at all cost.

7. Video Appeals to Younger Demographics

Younger social media users tend to prefer video over other forms of content. This is especially evident on TikTok, where the majority of users belong to Gen Z. This represents a unique challenge for social media marketers. On one hand, these younger cohorts will always respond better to video than other forms of content. On the other hand, the fact that they watch so much video makes it harder to make content that resonates – someone who watches hours of video on a daily basis is harder to impress than someone that only does so irregularly.

8. Video Makes it Easy to Find New Audiences

Social platforms have developed sophisticated systems for audience analytics. This makes it much easier to discover audiences interested in what your organization has to offer. Facebook is particularly notable in this regard. The combination of targeted advertising, private and public user groups, pages, and influencers from every niche enables video marketers to instantly find an audience for whatever they want to publish.

9. Video Streaming is Massively Popular

Streaming is quickly becoming the most popular video format around. As a result, social platforms are getting enhanced with extensive features for live-streaming. If you want to get in on the streaming bandwagon, the best way to go about it is to work with social media influencers. These middle-men make it much easier to reach audiences than attempting to build a streaming operation from scratch.

10. Video Facilitates Social Selling

Another aspect where video excels is in the realm of social selling. Consumers are much more likely to by products upon watching a video that explains its features and benefits. Again, influencers are key here. Consumers tend to trust social media influencers more than business pages, so working with them is a good way to get positive word of mouth for your products and services on social media.

Conclusion

Social media and video are both powerful marketing tools, so it makes perfect sense to use them in conjunction to achieve better business results. Thankfully, social media providers are in on the game, which is why we can expect even better video features in the future.