Best video formats for your marketing campaigns.
In this blog, we are going to talk through the best video formats for your marketing campaigns and how each one can benefit you and your business. Now, the format you choose will depend on the channel that you are communicating to your audience on. That’s one of the most important things to think about when it comes to choosing a video and using it in your online video marketing.
A video format describes the way in which a video is presented to a user. That may be the type of video file, it may be the platform it’s used on – but the best video format is the one that drives results for your business. Some video formats work better for B2C audiences and certain sectors, and other video formats work better for others!
Below we’ve outlined how you can use and implement the best video formats for your business to pack a punch with your online marketing.
Since the dawn of the smartphone and being able to capture video, vertical videos has been a criminal offence in the video world as they did not fit horizontal layout on platforms such as Facebook and YouTube. This is because people browsing on their devices just saw it as a waste of screen space. So this video format has only really come into play in recent years.
However, times have changed. Vertical video formats are now seen as the norm as Instagram and Facebook have pushed hard for the format. Also, it’s an undoubtedly natural fit for mobile which has created a new and exciting way to format video content giving you the chance to experiment with unique framing and angles.
In fact, a study by Facebook found that 65% of users find brands using vertical videos more innovative and 79% said the format was more engaging than horizontal layouts.
Speaking of vertical content, there is not a more popular layout right now than a story video format. They are uploaded by the user and can typically last up to 30 seconds or less. They are quick and simple videos that have a high engagement and they typically disappear after 24 hours across platforms like Instagram and Facebook. This can build organic and in-the-moment relationships with audiences as well as giving them an exclusive behind-the-scenes look at the brand. This video format is also great for user-generated content and increasing engagement across social media.
With their mobile-friendly layout and their 24-hour limit, the story video format has a lot to offer as they are relatively new to the social media world and have proved popular with younger audiences. They are a good match for brands that want to appeal to those users.
In addition, there are a lot of features that brands can use to engage with audiences and can make them stand out from the competition. For instance, question stickers where the audience can engage with the brand in an “ask me anything” style format. This is a great way to answer audience questions and single out members of the audience.
Lastly, almost all social media platforms have now started to implement story videos so there is no excuse not to adopt this approach and take advantage.
A brand video is a great way to market campaigns as they are typically created to showcase your business’ vision, mission, products, services and what separates you from your market.
The aim of a brand video is to build awareness around your company and to lure in potential new clients and fascinate your target audience. This type of high-quality video can embody your business and communicate who you are all in under 60 seconds.
A brand video can help communicate your businesses value proposition through a combination of animated video, still image video, impactful video and audio storytelling. The best kind of brand video is one that is used across multiple platforms to communicate who your business is clearly and concisely. When we design a video strategy for a business, we make sure you can use the video we create across all social media channels, your website and in any emails or documentation you may have internally.
Among video marketing styles, animation is probably one of the best formats for marketing campaigns. This is because it is the most visually creative and can convey hard to grasp concepts that need strong visuals to re-enforce the messaging. There are multiple options when choosing to do an animation, such as explainer videos, brand animations or infographic animations. The list goes on!
Live streaming is a new style of marketing campaign as it gives viewers a real-time perspective of your business that your viewers can connect with. As well, this unedited format is a great way for your audience to engage with you directly and with other viewers watching the live stream. In addition, you will be able to see how your messaging is being reacted to by your audience as it’s being filmed.
All in all, live streaming is a great way to reach a larger group in terms of audience and speakers. For instance, audiences can watch from wherever they live in the world and speakers can discuss their topics remotely. Lastly, after live streaming you can send it around to potential customers who might not have attended and can then watch at their leisure.
360 degree videos, also known as immersive videos or VR videos are new to social media. They are an engaging video format as they place the users at the centre of the content, letting them look in any direction using their phones or VR headset.
If you want to take it a step up and immerse your viewers further, you can shoot 360-degree videos live and your viewers can watch the videos as they happen and can see everything going on around the camera. This would be a great format to use for conferences or a product launch, as there is nothing more in the moment than live VR content.
Give 360 degree videos a try. It is sure to turn heads (literally).
Your customers want to know that your product or services can and will solve their specific problems. One of the best ways to prove this is by creating a case study or testimonial videos that feature your satisfied and loyal customers. Get them on camera talking about their challenges, address their issues and how your company helped solve them. These work particularly well for online video marketing as they showcase your customers feedback in an easy to access video format.
Choosing the right file format for your video is really important. As you’ve seen, video formats come in many shapes and sizes – but one thing that can really affect the quality of your videos is the video file type. Choosing the best video file format type can give your users a high-quality experience in high definition, and using high-quality video and audio assets means your audience can enjoy the video without any disruptions.
Back in the day, Adobe Flash Video, QuickTime Player and Windows Media Video/Windows Media Player were the best options for video players around and the only video options for businesses to have. But Windows Media Player only works if you have a Windows run computer or phone – and technology has drastically changed how we view and consumer content. There were so many issues when it came to Flash Video and QuickTime Player including issues around load time and large file sizes, and poor load speed due to less compression on web browsers, that there are now (thankfully) some way better options for you to use giving you high video quality and a low file size. So let’s talk about how file types can make a huge impact on your video marketing.
These days pretty much all devices and platforms support MP4 – so it’s probably the most universal video file format around for video and audio files. The type of video files you select will vary on the platform and channel you use – most social media channels now only accept MP4 video files.
AVI and MP4 are video and audio container format wrappers for video files. Both AVI and MP4, .mov and AVCHD (advanced video coding) are high in quality but vary in file size. MP4 is more flexible when it comes to being universally accepted across digital platforms. In fact, most videos you’ve probably watched that offer high video quality are video files that uses the MP4 video format!
MP4 can also be used to store high definition video files, text, still images and audio files. MP4 works best for digital video/audio and will probably be the file type used across any of your digital video marketing. A video using MP4 is likely to have a quicker load time too.
MP4 is the most universal file format out of all of the video file formats. It offers the highest quality of video at the lowest size of storage needed – making it ideal for online and digital marketing purposes.
There isn’t an answer to this I’m afraid! It comes down to what video formats offer your customers a high definition and high-quality experience for you and your business – and you’ll only know if you test it yourself.
The best file type for your video across websites, social media and to use for internal communication should be MP4. No matter the platform or channel, MP4 will offer you high-quality video and audio, and lower video size due to the video compression. So load speed won’t be an issue.
If you are looking to implement any high-quality video formats to your marketing campaign you are already in the right place! Considering it is the first step. We’d love to chat and talk about video and can help make this a reality for you. Please get in touch with us if you would like a free chat about your video marketing objectives.