Customer-centric marketing is a specific take on marketing that B2B brands shouldn’t forget when it comes to their video strategy.
If you don’t already have a video marketing strategy keep in mind, most millennial buyers absorb information through video on social media every day. Plus, product videos can increase purchases by up to 144 percent. But what does it mean to take a customer-centric approach with video? Isn’t all marketing customer-centric by definition?
It may not seem like it, but there’s a big difference between these two approaches: Marketers spending all their time talking about how great their product or service is; and building relationships with customers by teaching them how they can better understand or solve an industry problem and creating opportunities for brand advocacy and collaboration.
Here’s how to walk that fine line with your video marketing:
Create Clear, Customized Content
A customer-centric approach to marketing involves focusing on the customer and their concerns. You can find out what their concerns are through reviewing your website and social analytics to see which content resonated the most. You can also engage in social listening, share social polls, or just do some basic customer feedback surveys to gather information.
In your video metrics, pay attention to audience behavior. What kinds of video content are they paying attention to? How many seconds or minutes are they staying engaged? Do they bounce quickly, or do they watch multiple videos in succession? Now, take that data and find gaps in your content. Who are you not serving? What subjects are not covered? Audit your content and find out which audiences are responding to what content. To engage new customers and stay top-of-mind, keep atop industry trends—if your niche is talking about a specific topic, make sure you spend time digging into those topics to both provide value and build thought leadership.
Create a Community (of Advocates)
Once you have a strong following, you can cultivate it into a community. To do that, get your customers involved. Facilitate valuable discussion for them by asking questions in your videos. In the social media posts sharing your videos, respond to customer questions and encourage them to share, learn, and interact with one another. Let their word-of-mouth carry your brand message to new heights. In fact, customers themselves can be your greatest brand advocates.
If you have a loyal audience segment, create opportunities for them to create and share their own videos featuring your service. At live events, give them the opportunity to talk, or quote their customer reviews in your own content.
Let them know their words and input is valuable. These types of community-building actions build customer trust, boost your brand’s reputation, and strengthen your overall video marketing efforts.
Not only that, you’ll be able to gather more information about your customers from these activities. With that kind of data, you can create stronger customer personas, with more detail about their cares and pain points.
Be Transparent – Tell Your Story
To create a loyal audience in the first place, you’ve got to be transparent with your customer base. Through video, let them in on your processes. Show them who you are.
In other words, tell your brand story. What do you do? More importantly, how do you provide value for your customers?
Speak directly to your B2B customers about your solutions, and make sure your video content is useful and engaging. Use examples and uses cases to get your point across. Target your B2B clients and enterprise organizations with industry-specific language that they will understand and react to. Use inclusive pronouns – “we” and “us” – to hammer home the feeling of belonging and community. Use literary devices such as alliteration to amplify an atmosphere of alliance and employ repetition to ensure viewers and listeners retain your message.
In other words, be a great storyteller.
More than anything, though, make it crystal clear in your videos that you and your customers share the same goals and values. Give your customers the chance to become involved in your brand and your community, and customers will continue to care long after the cameras finish rolling.