Video Marketing: Three Tips for Maximum Exposure

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YouTube is becoming one of the most popular places on the internet for marketers to get their message out there, either as part of a direct viral marketing campaign or as the result of someone picking up something of theirs and putting it online. With incredible viral capabilities and a huge inbuilt audience, YouTube should be your number one target as a viral video marketer. These three tips will help you get the most out of YouTube, maximize your viewers, and provide alternative revenue streams beyond your direct customers.

#1: Shoot for mass appeal, but don’t sell your core audience for it.
Every major viral marketing campaign starts with a small, dedicated audience. Whether you’re marketing shoes or sandwiches, you need to identify the big players within your niche and tailor your strategy for them. At the same time, make sure that your video will appeal to people outside that audience, either as part of a recommendation and viewing, or just by stumbling across it. This means giving it a title that will come up as part of organic YouTube searches, linking to your video from other blog posts, and making sure your promoting content that the wide majority of YouTube viewers can understand and enjoy.

#2: Explore advertising as well as direct sales.
The intended result of most viral marketing campaigns is to increase brand awareness and build sales, but that’s not always the reality. Fortunately, YouTube provides some useful tools to use if your viral marketing video is an awareness success, but not a sales monster. By using overlay advertising and on-page PPC advertising, you can gain indirect funds from your video. This is helpful if you’re not bringing in direct income but are experiencing a lot of page views.

Keep in mind that this strategy can be risky. YouTube uses Google’s intuitive page advertising, which bases text advertisements on the viewing habits of your users. Your advertising could be pointing people towards a competing service, so be sure to examine and analyze the financial results before you bet it all on this strategy.

#3: Don’t try to control your message.
When you aim for mass awareness, you’re undoubtedly going to get people that take your message the wrong way. At the heart of every viral marketing video is a truth that’s perhaps a little bit edgy, which is entirely why it appeals to so many people. In order to achieve real mass appeal, you often need to walk a tightrope between edgy and offensive, and it’s very possible that people may take offense to an edgy video. Remember that this will happen, that it often provides more exposure than a 100% positive response, and don’t try to control it. PR statements are useful, but they’ll never control a message that’s gone viral. Embrace positive feedback and exposure, let the negative people say what they want, and enjoy the positive effects of your video.