Video marketing is all the hype nowadays.

Digital marketers will not spare you an earful of how beneficial it is for marketing your business.

With websites and social media platforms making available more video formats than we’ll ever need, this trend has been on the rise for the past seven years or so. And it’s not going away anytime soon.

So, you want to cash in on what helps increase your brand presence and conversion rates, but where do you start?

Common Misconceptions About Video Marketing

If this is your first time using video marketing for your business, the ideas in this article could help you see things from a different perspective, so you know what to look out for and discuss when you hire an agency for your marketing.

Without further ado, here are the four tips in no particular order:

1. Marketing is a Gamble

Any person that tells you otherwise is either lying or twisting facts to get your money. Unless he/she is a psychic, of course.

But as far as we know, no marketing tactic can guarantee results.

You can’t guarantee an ROI (return on investment) even if you spent a whole year working out the best-laid plans.

Because while you were busy planning, the markets have changed, technology has changed, trends changed, and people changed.

Sure, you can make predictions and gather data to confirm these predictions. And you can plan ahead – and you should.

But all of this is just a means to minimize the risk, and (hopefully) maximize the returns.

You can never know how people would react to your marketing. There are too many variables.

From your product itself to the location and platform. Everything affects how people perceive and react to your marketing efforts.

So yes, marketing is somewhat a gamble.

Nonetheless, it can be a measured gamble. And that’s what you want to focus your energy on.

Because although you can’t guarantee how people would react to your marketing, better planning can help you strategize and streamline your marketing efforts so that you’re not wasting your money on random shots in the dark.

Whether it’s video marketing, email marketing, social media, or paid ads, taking the time to research and plan can help you ensure that you’re communicating to the right audience that is more likely to respond favorably to your message.

2. Video View Count Doesn’t Matter

Nowadays, you can hire video creators for less than $100 on websites like Fiverr and Freelancer to make videos for your business.

Or if you’re on a very tight budget and eager to learn, you could even make your own videos.

The creation and distribution tools are available and accessible for everyone with an Internet connection.

But the point isn’t just making video content for views.

The point of making marketing videos for your business is to achieve a specific goal. Otherwise, it would be a waste of your time and money.

So, while view counts may matter to some fantastical algorithm in the Google cloud, and while it may psychologically nudge the needle in your favor, it certainly isn’t worth sweating over.

Instead of view counts, what you should be more concerned about is whether or not your video achieved the desired result.

For example, let’s say your video invites viewers to go to your website and subscribe to your mailing list — how many of the viewers actually did go to your website, and how many subscribed to your mailing list? That’s what you want to measure.

You could use free tools like Google Analytics to find this data.

Point is, it’s not the views nor the likes that you should be pursuing. What’s important is that you specify the goal you want your video(s) to achieve, and you create your video to serve that goal.

3. More Content is Not Always Better

Who came up with the idea of filling the Internet with junk in the name of marketing? Because that’s exactly what’s happening nowadays.

There’s more spam than ever before, and there’s no way to clean it all up.

Worst part? Many digital marketers will try to sell you the idea that more is better. They want you to become a co-conspirator in this elaborate junk-dropping scheme.

Video marketing can bring great results, but uploading more video content blatantly does not equate to better results.

Maybe that strategy worked when online streaming first started, but doing it today will only drive your brand down the drain faster than Roddy in Flushed Away.

As a business, you don’t want to share useless content that labels your brand as spam.

So, before you set a goal of filming yourself in your car on your way to work every day, ask yourself would you be interested in watching that video?

Is what you’re talking about interesting enough for you to listen to?

If it’s not, then maybe you should leave that content for your personal social media accounts.

4. Every Business is Unique

People will try to sway you in one direction or another.

You’ll hear about success stories from other businesses and entrepreneurs who used certain types of video content for their marketing.

You might have even seen competitors increasing their sales and brand loyalty through certain video campaigns.

It can be very tempting to follow in their footsteps and recreate the same content under your brand.

But at the end of the day, your business and your circumstances are different. What worked for them isn’t necessarily going to work for you.

Even if two coffee shops on the same street are selling the same coffee, the circumstances are different. The needs are different.

Maybe one shop has a charismatic barista that’s winning people over on social media, and the other doesn’t.

That alone can be a huge marketing advantage.

Some behind-the-scenes footage and self-shot videos featuring the sociable barista could attract visitors and followers.

Meanwhile, the other coffee shop might have to hire professional talent and a video production company to make engaging marketing videos.

When it comes to video marketing, always play to your strengths.

Weigh in your advantages over your competitors, as well as your weaknesses, then make videos that emphasize your strengths and unique selling propositions.

Entrepreneurs and micro-businesses, for instance, could find more benefit in making personal unpolished videos, while organizations or brands that aspire to grow bigger in the future could do more harm to their brand by making low-quality videos.

Read more: How to Create Marketing Videos to Grow Your Brand

The Bottom Line

Video marketing is trending, and video content is on the rise. It’s also becoming increasingly easier to create and broadcast video content to millions of people around the world.

And that’s precisely why as a business, you want to make sure that the content you create and distribute to all these people is well-thought-out and reflects your brand’s image and values.

This is especially crucial for businesses on a tight marketing budget.

You want to invest your money in marketing videos that would at least add to your brand’s goals in the long run, even if they weren’t successful in achieving your short-term goals.