4 good reasons professional services need video marketing

Director of Design and Digital, Jamie Wilkinson considers 4 reasons professional services businesses should be using video.

1. The statistics.
Cisco (the IT and networking company) estimate that 80% of the internet will be video by 2020. Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg has said his challenge in the coming 5 years is to prepare the platform for a time when just about all content on it will be video. We are heading for an era when text, and photos to some extent, will be superseded by video. It’s going to become the default tool for public communications – now is the time to get on board with video before it’s too late.

2. It’s engaging. 
How many people can say they go an entire day without watching some video on the internet? The video version of this article will get significantly higher levels of engagement and reach more people than the text version I’m currently typing. Similarly, every social platform reports higher levels of engagement for video than text and imagery – and most of us want MORE people to know about our services, so why wouldn’t you use the tactic which delivers exactly that

3. It’s a natural evolution.
Professional services companies are already promoting their expertise. We aren’t selling widgets so we need to find ways of demonstrating our expertise and knowledge – think professional breakfasts, functions and events which are run or presented by professional services sectors and companies. Video is the logical extension of that, but exposes the same content to a much bigger audience than you could fit at a breakfast. (And much more cost effectively as well!)

4. It’s easy.
The video above was produced in its entirety using an iPhone 6 – so not even the newest version of that particular phone. I used a $30 lapel mic for better audio, a $50 tripod to keep the camera stable, and that was all in terms of hardware. In terms of the apps used to create the content – Spark Post handled the imagery, Apple’s own iMovie was used to edit the content together, and I used a paid app called Teleprompter to help ensure I could deliver the script in a reasonable way. All in all, it took about 90 minutes to make. Obviously this quick and easy set up won’t work for every corporate communication (for that, you can always contact Purple!), but as an example of how you can get very reasonable results quickly and cheaply, hopefully it gives an idea of what’s possible.

Video is coming – and not just to tech startups or media companies: every sector can benefit from some visual video content. Given how slow professional services have been to this format of communications, you could be leading the pack if you get on board now.

Purple Director of Digital Jamie Wilkinson is a former BBC broadcaster and an expert in digital and social media content and management. Email Jamie.

Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash