12th March 2014

How to Use Short Videos to Position Yourself as a Thought Leader

Everyone has learned over the past few years how important it is to utilize social media networks in their marketing strategy.  We are currently seeing a rise in the popularity of online video as a platform for influencing brand perception as many brands and companies are incorporating video into their website or by sharing them through social media.

Simultaneously, we have seen LinkedIn evolve from essentially a “Facebook for Professionals” to a platform through which brands and executives position themselves as thought leaders in their space.  LinkedIn allows you to post multimedia, and LinkedIn is also optimized in online search results which is another reason it is so important.  Maximizing the utility of LinkedIn should be a focus when thinking about using video to bolster your position as a thought leader.

You are probably sharing articles and participating in group discussions already, but now is the time to start incorporating video as well.

Explainer Videos

Teach the user how to do something or explain a complex concept relevant in your space.  Explainer videos are not limited to how your product or service works.  In fact, they can be a terrific way to position yourself as a thought leader in the space by tackling a topic relevant to your target audience that is not directly related to your offering.  This demonstrates that you understand who they are and what is important to them.

Ultimately, they are more likely to believe that you know how to deliver the product or service you are offering if they believe you truly understand their concerns and priorities as a buyer.

Share and Optimize for Search

Push this video out through your social media channels.  Adding video to your landing page is a great first step, but put the video you’ve worked hard to produce in front of the people you want to see it as a way of drawing them to your website in the first place.  All of the social media platforms (LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, et al.) you use to communicate with your customers are a good place to include video as a means of drawing visitors to your site.

Optimize your video for search engines using strategic meta descriptions and hashtags.  Make sure the pages where you are posting the videos are optimized as well.  The video you produce is only powerful if it reaches your audience.  You’ve done the hard part already and created some great video content, now make sure you position it to generate as many inbound leads as possible.

Ultimately, whether through explainer videos or other video ideas we’ve mentioned previously  in last week’s blog,  the key is to make sure you are communicating something about your expertise rather than your product.  Show your audience that you understand them and their challenges, and they will come to view you as someone who might have something worthwhile to offer because you’ve established that you understand where your solution fits into their world.

So go produce some new videos that position you as a thought leader in your space, and don’t forget to make sure it reaches the right audience!

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About the Author

Anish hails from London and holds a degree in software engineering from the University of Manchester. Following his education, he worked for several years in the financial industry as a platform administrator before founding Revolution Productions in 2008. In addition to over seven years of video production, Anish is seen as an industry professional, adding his insight in publications such as VentureBeat, ReelSEO and Wistia.

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