Five ways to distribute your online video content (besides uploading them to YouTube)

“If you build it, he will come.”

The words of the mysterious voice in the 1989 movie Field of Dreams continue to echo throughout the credit union industry twenty five years later, specifically when it comes to building digital channels.

There’s just a slight adjustment to the quote: “If we build it, they will come.”

“If we build a website, they will come.”

“If we have a Facebook page, they will come.”

“If we produce online videos, they will come.”

While it is quite possible that each digital channel can suffer poor execution due to this flawed philosophy, it’s this last point that I would like to focus on.

Just Because You Use YouTube Doesn’t Mean You Will Get Views

As more credit unions start to explore online video as a method to market to specific consumer segments, the strategy in which these videos are distributed must be discussed.

There’s a stat that many marketers like to use in an effort to demonstrate the validity of needing an online video presence, specifically when it comes to YouTube.

“YouTube is the number two search engine, just behind Google,” they say.

That’s a true statement. But when I hear it, my immediate rebuttal is, “But are consumers searching for your credit union on YouTube?”

There’s a pause as people consider this counterargument.

I continue. “While your credit union might have a few videos, are consumers actively searching for your financial institution on YouTube? Or are they searching for the next Taylor Swift video? Or the latest cat clip? Be honest with yourselves.”

At this point, people begin to understand that just because a credit union has a YouTube channel with a few videos doesn’t necessarily mean these videos will get views. Now let me modify the words of the voice from Field of Dreams: “If you build it, they may not come.”

This is where having a distribution strategy comes into play.

Online Video Success Begins by Developing a Strategy

The production of online videos requires a strategy, which should include the methods of distributing these videos. Otherwise, it’s like a cook preparing an intricate seven-course meal without having a waitstaff to serve the food.

The most common mistake I see credit unions make is that they upload their video to YouTube and stop there. Their distribution plan has been completed and another task has been checked off the list.

But when a video is uploaded to YouTube, it is not the end, but the beginning of the distribution process. Because unless you have built a large base of subscribers to your YouTube channel, which most likely isn’t the case, these videos will be alone in a vast sea of digital content.

Like any other piece of your content marketing efforts, you need to drive consumers to your online videos. Here are a few methods to explore when developing a strategy to distribute them.

• Embed them on your website. Sometimes overlooked, embedding videos on a credit union website provides a quick way to distribute your video. But look beyond the home page. For example, if you have a short educational video about the home buying process, embed it within the mortgage section of your website.

• Send emails. A marketing research firm found that if an email included a link to a video, click-through rates increased 2-3 times. While you can drive them directly to the page on which your video is hosted, I would suggest you instead create a landing page specifically for the video. This ensures that your audience is not distracted by the other content on the video hosting site. Furthermore, a study by Eye View Digital found that using video on landing pages can increase conversion by 80%.

• Upload them to your social media channels. Use your existing social media channels as another method to distribute your video content. But when doing so, think about the intended audiences of these videos. For example, if one of your online videos highlights your credit union’s business services, it may perform better in your LinkedIn networks versus your Facebook page.
• Explore YouTube ads. This is a relatively new frontier. YouTube allows for very targeted messaging based on general demographic data, such as age, gender and location. So if you have a video with a targeted message for a specific market segment, exploring YouTube ads could provide you with additional way of distributing your video content. And while we have written about why financial institutions should turn off YouTube advertisements, this shouldn’t preclude you from exploring this avenue.
• Reuse them in the future. Part of an effective content marketing strategy is to reuse previously generated content. While this is not applicable for time sensitive messages, evergreen video content can be reused and redistributed over time. One of our clients has implemented this strategy. On their Facebook page, this credit union has recently been reposting videos from a two-year old educational series along with tailored messaging written around the approaching holiday season. And people have been commenting on these posts, despite the fact that the credit union had previously published the same videos on their Facebook page a few months ago.

Prove Your Video Distribution Works

One of the most glorious attributes about digital marketing is that consumer actions are measurable. And these metrics allow for a better understanding and refinement of these digital processes, including online video distribution.

Once you begin to employ the above tactics in your video distribute strategy, begin to review the analytics and see how consumers are behaving in regards to each of these methods. Improve the processes along the way to find further success in a digital economy.