This is the era of video. From TikTok to YouTube to Netflix and Amazon on-demand. The barrier to entry is sitting at an all-time low for video marketing. Whether you’re a large enterprise brand or a small shop on main street both make a huge marketing impact with video. Follow these 7 steps to measure video marketing.

Market your business with video content.

Just because something is easier than ever doesn’t mean it’s necessarily the right fit or that it’s cost-effective for every business. It all comes down to ROI.

Like other forms of marketing, business owners must see a positive return on ad spend (ROAS) on their ad campaign costs. If you don’t, there’s a chance you’re wasting your budget.

Luckily, there are a few easy steps you can take to measure the ROAS of your video marketing campaign and determine whether or not this strategy is paying off for your business.

How to get started:

1) SET YOUR OBJECTIVES 

What action do you want people to take after viewing your video?

Never launch any type of ad campaign – video or otherwise – without having a clear understanding of your overall objectives. It truly is the most essential point in executing a successful campaign.

Objectives vary from business to business. You’ll want to evaluate your goals for every campaign you launch. It’s possible to launch a campaign this month to drive sales for a new product launch, and then next month, launch an informational campaign that educates and amplifies brand awareness.

Either way, if you don’t know your goals, you can’t measure your success.

Ultimately, a video campaign serves as just one piece in your conversion funnel. You’re probably using it as a small step in a larger strategy.  A true understanding of performance and ROAS starts by knowing what to measure. 

2) UNDERSTAND DISTRIBUTION METHODS 

Before you spend time and money creating an amazing video, know how and where you’re going to distribute it. This will inform other decisions you’ll make in ROAS measurement, such as how you analyze success across multiple channels.

There are a number of different places to share your video online and offline. The challenge comes when you try to track and measure each place you distribute.

If you’re just starting out, focus on the following four places. With each video you create you can build multiple assets tailored to the individual channel.

  • Your business’s YouTube channel
  • Your email newsletter
  • A page on your website (for example, a campaign-specific landing page)
  • Your social network profiles

Branch into new areas as your campaigns grows, but you’ll find that beginning with these four options will give you the best bang for your buck from the start and will meet the needs of most small businesses.

3) CHOOSE YOUR MEASUREMENT MODEL

Measure your video campaign ROAS using one of three models. Each has its own intricacies requiring various levels of depth. Let’s briefly review:

ABSOLUTE ROAS

When your video marketing campaign stands on its own, use absolute measurement. Doing so will give you insight into the video’s performance, independent of other media spend. With this model, you’ll track metrics like:

  • Cost per subscriber
  • Cost per purchase
  • Cost per download
RELATIVE ROAS

Relative ROAS focuses instead on your video marketing campaign’s performance compared to other media spend – for example, the success of a TikTok or YouTube campaign compared to the TV ads you run on a regular basis.

Although this is a more complicated type of measurement, using it will give you deeper insight into where and how to allocate your budget in the future.

ATTRIBUTION MODELING

Holy Grail of ROAS measuring. Unfortunately, it’s also one of the most complicated models in analytics. 

Basically, attribution modeling involves measuring the impact of your video on every individual marketing channel you use, as well as every stage of your buying funnel. It’s fascinating data to see, but the payoff for gathering it rarely justifies the complexity required to do so for small businesses. Our friends at Salesforce delve deeper here.

4) STRATEGIZE AN ANALYTICS SYSTEM

Your overall marketing campaign objectives and target metrics should ultimately drive your choice of an analytics process. Numerous analytics tools help small business owners evaluate the interaction of others with your video, allowing you to examine things like:

  • How many people watch your video to the very end.
  • At what point people stop watching your video (aka – your “drop off rate”), on average.
  • Demographics of your viewers.
  • Number of times your video is shared.

Each of these aspects provides insight you can use to plan future campaign developments based on your current success.

5) CONSULT ON A REGULAR BASIS

Once you’ve established the metrics you’ll be tracking and how you’re tracking them, find someone that can assist you in the measurement process. This isn’t a requirement in measuring ROAS, but it does make the process much easier.

We’re looking at simple steps in this article. And there’s nothing that makes complicated analytics simpler than a qualified professional who can work with you from initial setup to final review.

Even if you choose not to hire a professional consultant, it’s still important that you find ways to consult with your video production team on a regular basis. Reviewing the analytics may help you uncover changes and adjustments that need to be made to the campaign.

Spotting these early on can make the difference between a successful and unsuccessful video marketing effort.

6) MAKE NECESSARY ADJUSTMENTS

Unfortunately, nobody’s perfect. There’s always a chance that your first video marketing campaign will be more of a learning experience than a slam dunk (although big wins right off the bat aren’t totally out of the question).

It is likely necessary to make some adjustments along the way. This may come from advice provided by your production team or from insight you pulled from A/B testing a specific video or messaging component.

Regardless, it’s not something to feel bad about. It’s all part of the campaign process.

When you do make changes, make sure to clearly mark it in the data. You want to have the ability to explain any sudden increase or decrease, especially if it can be directly attributed to an adjustment you made in the middle of a campaign.

7) ANALYZE THE FINISHED RESULTS

Once you’ve finished running your video marketing campaign, you’ll want to conduct a final analysis of the results. Review the goals you set forth back in Step #1. Then, measure them against the relative metrics that you chose at the start of this process.

Hopefully, you’ll see a positive return on ad spend for your video campaigns. But that’s not always the case. When you take a loss, don’t just give up. Keep digging into the data and try to find ways that you can improve for future campaigns.

It’s all about testing and learning what works with your audience. That’s the only real way to see a consistent positive ROAS with video marketing over the long run.

For more help: 
5 Steps to Advertising your Product

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