Best Places to Post Video Content to Drive Brand Visibility
In 2022, so many brands are struggling to compete for recognition online. For many businesses, it can seem impossible to stand out from the crowd. But adopting savvy video sharing practices to the right platforms can really give businesses a boost. Of course, knowing the best video sharing websites to post to, and how to optimize these posts, is easier said than done. That’s why this guide exists. It makes posting to video sharing platforms both easy and effective. Ahead is everything you need to know about the best video sharing platforms and making the most of them. The following advice applies to pretty much anyone who needs to know the ins and outs of video upload sites from a business perspective.
What Is Video Content Marketing?
Video content marketing is a broad catch-all term for the entire process of producing and proliferating videos that promote a brand. It applies to all kinds of videos and all sorts of marketing methods. Video content marketing is older than the internet, think TV commercials, but the internet has significantly broadened the ability of brands to use video content marketing effectively.
Many brands in the present day make a major mistake with their content marketing: they spend significant amounts of time focusing on the production stage and neglect the marketing stage. This leads to high-quality videos that fail to reach their consumers. Luckily, it’s entirely possible to rectify this issue, with a little know-how of video sharing platforms.
What Are Video Sites?
Many individuals will be able to name some of the most popular video entertainment sites, such as YouTube or Vimeo. But what people often fail to consider is that many other websites fall under this definition, even if they are not primarily marketed in this way. For instance, almost everyone online today has watched a video on Facebook, but few people would refer to Facebook as a video site. But the fact is that Facebook is an immensely popular video sharing website. In 2021, the site had millions of video uploads.
This also applies to other social media websites. Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn are all also video sharing platforms that most people neglect to think of as such. And there’s significant evidence to suggest that social media is becoming more video-centric. In early, 2022, reports stated that Americans were watching social media video content as much as traditional TV. Additionally, TikTok, a social media platform that is 100% oriented around video content, had 1.2 billion users in the fourth quarter of 2021 and is projecting 1.5 billion users by the end of 2022.
So yes, YouTube and Vimeo are video sites. But so are Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and many other sites that prominently share videos.
Why Video?
There’s no one reason for a brand to become more video-sharing savvy. Instead, there are many. The previous paragraph, which highlighted how social media is increasingly becoming focused on video, is just the tip of the iceberg.
In terms of producing videos, brands have more options than ever before, with production companies being able to offer a number of solutions at different price points. The same range of options exists in terms of marketing video content. With so many video-sharing platforms offering a number of marketing solutions, such as paid reach and influencer promotions, there’s no shortage of potential ways for a brand to get noticed.
And last but not least, the truth is that video content is a great way to reach customers. Everyone who has used video content marketing effectively knows this. Here’s the proof: Hubspot recently reported upon an exhaustive survey of hundreds of marketing professionals and online consumers. 92% of the marketers stated that video remains an important part of their strategy, up from 78% in 2015. The marketers made similar statements regarding the return on investment (ROI) of their video content, with 87% of marketers saying that video content had increased traffic to their website. In 2015, 55% of markers had stated this.
Any professional survey of video-sharing reflects the above statistics, proving that video content is a highly effective form of customer engagement. But of course, just having a video is not enough. You need to know what to do with them. Here’s how any brand manager can make this happen:
Before You Post - Analyze Your Video
Much of the nuance of video content marketing lies with assessing content and determining the best places for it to appear. So any brand manager or marketing professional needs to ask themselves some core questions relating to the function and target audience of the video. For instance, if the video is focused on introducing the company in general, then that informs where it should go. In this instance, strong places for the video to be posted include the homepage/about section of the brand website, on social media posts that are pinned to the top of profiles and on websites where customers are likely to find the business, such as directory sites.
A strong approach to take with this is to consider everything to be a potential video sharing platform. And that isn’t just restricted to the internet. If your brand is hosting an event, would it be possible to use the video in this context as well as online? If so, then there’s no reason to treat the event as anything other than a video sharing website. Just think about the best way to integrate the video within the activities of the event, such as at the opening stages of a presentation.
But as anyone who is reading this is likely to be specifically looking for video sharing solutions online, ahead is an overview of how to pick online content marketing platforms.
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The Top Video Content Marketing Platforms
When it comes to selecting platforms for effective video sharing, it’s a good practice to initially pick the most consistently used websites that your brand’s consumer base will use on a regular basis. Looking for ever more interesting video sharing platforms also makes sense. But almost every company will gain value by posting their content on a regular basis to the following platforms:
The Obvious Platforms
The Brand Website
Posting to brand websites ensures that existing customers will see the video. It also helps with branding consistency and acts as an easy place for a brand’s audience to find their videos, as long as the brand does a good job of maintaining the video content on their own website!
Of course, the brand website should never be the only place for video sharing. Instead, it should be regarded as the brand’s headquarters, with the other platforms being the places where the majority of customers hear about the brand for the first time.
The Brand’s Most Often Used Social Media Channels
For the majority of brands, this will be Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn. The biggest challenge with cross-posting to these obvious platforms will be ensuring that the messaging is consistent yet adapted to the specific niche of that platform. For instance, a post promoting video content on LinkedIn will likely have to be much more formal than a post on Facebook. Additionally, factors such as Twitter’s 280 character limit have the potential to disrupt branding consistency.
Any brand should have a presence on the world’s biggest video platform. It’s a site that reaches 2.1 billion people. Another way of stressing the importance of YouTube is the fact that not only is it the second most popular search engine on Earth, but it’s also owned by Google, the most popular search engine on Earth.
For many brands, it can be hard to establish an audience on YouTube, due to the sheer volume of content available on the site. In fact, a visitor to YouTube in 2022 can choose between 800 million videos. But consistent high quality posting will pay off.
Platforms That Are Great For Attracting More Site Visitors
In case you’re still on the fence about the effectiveness of using Facebook for video sharing, here’s another fact: 71% of Facebook consumers believe that video ads are relevant, meaning that they are being paid attention to. This shows that Facebook’s ad targeting has been particularly effective in removing one of the major worries that every brand manager has regarding their video content: whether or not their videos are getting attention.
As with all social media, brands have little control over the comments of others on Facebook. That includes comments on video posts. This issue is especially relevant for Facebook, however, as it’s the most popular social media platform today. Its paid advertising can also be costly because of its popularity.
Instagram is particularly great for “how-to” videos. In fact, 80% of watched Instagram videos fall under this category. And it’s highly likely that any brand can reach consumers on this platform. Every month, Instagram has more than 2 billion users, with 59% of the site’s users logging into the platform daily. Any brand would be foolish to ignore such a popular platform.
There are downsides to Instagram, however. For instance, business accounts on Instagram appear lower in user feeds. And as with Facebook, the advertising costs for Instagram are high.
Twitter may be slightly less popular than Facebook and Instagram, but it is still a great place to find new users for a number of reasons. Hootsuite’s research into Twitter shows that its users have higher than average incomes and 54% of Twitter users are likely to purchase new products. And that’s pretty incredible considering that Twitter is the 9th most visited website in the world. So even if it is less popular than Facebook or Instagram, it’s still hugely popular.
There are other limitations with Twitter. The 280 character limit per post is obvious. But brands with a more serious focus can struggle to stand out on the site. Marketing experts have described the site’s feel as being that of a “bar scene.” Brands with relaxed and fun focuses will find Twitter a more welcoming home than those that aren’t.
Some consider Tumblr to be fading out of relevancy. But the truth is that it’s still a popular platform. In 2020, the site managed to gain 327 million visits. This means that it’s still the 103rd most visited website in the world and 25th most popular site in the US. And like Twitter, Tumblr’s users tend to have high incomes, with 27% of 2020 US Tumblr users having an annual household income of over $100,000.
Technically, Tumblr’s future is in a state of flux, and it isn’t clear if it can continue in the long term. In 2022, the site’s future is slightly brighter than in 2019, when leading news websites claimed that Tumblr was dead. But in January, 2022, Tumblr stated that its revenue had increased 55% since July, 2021.
As a business directory, Yelp is naturally a strong place for brands to discover new customers. According to Alexa, In the US, Yelp is the 44th most visited website. And it’s also constantly improving the ways in which businesses can connect with potential customers. For instance, in 2021, it launched a new advertising platform, which boosted the ability for brands to reach customers across the web. Naturally, this makes it an essential place for businesses to host videos.
As with other platforms, there are issues with Yelp. For instance, it can be difficult for brands to remove their paid presence from the site, especially if the brand wants to remove this paid presence within 12 months of first signing up for this feature. And brands also have zero control over the reviews that users post of them.
Perhaps the most important statistic when it comes to video content marketing on Reddit is this: 47% of Reddit users are online almost all the time. This means that there’s more opportunity for brands to catch a Reddit user’s attention. And video content is growing on the site. In 2018 alone, Reddit’s video content grew by 38%.
Brands may struggle with posting to Reddit for a number of reasons. For instance, some Redditors are highly resistant to promotional efforts, and each individual subreddit, meaning group, on the site has its own rules for posting, so it can take a lot of work for a brand manager to make their posts adhere to the different group rules.
In 2019, Tripadvisor’s video content marketing possibilities received an upgrade, when it introduced sponsored content experiences aimed at high-intent travelers. The “Discovery Carousel” is the place where video content really shines with this solution. Then in 2021, the site introduced a Live Sentiment Dashboard to give businesses increased data intelligence. Of course, Tripadvisor won’t be relevant to every brand, but it’s incredibly helpful for connecting businesses that are focused on tourism.
As with Yelp, there’s no means for a brand to regulate the reviews that they receive on Tripadvisor. Additionally, the site has previously been plagued with fake reviews.
It’s a video sharing platform in a similar vein as YouTube. Some think that it’s unimportant, but it still gets a significant amount of traffic. For instance, current estimates state that it has between 132 million to 138 million site visits per month, meaning that it allows brands to reach a wide range of consumers. And, being a video platform, video content is naturally suited to Dailymotion.
However, some brands may find themselves frustrated with Dailymotion’s lower quality of functionality than more popular sites like YouTube.
This site has a global reach of 300 million people. Some may think that Imgur is less important for video content marketing than other platforms, but it’s worth noting that a number of brands have turned to the platform, such as Old Spice, Sony PlayStation and Ebay. Since 2018, the site has allowed videos, but the maximum length is 30 seconds.
Some brands may struggle to find an audience on Imgur, particularly those with an older consumer base, as 75% of the site’s audience is aged under 35.
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Where to Post a Video to Engage More Followers
As the world’s largest professional network, LinkedIn is the perfect place to engage people when they’re in a “business mindset,” meaning that they’re more likely to look for new opportunities. And video content performs incredibly well on LinkedIn. In fact, video posts are shared 20 times more often than other kinds of posts on the site. Video ads can also be highly targeted, with the site offering over 200 targeting characteristics.
However, some brands are put off by LinkedIn’s high advertising costs and its strict advertising rules.
Think of this as a more creative, high-end version of YouTube. Naturally, this means that videos that have higher quality visuals do best on the platform. One major advantage of Vimeo is that it doesn’t work on an advertising model. Instead, it makes money through paid memberships. The upside of this is that your own videos will never have a rival company’s ad playing before your video. It also has 260 million users.
The paid membership model may be a disadvantage for some businesses, as, unlike YouTube, users have to pay to store a higher quantity of videos on their accounts.
As mentioned earlier in this article, TikTok is set to grow from 1.2 billion users in late 2021 to 1.5 billion users by late 2022. The site literally revolves around video content, meaning that every single post is a video. And businesses posting their videos to the platform have seen results. In fact, 88% of TikTok users have purchased something that they saw on the platform.
TikTok does have some drawbacks, however. For instance, its organic analytics data only tracks for 28 days before becoming unavailable. So for long term tracking, that means that the data will have to be manually stored in a spreadsheet.
Basically, this is what Facebook considers to be its video on-demand service. Essentially, it acts as a version of its social media feed, except that feed is for videos that users are likely to find interesting.
There’s no way to specifically post a video to Facebook Watch. Instead, the site selects existing videos to post. These videos are also interspersed with ads.
It’s a blockchain-powered library of videos, music and all other kinds of content. The site also promotes itself as allowing publishers to create content without any risk of demonetization or other interference. Thanks to this, brands have more freedom to post whatever they want to LBRY, without being subject to regulations. Of course, that can also be a downside, with some sources highlighting that the platform could encourage extremism.
Where to Post a Video to Nurture More Potential Prospects
Marketing emails
Many email providers, such as Gmail and Outlook, don’t allow video to be directly integrated into individual emails. But there is a way to ensure that email can be used to reach your existing potential customers. One common solution is to save a frame of a video as an image and then place a video play button over that image. Then make that image a link to the video itself.
Instagram Stories
HubSpot recently discovered that 55% of marketers were planning on increasing their investment into Instagram Stories in 2022. This shows that Instagram Stories is a great place to get video content noticed. The videos posted to Instagram Stories are automatically deleted 24 hours after upload, making them ideal for brands to utilize for time-sensitive promotional activities, such as competitions or flash sales. On the downside, the analytics data of these posts are also deleted after 24 hours.
Pinterest’s video pins always stand out, especially as they’re almost always placed next to static image pins. The site is also incredibly popular, with 431 million active monthly users. And 85% of the site’s users say that Pinterest is their go-to place to begin new projects. The opportunity for brands in this instance is clear, as people who are starting projects will almost always need to make purchases. On the flip side, Pinterest’s scheduling and tracking software is somewhat basic and time consuming to use.
This article-based site allows video embedding, with users often utilizing video content to make their articles stand out. Medium also manages to gain 153 million visitors a month. And some brands have effectively used Medium to reach customers. Dropbox regularly posts medium articles and has over 202,000 followers on the site. Crowdfire also has a presence on the site and has 75,000 followers. However, one disadvantage of Medium is that it is lacking when it comes to lead generation, with the platform not having any specific lead generation tool that brands can utilize.
Within LinkedIn, there are many individuals who join specific Groups. Groups are exactly what they sound like, sets of individuals with certain professional interests who are all in one space. Many brands will employ individuals who are members of relevant groups, meaning that companies can post their videos to this space through their employees. It’s also possible to send ads to LinkedIn Groups. However, there is a tendency for some groups to become overly promotional, which can result in the majority of users avoiding these groups altogether.
Show Off Your Creativity on the Top Video-Sharing Sites
Now that you’ve gained a wide range of knowledge about the breadth of video-sharing platforms, consider how this knowledge can affect video production from the content creation stage. Video sharing is multifaceted. Videos can easily be tweaked to fit one platform more than another. For instance, if you’re shooting a video, you could make an effort to create a number of different versions, such as one that’s more relaxed and fun for TikTok and one that’s more serious for LinkedIn.
It’s also important to try out a wide range of different video formats for these platforms. You may find that animations perform much better on one platform than another. The same could be true for explainer videos, testimonials, product demonstrations and more. The key is to try a number of different approaches and then discover what works best on which video sharing platforms.
Conclusion
When it comes to branded content there’s no such thing as a specific best site to share videos. Different brands will find that some video sharing platforms are more suitable than others. They’ll also notice that what works on one platform will be different to what works on another platform. While the sheer variety of possibilities on offer may seem overwhelming at first, this is a good thing. In reality, brands in 2022 have more freedom to expand to new audiences than ever before.
The next step for brand owners now is to create a strategy for utilizing the many video sharing opportunities out there. This guide should have given you the building blocks for starting this process. Just remember: always look for new opportunities, and always look for ways to tweak your content.
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8 years experience in video production, video ads and building successful teams.
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