YouTube is the second largest search engine in the world. 72 Hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every 60 seconds. It’s kind of a big deal. While there are thousands of hours of cat videos, make-up tutorials and lifestyle vlogs, YouTube is also a great place to build your supplement brand.
Here’s how to get started!
Why Video Content Marketing?
According to WordStream, “One-third of online activity is spent watching video.” If you’re not producing video as part of your content strategy, you’re seriously missing out. While blogs are great and an essential way of improving your SEO and discoverability, many people now would rather just watch a video than read a blog.
The key to good video content marketing is the same as the key to good content marketing in general: make good content.
In the “olden days” people would get their information and entertainment from traditional sources first newspapers, then radio and then TV. These media outlets were very tightly controlled. Joe Schmoe mom-and-pop shop owner didn’t have a way to easily reach thousands of people. It’s not like they had the money or resources to start their own newspaper/radio station/TV channel.
If you wanted to reach the masses you had to go through the media.
Advertising became big business for traditional media sources. The newspaper/radio station/TV channel would attract the audience and the advertisers would pay to get their ads in front of people.
Now and days though, literally anyone with the internet and a mobile device has the potential to attract thousands of eyeballs. Now Joe Schmoe mom-and-pop shop owner can be the media and the advertiser.
The key here is to keep in mind that in order to attract an audience you have to produce video content that people want to engage with. No one will be attracted to content marketing that is only advertising in disguise.
How do you know what kind of content your ideal customer wants to engage with? Well first you have to…
4 Steps to Building Your Supplement Brand on YouTube
1. Do Your Research
Just like when you’re starting any new project, the first step is research. Following through with or skipping this step can mean the difference between success and failure. There’s no way for you to know what kind of content your audience likes to engage with without researching your audience. It’s also important to find out what kind of video content works and what you’ll enjoy producing as well.
- AudienceFind out what channels your audience already watches. These don’t have to be channels about health/wellness or within your niche at all. It’s important to know what style of videos your ideal customer enjoys so that you can take inspiration from those. Do they like long or short videos? Do they like how-tos or listicles?To answer some of these questions you can ask your customers what YouTube channels are their favorite. You can even go into Facebook groups with demographics similar to yours and ask them for recommendations on YouTubers to checkout.
- CompetitionYou’ll also need to research your competition. Researching your competition is much easier than researching your audience. All you need to do is search a few of your own target keywords on YouTube and see who else pops up. The first few results are who you’re trying to beat.Do a bit of digging. Visit these channels to find out…
- What types of videos they produce
- How often they post videos
- What their production value is
- How many followers they have
- Popular Channels
The third step you need to take in your research stage is really look into popular channels. You’ve probably watched hundreds of hours YouTube videos without actually analyzing a single minute. Now it’s time to actually figure out what makes a video good and what makes a channel popular/successful.For research purposes though it’s time to actually figure out why you like certain channels/videos. You need to know:- What they do well/poorly
- How do they edit their videos
- What is the look/feel of their channel
- Which videos are their most popular
- How do they interact with viewers
2. Create Good Video Content
Once you’ve done your research, it’s time to create. You should already know what types of videos you’re making and what your content will like so now you just have to put it into action. Put together a list of videos you’re going to make and get to work.
Remember that your videos don’t have to all be about supplements. Earlier we talked about how content marketing makes you both the media and the advertiser. A supplement company doesn’t only show ads during shows that are about supplements. But a supplement advertiser would probably do well running ads alongside a show about health and wellness.
Another tip for creating good content that your audience will actually want to watch is create content that you want to watch. It’s always a bad sign when you get bored watching your own videos.
If you’re not creating good video content you’re wasting your time. At the same time, your first few videos are probably not going to be Oscar worthy, if you know what I mean. Do your best to produce the highest quality video you can. There are plenty of free tutorials on how to properly shoot and edit YouTube videos.
3. Optimize Your Videos for SEO
This has already been said, but it’s worth repeating: YouTube is the second largest search engine in the world. And just like your website, your Amazon listings, your blog, etc. your YouTube videos need to be SEO optimized.
This means you have to do your keyword research just like for any other content. You’ll then create videos around these keywords. It’s important to incorporate your keywords into the video title, description and tags.
Optimizing your videos is essential for a successful YouTube strategy. It’s how people will find your videos! Again if you need to sneak a peek at your keyword competitors, that’s a good place to start. See what they’ve done to rank for that particular keyword and then do it better.
4. Stay Consistent
Consistency is one of the most important factors of creating your YouTube channel. Be consistent with
- Quality
- When you post
- How often you post
- The types of videos you post
Viewers like consistency, who doesn’t. If you say you’re going to post a new video every Wednesday, then do that! Also it’s ok to have different types/styles of videos but if every video is a different style it could be really difficult to create and keep an audience.
And of course keep the quality of your videos consistent. It’s ok for your videos to get better in quality (that’s a good thing) but going the opposite direction can hurt your branding and reputation. If your videos are cheap and all over the place people might assume your supplements are of the same quality.
Introduction to Advertising Your Supplements on YouTube
Growing your channel and building up an audience isn’t the only way to gain attention for your supplement brand on YouTube. Advertising on YouTube is another great way to build your brand. There are 6 different types of ad formats that YouTube has to offer. This variety means that you have a lot of options to choose from.
YouTube Ad Format Options
1. Display Ads
If you want to reach desktop computer users, who tend to be older, display ads might be something you want to check out. According to Instapage, “Display ads on YouTube display advertising appear to the right of a video player in the corner of the screen, and they’re only available for advertising on desktop. They come in multiple sizes and formats like image and animation, but none support autoplay sound to keep from interfering with the video player.”
2. Overlay Ads
According to Strike Social overlay ads are, “an online billboards of sorts. These are generally static images or have very minimal movement and animation to them. They appear either to the side of the video or as an overlay on the bottom of the video. They’re good to include in your YouTube advertising mix because they’re less expensive than other ad forms like those that appear before or during videos.”
3. Bumper Ads
Instapage says, “YouTube’s bumper ad is a six-second, unskippable video ad that plays before a YouTube video. It is one of YouTube’s six different advertising formats. Due to their short length, bumper ads are best for creating brand awareness and reach.
In contrast, ad formats like overlay ads, skippable, and non-skippable video ads are better for longer ad spots that dive deeper into product features and benefits.”
4. Skippable & Non-Skippable Video Ads
YouTube recommends using skippable, in-stream ads, “when you have video content you’d like to promote before, during, or after other videos on YouTube and across websites and apps running on Google video partners.”
As for non-skippable ads they recommend that you use non-skippable ads, “when you have video content you’d like to promote before, during, or after other videos on YouTube and across websites and apps running on Google video partners and you want viewers to see the entire message without skipping your video.”
5. Sponsored Cards
Strike social says, “One of the newer additions to YouTube’s ad arsenal is the sponsored card. How it works is that users will see a brief “teaser” for the sponsored card. After a few seconds, the teaser is replaced by a card icon. Appearing in the upper right-hand corner of the video they are currently watching, the icon gives users the choice of clicking through to access further information about the sponsored content. In that sense, it is similar to display ads except where it’s located and how it functions differs slightly. The commonality among them is the ever critical call-to-action.”
6. Mid-roll Ads
Mid-roll ads include skippable and non-skippable video ads in the middle of a video. You could think of it like you have a captive audience. If someone is already in the middle of watching a video they’re most likely going to finish watching that video and won’t click away. On the other hand some watchers really despise mid-roll ads despite the fact that they’ve simply become part of the YouTube landscape. Give it a try and see if it works for you!
The Takeaway
YouTube is a great place to build your supplement brand. It’s the biggest video watching platform in the world and has the potential to attract millions of followers. Not only that you can use your YouTube videos as content in other areas of your marketing as well.
You’re free to get creative and that can help you attract an audience that will love you, your supplement brand and your products. So what are you waiting for? YouTube is waiting for you!
Read: What You Need to Know About Email Marketing