It’s true, video makes everything better — like how well your dealership is found, thought of, and engaged with online. Everyone knows that they should be making videos, but end up not prioritizing it because it’s kind of a pain in the ass. That’s understandable, but also a huge missed opportunity — so take a look at how impactful video can be to your sales, how you can start making them today, and how we can help.
Making Videos Will Increase Your…
1. SEO authority and visibility: Google’s job is to give searchers the best answer to any question, and their algorithm has started to rank YouTube results and webpages with video as the best (most helpful, useful, engaging) answer for many queries — particularly tutorial, how-to, review, and test-drive related queries. The more granular you get the more likely you will rank highly for long-tail, model-specific keywords — like this “2016 Honda Civic Keyless Access Setup” video we made starring our buddy HondaPro Jason.
2. Brand Awareness: Producing creative video spots — whether for traditional and/or digital platforms — will stick your brand name, and your USPs, in your audience’s collective mind. A spot we just ran for a dealer in the Chicago suburbs on broadcast TV, Facebook, and YouTube resulted in a 25% lift in direct traffic, the key indicator of increased brand awareness. That lift then correlated to an increase of 30 units sold YOY this past November. Here’s another spot currently running on broadcast and digital, which is too early to report on, but shows the kind of goofy, original ideas that will make people remember your brand.
3. Social media growth and reach: Video ads typically enjoy better engagement than static ads on social media (of course there are exceptions depending on the content / platform). In a recent paid social campaign we ran for a client on Facebook — consisting of both static and video ads — 85% of the total engagement came from video ads, even though video ads only represented 17% of the total spend. Another campaign we ran this past summer (see below) resulted in 67% more reach and 48% more clicks at half the cost.
4. Website engagement metrics: Having videos on your website keeps people on your website. We can definitively see the difference across many campaign landing pages — which we have launched and then added video to at a later date — where there are significant increases in Time On Page. The longer you can keep a user on your page — educating them about your vehicle, service, or offer — the more likely you are to ultimately convert them. For example, this simple landing page video explaining an offer campaign has resulted in 100+ leads.
5. Visits and Sales: Increased metrics and conversions ultimately lead to increased sales. Specifically, a Google report this month showed that videos targeting “[Brand/Make] + Reviews” and “[Brand/Make] + Specs” keywords were tracked to show an increase in actual in-store visits. Google advocates that video is a critical first moment of the online consumer’s buying journey, and being there for that first moment correlates to in-store visits within the week. (Google’s Study).
The best part is that each individual video — if properly syndicated, optimized, and distributed — can positively impact your SEO, Social, and Website all at the same time. You know what else is great news…?
Videos Are Really Easy to Make Now!
Everyone can make videos nowadays. They require no equipment (if you have a smartphone), no financial investment, and nearly no time at all. Look: I just made these three videos of myself at my desk in less than 10 seconds!
Me, as a dog!
Me, slowly realizing I’m beautiful!
Me, as a blue alien!
Are these three visual masterpieces the result of four years of training from my video production college degree, plus another five years of experience here at LDM working with a team of highly-trained creative professionals. No, I learned how to do this from a three-year-old: my friend “Baby Z”.
Baby Z is the King of Snapchat
Baby Z: My teacher, my inspiration
Puppy Z ? ?
My point is: everyone can now shoot and publish their own videos instantaneously. There is nothing stopping you from walking out onto your lot today and shooting a vehicle walk-around for every single new model on your lot — with only an iPhone, a smile, and your expertise — and then publishing them all to YouTube, Facebook, and your website to try and reap the rewards of all the metrics we discussed above.
That’s no joke. Our friend HondaPro Jason got his start by passionately following that formula, and has now amassed nearly 17 million views and over 70,000 subscribers to his YouTube channel. Same story with our Regional Manager, Allyn Hane AKA “The Lawn Care Nut”, who is also about to hit 70,000 subscribers by bringing his selfie-stick and lawn mowing skills to the web.
If you have the passion, the right content strategy, and the know-how to correctly optimize your videos for search engines — you can really get your face and brand name out there with nothing more than a phone. The only problem is…
Videos Are Really Hard to Make Now.
It takes a serious camera, script, and production team to make a winning video.
This is where the other shoe drops. Life isn’t all adorable baby snapchats and easy YouTube fame.
Look: bringing great content is only half the battle. Since we are all totally inundated with online videos now, we have come to expect great content and great production quality. If you don’t have the total package, if you’re not bringing superior value, people will scroll right on by because there’s always a better video right around the corner, and we can all make that snap-judgment immediately. It’s a harsh digital world.
Shaky video, bad audio, unbalanced color, and amateur editing will not only fail to draw viewers in, but will devalue your brand by leaving a negative impression. It’s difficult to trust a business if they don’t look professional.
Even content creators like Allyn and Jason — who get more slack since they are not brands trying to sell anything, just cool people educating their peers — have had to significantly upgrade their equipment over the past few years to keep growing their audiences. Flip through their YouTube channels and watch the evolution of them investing in wireless mics, camera stabilizers, and many post-production hours to keep their videos entertaining for our dwindling attention spans.
You need high-quality video to present yourself as a high-quality business. Shots like this from our LDM drone pilots go a long way ?
So, where does that leave us? We know that:
- Video is a sure-fire way to boost your marketing and sales
- You need the one-two punch of great content and great production quality to get results
- This all still sounds like a pain in the ass
This is where your friendly neighborhood creative digital partner comes in: LDM.
What Can LDM Do For You?
Me and our Art Director, Phil Bridge, talking about scripts and cameras and stuff, probably.
I feel like we have the kind of relationship now where we don’t have to give you the hard-sell, but just so you know: we have a full-service creative department of copywriters, designers, videographers, video editors, motion artists, and visual effects artists on staff. In short, that means we can make anything for you, and more efficiently (see: cheaper) than others in the industry because we don’t hire any outside vendors — our creative team does it all. Once produced, we then work with our SEO, Paid Search, Social Media, and CRO digital strategists to make sure you get maximum ROI impact out of each video across channels.
We partner with each individual dealership to create custom videos that work towards their goals, represent their strengths, and fit their budget. Having said that, we can break our video services into some general categories for you to get you an idea of what we offer:
Video Strategy Consulting: If you’re up to the task of shooting and editing your own videos, but want to make sure they make an impact online, our team can provide you with a custom content strategy (based on keyword and market research) that will be your guide on which video topics (models, features, USPs, offers, news) will get the most reach, visibility, and engagement. We will then teach you how to properly syndicate and optimize your videos for search engines (or do it for you!).
- Bonus Tips: We can also give you some recommendations for equipment that will work with your particular phone or camera to boost the quality of your audio and video.
Video Production: You want the A-Team making your videos? We’ll send our videographers, fancy cameras, and high-flying drones to make your dealership look awesome. Although we will completely customize your shoot for what you’re looking for, these are some commonly requested video types that have been effective for our clients.
- About Us: Let the world know why they should buy from you.
- USP: Breakdown a specific offer or perk you have that no one around you does.
- Walkaround: Make a salesperson a star and tour a specific model or model feature.
- Service: Show off how inviting and convenient your service department is to convert more appointments.
- Follow-Up: Go the extra-mile and add a personal touch by playing follow-up videos after lead submissions.
- HTML5: Add a video background to your homepage and “wow” online shoppers the second they arrive
- Event Coverage: Got something special going on that you want to record and share with your fans? Our team will capture all the excitement.
Creative Campaign: This is where we can really bring everything we talked about together for maximum impact. We’ll learn what makes your dealership special, then come up with a creative concept based on it that will make people love, remember, and shop your brand. We’ll script it, shoot it, strategically push it out across platforms, and then monitor your metrics to make adjustments on the fly.
Let’s Get to work 🙂
You know why you should make videos. You know how to shoot videos. So… are you ready to make some videos? Let us know what you have in mind!
