151 Guerrilla Marketing Ideas :: Video

Today's Low-cost, High-impact Marketing Ideas focus on Video.

For the full list of ideas, organized by category, check out this post.

1. how about making a video/ commercial on youtube, with the right tags you're guaranteed to get views and visits
   
2. Sell more than handmade items. Use video to sell your story.
   
3. I am actually planning to vlog some craft tutorials to attract some traffic
   
4. If the way your create or sell your product would be at all interesting to watch - create and post Youtube videos about it. Humorous commercials will get you attention here too!
   
5. I've also thought about selling video beadweaving tuts for download.
   
6. You can show people your products and services by posting videos to your website, blog, social networking sites, etc
   
7. There is a website call animoto.com that allows you to upload images to their site, and they have some software that creates the video for you.
   
8. I have done a couple of videos of the things that I make.

As mentioned in this post, the ideas in this post came from my snippets of ideas saved from Etsy forum posts over the last year. If you provided an idea listed here, please comment and I'll credit the idea to you with a link to your shop, ok?

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What will you show us in your video?

Last week you learned how easy it is to put video in your blog. Have you need wondering what you could do with it? ...or were you even wondering why I told you in the first place?

Imagine you're at an art fair or visiting an artisan's village. You wander from shop to shop, marvelling at all the wonderful things for sale. Some shops have the items displayed on shelves for you to look at, other shops have items on tables that you can pick up and examine more closely.

A few shops feature the artist at work. They talk to the growing crowd about their equipment, supplies, and technique, and look like they're genuinely having fun as they create more of the same art they are selling. It's fascinating to watch them work and explain the process, both technical and creative. As you watch them work, you notice there is always a crowd around their shop and the cashier is very busy, constantly ringing up purchases. After watching for a while, you decide you like this artist, their style, their sense of humor, and you just have to have one of their items. Not only because you love the item itself, but you are enjoying the complete experience of how your item came to be.

You buy the best piece in the shop and bring it home. The next time the art fair comes around or the next time you visit the artisan's village, you look for the same artist to see what new items they are selling this time. You also recommend friends to check them out and talk about your experience.

So now let's think about your business.
Is it a blog? Do you have an Etsy shop? Is there something you would do differently if you were selling to your customers in a shop, face to face?

You could create that same artisan environment with video on your blog. Invite your readers into your studio, office, or other workspace and introduce yourself.

For those of you with an Etsy shop, you could show off different techniques you use. Hint: this will add value to your work once your customers see how work intensive/detailed your craft is, or how much skill goes into creating your pieces. You could also do a regular video series regarding your studio or shop - why not have your customers ask you questions and you dedicate a 2 minute video to answer each question, and run this as a regular weekly series?

You could also show off the process you need to go through to create a piece of your work.

How about showing video highlights on new items in your shop?

Or... show us your muse, so to speak. How about a video of people or places that inspire your creativity?

Do you publish tutorials on your blog? Why not pair up a written tutorial with still photos with a video tutorial. Just watch a cooking show or Carole Duvall on HGTV to see how they plan their video tutorials. They're not that hard.

If your video really stands out because it's unusual (such as the couple having breakfast on their porch with their neighborhood deer,) or funny, very entertaining, cute, informative, or even maybe a little controversial it could circulate around the internet as a YouTube cult classic.

What else can you think of? Comment here with your big brainstorm - or share a link to your video so we can visit... and marvel at your cleverness!

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Incorporating Video Into Your Blog

Last week I posted a brief video of my car into this blog to show my friend Amador how easy it is to post videos online.

Today I'd like to share a quick how-to so you can post your own videos on your blog.

It's a lot easier than most people think. Like I said last week, I don't own a video camera.

Equipment Needed:
#1 - A digital camera that can shoot video. If you're not sure about yours, check the various shooting modes you have: close ups, scenery, action, flash, movies... Your shutter button may have a little movie camera icon on or near it.
#2 - A method of transferring images from the camera to your computer. Could be a memory card or a cable that hooks them together.
#3 - A computer with an online connection
#4 - A blog or other website where the video will ultimately be shown

If you're reading this, chances are you have #3 on the list. If you also have at least #1 and #2, then you're ready to start.

Ready?
First, decide what you will use for your #4 in the above list. It could be YouTube, but I'll be expanding on this concept in upcoming posts and to take advantage of all the great tips coming up, you may want to have your own site (or blog.) At the very least, you'll want a website or blog that will let you submit your video for all to see (other than You Tube.)

Step One: Choose your subject matter.
This first video will be your demo, so don't stress out about this.

If you want to be the star of your demo, set the camera on a counter or cabinet and step back so it can show your lovely face as you recite a short poem or sing a silly song. Actually, you could simply introduce yourself. That would be a short and sweet 15 to 20 second video perfect for your demo.

If you'd rather not be the star (I understand completely,) then find something interesting, be it a family pet, a tree in the yard, or a goofy kid.

Step Two: Shoot your video.
Don't make it too long, just 30 seconds to one minute is enough.
A little camera shake and wobbliness is ok for your demo. You're a real live human.

Shooting tips:

- Make sure you talk during the video to keep it interesting. Describe what you are shooting and explain something interesting or significant about your subject.

- Talk at a comfortable pace, not too fast, and speak clearly. Smile - people will hear it.

- You may want to plan ahead with what you will say to avoid dead space or overuse of words like "Ummm" and "Uh..."

- Make sure there is sufficient light for your viewers to see the subject.

- When moving the camera from one subject to another, move slowly. Rapid movements make viewers dizzy and disoriented with your scene.

Step Three: Upload your video.
If you can take the memory card out of the camera and insert it into a port on your computer, you can upload the video directly you YouTube.

OR - If you need to connect the camera to your computer with a cable, upload the video to a file where you can find it. You can upload it to You Tube from there.

Go to YouTube and either log in or sign up.
In the upper right hand corner, you should see a button that says Upload. Click it and follow the instructions to upload the video you just made.

Your upload will take a few minutes, depending on how fast your internet connection is.
When I upload videos, I notice that YouTube says to wait until I see a message telling me the video is done but it seems to take forever. Meanwhile, if I open a new window and go to You Tube, my video is there, ready to play with. You video may be ready before YouTube tells you it is - you may want to check on it in a new window after a few minutes.

Step Four: Embed your video into your blog.
Note: What blog would you like to post your demo video to? You may want to consider that at this point. Ok. Open that blog. Ready?

When you see your video, grab the code to embed it, and open a new post in your blog. Click to edit the HTML of the post, and paste in the code from You Tube. Add any appropriate comments and publish it.

Ta-dah!

Once you get the hang of this, you should be able to produce a great little video for your blog in about 15 minutes or less.

Coming up next: I've got some big ideas for you! Check back later this week to find out how you can use video in your blog to increase traffic and/or Etsy sales!

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Demo for Amador

Hi Amador,

Here's a little video to show you some of the features on the 2007 Chevy HHR.
Hope to hear from you soon.

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Video advertising

This morning, I saw an interesting email in my inbox offering a free video ad based on my own images uploaded to my uShops store. This is a brilliant idea. Merchants who take advantage of this free offer would be wise to post that video to their blog, website, social networking sites (such as MySpace, Facebook, Ning, etc.)

On a side note, check out the bottom of the email where you can share this email with various other social networking sites with just a few clicks. That's some very clever viral marketing.

Will I be making a video of Pass It On Plates? You bet.

Meanwhile, I'm intrigued by the links to del.icio.us, digg, etc at the bottom of the post. I will examine that further and talk more about it in an upcoming post.

Read on...

Hi,

Our mission is to help you sell online.

We, at uShops are excited to announce that we have partnered with companies to provide video ads to all shops. We think this will provide our users a great marketing opportunity to showcase their products in a interactive manner within their own community, websites , blogs or video sharing sites. More views will lead to exposure which will convert into sales.

For a pilot project, we are inviting your shop(and products) to be morphed into a online interactive video. If you choose, we will create and host a 30-45 second video of your shop (its products) and provide with you a link to post to any online site. We will post selected videos on the uShops blog as well.

Just send a email to shopAds@ushops.com and enter "I want my Video ad" in the subject to have your video sent to you by early next week (1st Sep 2008). By sending the email you give us permission to create video using your product images. We will need at least 5 products in your shop to be eligible for the video creation service.

BTW - This pilot service is free to use and you can post this video to as many site as you like.

Feedback , comments and other suggestions on this topic are welcome.

Thank you for using uShops
uShops Support team
http://www.ushops.com
Email: support@ushops.com

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