The archer narrowed his eyes against the glare. Two hundred feet away, were six targets. He almost laughed. Longbows could send arrows anywhere between eight hundred to a thousand feet, depending on the weight of the arrow.
And, of course, the archer. The King, his favourite nobles, and their women sat in the small grandstand on one side of the field.
On the other side, a raucous crowd of villagers jostled for space. Flags and bunting snapped in a breeze laden with the aroma of hot pies, ale, unwashed bodies, and sweating horses. Someone tapped the archer on his shoulder. He turned to see the grinning face of one of the King’s Guard.
“Archers ‘ave to wear these ‘round their eyes,” the guard said, holding out a thick, black scarf. “Make’s it fair, like. See?”
Any advantage Robin Hood had was gone. He’d be blind. There’d be no splitting anyone else’s arrow in half today. “Should have stayed in the forest,” he muttered.
It’s all very well being the best in the business and having fabulous marketing videos to prove it. But, if you don’t hit the target, it’s not going to matter.
To hit your target audience, there are two things you need to discover before unleashing your creativity: Who your audience is, and to which social media platform do they gravitate.
- Know your audience The more you know about them the better. Here are the ‘Super Six’ pieces of information you need to start with.
o Demographics (Global) – Age Range, Male / Female, Professions, Where They Live
o Geographics (Regional) – If they live in on the coast, adding coastal or sea-related imagery will probably attract them more than pictures of the Autobahn, for example. Locale can also provide information on Culture, Local Customs, and Preferences.
o Psychographics – Interests, Motivations, Personalities, and Values
o Aspirations, Motivations, and Pain Points – It’s no good trying to sell Lear jets to people who are struggling to pay school fees.
o DISC Personality Traits – Dominance, Influence, Steadiness, and Conscientiousness. How your potential customers communicate, make decisions, and interact.
o Behavioural Characteristics – Content Consumption Habits, Online Engagement Patterns, Purchasing Decisions
- Know which social media your audience visits the most.
While you may loathe social media, stats show that over 78% of companies use social media successfully.
How do you discover on which platform your audience hangs out?
Using the platforms’ native audience insight tools, is the perfect place to start. If you’re selling cat food, you need to know which platform cat lovers visit the most when filling the seemingly endless void that watching cat videos fulfils. Knowing who the pre-eminent online cat expert is wouldn’t hurt either. Examining which platforms deliver the best reach, and impact, to your specific audience is vital.
Armed with this information, the next thing to know are the specs required by the video platforms.
Here is a comprehensive guide to 3 platforms on which you can upload your marketing videos.
- YOUR WEBSITE The first place your videos should go is your website as this is your digital store, right? The temptation to have the highest quality, i.e. 8K videos, is high. But download times are important. If it takes too long, users will move quickly to another website.
Here are the parameters for Website videos:
Duration: It’s your website, they can be any length you like. But users are busy, they want information quickly. Don’t waste their time. Shorter videos perform better than long ones.
Make sure your videos work smart – create videos that can be viewed on your website, Linkedin and You Tube, for example, without you having to create different version. The following are WordPress requirements. But it’s better to embed your videos directly from You Tube for better SEO, loading speed, and storage requirements. This will improve your website’s overall performance and UX.
File Size: Max 1GB
File Type: MP4 (preferred)
Frame rates: Any
Bit rates: 8MBPs for 1080p30, 12 MBPs for 1080p60 are recommended
File Resolution: 1080p – Max 4k
Aspect Ratio: 16:9
Known as the premier global social-networking platform for business professionals, Linkedin has also become a global marketplace for those professionals to showcase their products and services. It’s no surprise then that a rise in video content is being uploaded by its members. A marketing video on Linkedin is speaking directly to decision makers in other organisations. Here are the parameters for Linkedin videos: Duration: An absolute minimum of 3 sec.
A maximum of 10 minutes when uploading from LinkedIn’s mobile app.
A maximum of 15 minutes if you’re uploading from your desktop
File Size: Min 75KB – Max 5GB
File Type: AAC, ASF, FLV, MP3, MP4, MPEG-1, MPEG-4, MKV, WebM, H264/AVC, Vorbis, VP8, VP9, WMV2, WMV3
Unsupported File Types: AVI, QuickTime, MOV
Frame rates: 10 FPS – 60 FPS
Bit rates: 192 KBPS – 30 MBPS
File Resolution: Min pixels 256 x 144 – Max pixels 4096 x 2304.
File Resolution for Linkedin Stories: 1080 x 1920 pixels.
Aspect Ratio:
Video: 1:2.4 – 2.4:1. Square: 1:1 Portrait: 9:16
- You Tube
When it comes to business, You Tube is one of the best platforms on which to showcase your videos. It’s also the world’s second largest search engine after Google. And the largest gathering of a diverse audience in the world. Because YouTube is owned by Google, views on You Tube will push your ranking on Google up higher.
Here are the parameters for You Tube videos:
Duration: You Tube Shorts: A minimum of 15 seconds and a maximum of 60 seconds. The 60 seconds can be 4 different clips of 15 seconds each. Using music from the You Tube catalogue will limit the length of your video to 15 seconds.
Normal You Tube Videos: For major impact, it’s probably best to aim for 1 to 2 mins as your minimum. If you are wanting to upload longer videos, your You Tube account will need to be verified. When it is, you can upload videos up to 12 hours long. Not a great idea though. There’s unlikely to be enough popcorn in the world to keep a potential busy customer glued to a video for that length of time.
File Size: Max 256 GB
File Type: MOV, MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, MP4, MPG, AVI, WMV, MPEGPS, FLV, 3GPP, WebM, DNxHR, ProRes, CineForm, HEVC (h265)
Frame rates: For film source – 24 fps or 25 fps. Usually frame rates are 24, 25 or 30fps. Bit rates: 50 – 80Mbps
File Resolution: 1920 x 1080 pixels, 3840 x 2160 pixels, 7680 x 4320 pixels. However, in 2022, You Tube began removing support for playback at resolutions between 4K and 8K.
Aspect Ratio: 1:1, 2:3, 3:2, 4:5, 9:16, 16:9. 16:9 is the preferred full screen landscape size.
While there are many platforms on which you can post videos, we know you’ll find these three useful. And if it’s too confusing for you to navigate, give us a call and we’ll handle it all for you!
Which social media platform do you consider the best marketing tool and why? Let’s know in the comments below. We’d love to hear from you.