Why Goals are Important in Video Marketing (and Any Other Marketing)
Goals are incredibly important to your video marketing campaign. In fact, goals are important to any video marketing campaign. If you don’t know what you are trying to accomplish with a campaign, how can you determine whether it was a success or a failure?
Know Your Goals
Every video you produce should have an aim. Before you ever press the record button, plan out what you will do and what purpose it will serve for your business. It only takes a minute to sit down and think about this, but it can make all the difference for your company’s long-term success using video content marketing. How are you trying to make viewers feel? What do you want them to do when they finish watching? You should have direct answers to these questions before moving forward.
Executing a video marketing strategy can be a fun, creative experience. But your business needs results. Goals help us prove how effective a campaign is. They keep us focused and push us to succeed. So, let’s begin with the end in mind. What needs to happen for you to consider this a successful endeavor? Sales, leads, impressions, and brand recognition are all legitimate answers, but for these goals to be truly successful, our goals must be grounded in reality. That is why you don’t just need goals, you need SMART Goals.
SMART Goals
We recommend setting SMART goals for all of your marketing efforts. Smart goals are:
- Specific (the goal is clearly understood)
- Measurable (the goal and progress toward it can be measured)
- Achievable (the goal is realistic)
- Relevant (the goal aligns with your marketing strategy)
- Timely (a specific timeframe binds the goal)
For the sake of argument, let’s say your marketing goal is a bit ambiguous, like “I want to generate more traffic on my website.” On its surface, that seems like a good goal, but it’s unfocused. It doesn’t answer all the questions that will pop up when reviewing the campaign. What if you run an extensive video campaign, and the result is an increase in website traffic of 1%? Is that a success? What if your video marketing strategy takes four years to show a return on traffic? Is broadly increasing website traffic a relevant goal if most of your marketing takes place offline? This is a ‘more questions than answers’ situation.
SMART Goal Example
The SMART Goal is the differentiator that turns a soft and unfocused goal like “I want more traffic” into something that can be measured and push your campaign forward. Here is a SMART goal example of that vague goal example:
Example: Increase our average monthly web traffic from our YouTube channel by 50% by the end of 2019.
- Specific – There’s no mistaking (web traffic) what the goal is about.
- Measurable – Web visitors are easy to measure.
- Achievable – A 50% increase over a 12-month+ period is realistic.
- Relevant – Increasing web traffic from YouTube is a desired video marketing result.
- Timely – This goal must be achieved by the end of 2019. You put a definitive date on it.
Side by side, there is no question that the SMART version of our more traffic goal will provide a clearer picture of whether we achieved our goal and has created benchmarks that we can increase or adjust to make future goals.
SMART Goal Resources
There is any number of worksheets and articles on creating SMART Goals. We made one for you (Google Doc or pdf). Whether you are creating a goal for a marketing plan or any other facet of your business or life, this technique can be a powerful planning tool. If you are creating a goal, make sure it is a SMART one.
Conclusion
For more on SMART Goals and other planning tips for your video campaign download The Video Marketing Strategy Blueprint available in pdf or on the web. This is a quick, actionable guide to planning or refining your video marketing campaign.
If you have any questions and would like to discuss more, feel free to shoot me an email at neil@vidwheel.com or set up a time to chat.
Neil K Carroll
Owner
I was your average small-town video guy, but when the pandemic hit, everything changed.
I ran a traditional video production agency with exclusively local clientele, a downtown studio, and a busy schedule. My days were long, travel frequent, and life as I knew it revolved around producing video content for my clients.
Then everything changed. Schools and daycares closed, my professional life was disrupted, and I found myself navigating a new path. It was one of uncertainty, with no end in sight and no destination obvious, but it demanded flexibility and resilience.
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