If you’re running a small business, chances are you don’t have a big budget for marketing.
That’s why it’s important to be creative and get the most out of the resources you do have! If you’ve been following social media and internet trends in recent years, you’ve probably noticed that video is taking over and can be very effective for your small business.
One way to produce some really good content for your social media is by filming informational videos that can be turned into two weeks worth of social media content!
In this article, we are going to help you save time (and money) when it comes to producing social media content for your business. You’ll learn how to film and edit your video, and use it to create two weeks worth of eye-catching social media content!
Filming Your Video
Filming a video for social media sounds like a daunting task, but it doesn’t have to be! If you have a smartphone, you have everything you need to film a great video. We have a full article that goes into the details onhow to create and optimize a video for YouTube.
Here are a few quick tips to help you get started with filming:
Use natural light whenever possible. This will help your video look more professional. It will also help you look your best!
Plan out what you’re going to say before you start filming. This will help you stay on track and avoid rambling. If you are worried about not sticking to your script, try a teleprompter app.
Editing your video
Editing your video doesn’t take as long as you might think.
Canva is an awesome all-in-one tool that you can use to edit your videos AND create your social posts that we will talk about in the next step. Follow these quick tips when editing your video:
Start by trimming any dead space at the beginning or end of your video.
Then, upload the file to canva and add in any titles or text that you want to include. We recommend adding a title slide and ending slide that includes a call to action.
Finally, add some background music to your video. This will make it more engaging and entertaining to watch.
Envato Elements is a great resource to download background music for your videos.
Posting Your Video
Once you have edited your video, it’s time to post it on social media!
Another great place to post your full video is on your businesses Facebook page. This is a great way to get more views and engagement on your video. You can check out our Facebook page for inspiration and ideas.
You can also create shorter clips of your video to post on Instagram and Twitter. These social platforms are all about quick, snackable content that is easy to consume. So, make sure that your video clips are short, informative and to the point.
Turning Your Video Into Two Weeks of Content
To get the most out of the video that you created, you’ll want to turn it into multiple pieces of content for social media.
This is where Canva comes in handy again! You can use Canva to easily create images and graphics with information from your video that can be used for social media posts.
Creating content from your video will help you get more views and engagement on your video, and also help you reach a larger audience across many platforms, while saving you time.
Here are a few ideas on how to turn your one video into two weeks worth of content:
Day 1: Publish the video on YouTube and share it on your social media channels.
Day 2: Create a blog post about the video and promote it on social media. To make things even easier, useOtter.ai to transcribe your video and post the text as a blog.
Day 3: Create an Instagram story about the video and share it on your other social channels.
Day 4: Take a fun fact or quote and turn it into text with a picture that goes with it.
Day 5: Share some behind the scenes photos or videos on Instagram from when you were filming the video.
Day 6: Share a clip from the video on Instagram and link to the full video in your bio.
Day 7: Share a reminder to check out your blog post
Days 8-9: Create a social media challenge related to the video and encourage people to participate.
Day 10: Create a list post or promote free consultations, subscriptions, newsletters, or other lead magnets.
Day 11: Share interesting facts or comparisons as an infographic.
Day 12: Share another clip from your full video.
Day 13: Combine text and a visual image using a useful fact or statistic from your video.
Day 14: Share a reminder to watch your video on YouTube and link to the full video.
Schedule Your Posts Ahead of Time
Put your social media on autopilot by scheduling your content ahead of time! This will save you hours each week and help ensure that your content is getting in front of your audience on a regular basis.
We recommend using a tool like SocialPilot to queue up your content and post it for you automatically.
What Are You Waiting For?
Filming an informational video about your small business is a great way to create content that you can use for social media. Now that you know how to film a video on your smartphone, edit it, and turn it into two weeks of content, it’s time to get started! These tips will help you save time and money while still getting great results.
So, what are you waiting for?
Get filming!
If this process still sounds too time consuming for you, contact the social media experts at IFTS and we will get the job done for you! Call us today at 412-715-6266.
If you have been paying attention to social media and online trends over the past few years, you will have noticed that video is taking over. Video is one of the most effective ways to reach your audience, and it is only going to become more popular in the coming years.
In fact, most Facebook Ads that are videos out perform their image-only counterparts at a scale of at least 10 to 1.
As a small business owner, you may be thinking that video marketing is out of your budget or too time-consuming. However, there are many ways to incorporate video into your marketing strategy without breaking the bank or taking up too much of your time.
In this article, we will discuss why video marketing is so effective for small businesses and how you can take small steps to begin incorporating video into your marketing strategy.
Why should you as a small business owner invest your time in video marketing?
Video is an incredibly powerful tool for reaching your target audience. Video content is more engaging and easier to consume than text-based content, making it more likely that your target audience will actually watch and remember your videos.
But how do you know your customers really care about video?
In an effort to better understand how, why, and where customers did their research before choosing to support small businesses, Digital Marketer recently conducted asurvey.
When presented with the opportunity to watch videos introducing a business and/or showcasing its goods and services, 51 percent of customers stated they would be more likely to patronize that small business. Only 16 percent of those surveyed had the opposite opinion.
This insight proves just how important it is for small businesses to have a presence on platforms like YouTube, Instagram and Facebook, where videos are easy to find and consume.
Not only are potential customers more likely to watch videos about your business, but they’re also more likely than ever before to take action after watching them. In fact,four times as many consumers would rather watch a video about a product than read about it.
Whether you’re looking to increase brand awareness, drive website traffic, or generate leads and sales, investing your time in video marketing is a smart move for small businesses.
Is video marketing really that effective?
Yes! Video marketing is an incredibly effective way to reach your target audience as a small business. Here are a few reasons why:
Video is an engaging medium that can capture attention better than text or static images.
Did you know that humans process visuals 60,000 times faster than text? Video is a more engaging medium that can capture attention and hold it for longer than text or static images.
Not only that, but our brains are able to simultaneously process images, whereas our minds process words sequentially.
Why is this important? Information is easier to retain if it is easier to process.
Video allows you to tell a story and connect with your audience on a deeper level.
Video is the perfect medium for telling a story. A well-crafted story can evoke emotion and connect with your audience on a deeper level, which is essential for building trust and credibility. Clients are more likely to buy if they know, like and trust you.
Video is shareable, which means it has the potential to reach a wider audience than other marketing channels.
Get your best clients to do the work for you!
If you create compelling, informative, and entertaining videos, your audience will be more likely to share them with their friends and followers. This means your videos have the potential to reach a much wider audience than if you were relying on other marketing channels.
What Videos Can Your Small Business Make to Attract New Customers?
Now that you know why video marketing is so effective, you may be wondering what types of videos you should create to attract new customers.
Here are a few ideas:
Introductory Video
An introductory video is the perfect way to give potential customers a taste of what your business is all about. This type of video can be used to introduce your business, explain what you do, and talk about your unique selling points.
Product Video
A product video is a great way to showcase your products or services in action. This type of video can be used to demonstrate how your products or services work, highlight their features and benefits, and show off any customer testimonials you may have.
How-To Video
A how-to video is a great way to provide value to your audience and show them that you are an expert in your field. This type of video can be used to teach your audience how to do something related to your business, like how to use your products or services.
Customer Testimonial Video
A customer testimonial video is a great way to build trust with your target audience. This type of video features a satisfied customer talking about their experience with your business. Customer testimonial videos are an excellent way to show off your happy customers and highlight the positive impact your business has had on their lives.
Video Blog
A video blog is a great way to keep your audience up-to-date on what’s going on with your business. This type of video can be used to talk about new products or services, share company news, or give insights into your industry. Most audiences really enjoy those behind the scene peeks because it’s like you are sharing a secret.
How can small businesses get started with video marketing?
Now that we’ve established why video marketing is so important for small businesses, let’s talk about how you can get started. If you are ready to start incorporating video into your marketing strategy, there are a few small steps you can take to get started on the right foot.
If you’re feeling overwhelmed by the thought of creating videos, don’t worry. You don’t need to have a Hollywood budget or hire a professional production team to create effective videos. In fact, some of the most successful videos are shot on smartphones and edited with basic video editing software.
To get started, focus on creating short, informative videos that highlight your products or services. You can also create “how-to” videos, customer testimonials, and behind-the-scenes footage to give your audience a look at what goes into running your business.
Once you have a few videos under your belt, start promoting them on social media, on your website, and through email marketing campaigns. You can also create a YouTube channel to house all of your videos in one place.
What Are You Waiting For?
Video marketing is a powerful tool that every small business should be utilizing. By taking small steps to incorporating video into your marketing strategy, you can reach a wider audience and connect with your customers on a deeper level.
If you need help getting started, contact IFTS today at 412-715-6266. We can help you create high-quality videos that will reach your target audience and achieve your business goals.
Posting organic content in today’s world is crucial for social media success. Keeping up with posting daily to your social media sites can be very time consuming – and you don’t want to be spending all of your valuable time creating content that your social media followers might not even see or want to read. This is especially crucial if you, as the painting business owner, are creating this content.
In order to simplify the social media process, we have put together this easy to follow social media post ideas list. These top post ideas will help you stay relevant and engaging on social media while saving you time.
Before you start posting though, you need to get to know your audience!
Discover Your Audience In Depth
Knowing who your audience is will make creating content for your social media THAT much easier!
You’ll want to know your audience’s
likes and dislikes
interests
pain points
biggest questions
age
If you are trying to figure out who your target audience is, check out this blog post on how to define your target audience where we walk you through a few steps that will help you identify who is already engaging with your company (and your competitors) and how to utilize that information to establish a clear target group.
To get you started, most painting businesses have an active audience that mainly consists of women 35-65 that live within 20 miles of your location. They are normally the primary decision makers in a household. Also, the household income is in the top 40% in the area.
Now, the age may skew younger or older depending on your location, but this is a good jumping off point.
Top 18 Social Media Post Ideas
When creating your social content, you want to focus on creating a system where you can efficiently produce content.
With social media marketing, there are some concepts you can use to make your social content engaging and unique for consumers. This will, in turn, will improve your brand and get you more customers!
The following social media post ideas will help you quickly make effective social posts. The key to the posts we are going to discuss is that while you are keeping your audience interested, you can get to know your audience better without having to directly ask them anything. It’s like a bit of Jedi magic!
You will gain insight into what your followers like and this will allow you to further develop content ideas that will be relevant to your audience.
Most importantly, you can use these ideas to help you save time when planning social media content.
So, with that in mind, let’s get started.
1. This or that
As a painting business, you can ask people what cabinet color they prefer in a kitchen. This dark set or that bright white set.
There are a number of things that you can compare using the “this or that” post option.
2. A, B, C or D
This type of post is similar to “this or that” but instead, you are giving them four different options to choose from. You could post a question such as “If you could choose one thing to update in your home right now, what would it be?”
With this question, post four images such as a new kitchen, interior painting, exterior painting and bathroom remodeling and have them share their feedback. This can help you figure out ads to run and pain points to touch upon in upcoming posts.
3. Customer Review
Customer reviews are one of the most impactful posts you can put out there, yet you rarely see it being done by most businesses. This type of post allows you to toot your own horn a bit while letting others know that your previous clients have been absolutely satisfied with your services.
You can showcase reviews that have been left for your company on Facebook, Google, etc., videos that customers have shot on their cellphones, or even emails or text messages that you have received about your work.Does your business not receive many reviews? Here are 10 proven ways to get more online reviews for your business!
4. Story Time
There is nothing more engaging to the human race than storytelling. It goes back to the time of cavemen. So, why not use this to help liven up your social media?
This could be a story about you and how you started your business. It could be a story about one of your clients and their story of how you have made something in their life better through your services. It could even be a story that discusses why a client chose you over someone else to tackle their home project.
The story post allows you to connect with your audience on another level while establishing yourself as a personable brand. It’s a very humanizing post type.
5. Showcasing Styles
If you offer a wide range of choices in your work, let them know! Show off various styles and options within the services you provide. If you are a home remodeling company, show off a few different kitchen styles and ask your audience which they would pick for their own home.
Showcase your abilities to your audience will help them understand exactly what your company is about and the kind of work you do.
6. Transparency
When creating this type of post, you’ll be taking something that isn’t typically discussed in your industry, and share it with your social media audience. You’ll need to make it very clear for the customer to see, such as how your business operates or how you estimate work with integrity. Offer them a deep dive into your processes.
Transparency posts are engaging because they help you build a relationship with your audience. Discuss topics on which your followers are desperate to learn more about.
7. Business Details
If you are a painting company, including business details such as the process of making an estimate or how long it typically takes to complete a project can attract social media followers who are in need of your services. This is a topic that not many companies speak openly about.
You could also share the training process for your employees and how you only hire experienced professionals. Your followers will be glad to know that there won’t be just any average joe painting their home.
This type of post gives you an opportunity to showcase your professionalism.
8. Customer Spotlight
This post can be focused on one of your customers and the project that you helped them with. Shining the light on a customer will make them feel great, and more likely to share your social media post with other potential customers. This is a great way to get your business in front of new eyes. In fact, try to tag the customer that you are highlighting if possible.
This also shows how much you care about your clients and helps them to feel more connected with your company.
9. Quick Tips
Quick tips are social media posts that showcase a helpful tip or trick for something relevant to your industry. These can be beneficial as they will provide your audience with the knowledge they need to take advantage of a daily situation.
With someone who has as much experience and knowledge in your industry as you do, start sharing some helpful tips! If these valuable tips will help somebody, they are going to think of you every time they use it.
10. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
FAQ social media posts are great because they answer the questions you get asked most often! This is perfect for businesses that have social media accounts that get a lot of comments or messages. Instead of replying to each message, share it with your social media audience so everyone can get the answers to their questions without having to ask them.
[Bonus Tip – If a question is really popular, be sure to add it to your website as well to help with your SEO]
Ask your question in the opening line of the content with the answer written out below. This is how you turn frequently asked questions into questions that are no longer asked, saving you time in the long run. These work really well as videos too.
11. Before and After
As a home services business, before and after posts are a must! Showing your social media audience the before and after of a project will help them to understand how your services make a difference!
If possible, be sure to use a picture taken from the same angle with similar lighting. Try to use images that have stark contrast, such as going from light paint to dark paint or vice versa.
12. Feature Your Employees
We can guarantee your employees will love the fact that you take the time to showcase them, what they do for you, and how much of an asset they are to your company. When you share social media posts that include the team members, it helps to provide a friendly face behind your business and that will make your audience feel more connected!
People want to do business with people.
13. Comparison
The comparison post can relate to anything within your industry and it simply compares one thing to another. This could be comparing different brands of paint and how they are used, types of flooring, the quality of one painting process vs. another etc.
14. Pros and Cons
Anything that relates to your business can be a comparison with benefits and drawbacks. This can be in relation to your industry, your competitors, or things that your customers are doing.
What are the pros and cons of hiring a company who specializes in kitchen remodeling over a general contractor? What about one coat of paint vs two?
Be sure to highlight the situations where your business comes out on top!
15. Customer Generated Content
This is a piece of content that was created by someone who has used your services. This could be a photo of them in their new kitchen or a testimonial that they may have written about your business on their personal profile. Anything that is published by one of your customers is customer generated content.
When customers see you sharing their posts about your business, this encourages others to do the same!
16. Talk About Trends
There are trends that are relevant in every industry, which is why social media users are so engaged with content that discusses them. Trends can be anything from popular paint colors to tile and flooring patterns and accent walls.
If you have your finger on the social media pulse, share some of these trends with your audience and provide some insight about them. They may just see something that catches their eye! This also sets you apart as an expert in your area.
17. Long Form Content
You want to make sure that you are also posting long form content here and there. This consists of longer videos and blog posts that allow you to really share your message. Longer form content can be used when you want to explain something that is beneficial for your social media audience and internet browsers alike!
Some popular long form content topics that we have seen work for painters are as follows:
Popular color trends for the year
Tips for painting children’s rooms
One coat vs two coat
Warranty explanation
Pros and cons of certain paints or paint brands
18. Community Related Posts
If you are a local business, you should absolutely be talking about community-related activities. For example, you can talk about projects that your business has completed around the community. So, when people see that your company has done work on a common spot around town, they are going to think of you every time they see it!
You should also post about any charity work that your business has done.
Want To Know More?
This is just the start when it comes to creating engaging content that helps get you more clients!
If you need help creating social media content for your business or if you would like it done for you, contact IFTS today at 412-715-6266 to discuss a social media plan that is a good fit for you and your business.
