I’m about to tell you something that will change your life. Are you ready?

YouTube is not just for cute animal videos.

Mindblowing, I know. But hear me out.

YouTube is a great way to get your product and your content in front of a wide-reaching audience that spans across the world. If you have an online business, this could make a huge difference and drive your lead generation and potential revenue up dramatically.

So think about it for the future. Think about YouTube and how it could possibly drive business to your site, your company, and your product. Keep reading and you’ll find five ways that you can use…

YouTube to improve your marketing strategies and drive lead generation

1. Tell a story

Stories bring people in and capture their hearts. Stories are what drive people one way or the other when it comes to buying or decision making. Statistics and specs are deciding factors, but ultimately the story is what will drive the conversion stage in your buyer’s journey.

Things like this, the Dove Real Beauty Sketches campaign. Each person’s story is only about 30 seconds long – the time of a standard TV advertisement – but they each resonate strongly with the audience. Intertwining two stories – how each woman sees herself vs how the world sees her.

2. Stay relevant

It sounds obvious, but it’s important to remember. If your content isn’t relevant, then neither are you. Sounds harsh, but in the internet world when thousands of products are just a click away, relevance and attention-grabbing content is king. If you’re still posting ‘Rickrolling’ videos when the internet has moved on past that and past ‘planking’ or the ‘Harlem Shake’ and further on again past ‘water bottle flipping’ and then on again to something new and shiny? You’re not keeping up. And if you can’t prove that you can keep up with the culture of the internet, then it’s going to be difficult to be taken seriously as a digital marketer.

Campaigns like this Australian one from Carlton Draught beer are ideal for this kind of marketing. This campaign is an older one (7 years old), but at the time, it was making fun of a theatrical lean that advertising in Australia had taken.

3. Host a channel

Host a YouTube channel. When you put your written and social content on the internet, you don’t just drop it willy-nilly all over the web. You place it carefully in your blogs, on specialised websites, solely to ensure that the maximum amount of people see the content you’ve created. The same should be done with your YouTube content. Create a channel, host all of your videos in one place. Make sure you’re creating and posting regularly, but always make sure to ride the line between posting regularly and spamming your user.

And finally, make sure to use a call to action in each of your videos. To quote prominent user, Steve Dangle, who hosts a sports channel on YouTube: “Click ‘Like’ if you like this video, click ‘Subscribe’ if you really like, tell all your friends… and Go Leafs Go.”

4. Promote your content

Cross-pollination of content is key when you run a YouTube channel, a blog, and social media accounts. Share your content. Create a blog post about your videos. Tweet about them. Pin them to your Pinterest. Instagram screenshots. Coincidentally, mention your blog’s website and your social media handles in your videos.

Remember, going viral is the end goal. And sometimes, it’s the oddest and most unexpected things that can end up going viral. Like ‘What Does the Fox Say?’ (and now it’s in your head).

5. Don’t be that guy…

Everyone on the internet knows at least one version of ‘that guy’. ‘That guy’ is the person on the internet or in real life who does things like: responding to negative reviews with sarcasm; refuses to listen to other opinions; doesn’t engage with clients; is passive-aggressive.

‘That guy’ can ruin your day, and your lead generation. Nobody wants to deal with a person like that, so it’s very important to make sure that your interactions with people online are calm, polite, and if not friendly, then at the very least, civil. You might not remember every instance someone was polite or friendly to you online, but I will bet that you definitely remember when someone was rude to you.

It’s Internet 101: Don’t be a jerk.

And that’s it! Happy YouTubing and have fun creating! Now that you’ve gotten to the end… Here’s a cute animal video. Just for fun.

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