10 MINUTE READ
As social media becomes more widespread, hotels and hospitality brands are shifting their marketing strategy away from traditional paid advertising to a more content-centered approach. TV commercials and print ads have rapidly given way to tweets and hashtags, and the trend towards digital content marketing shows no signs of slowing down.
Video is fast becoming the most popular type of content on every social media platform, and there are plenty of statistics to prove it. With so many social media channels to manage, how can you leverage video to maximize viewer engagement and earn more followers?
First, we should briefly examine the different types of video content that get shared online. Broadly speaking, there are two main types of video content: user-generated content and branded content.
User-generated video content includes any type of video produced by a consumer and uploaded to social media. This can include smartphone videos, desktop webcam videos, edited videos, or live videos that are uploaded to sites like YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram. There are many benefits to leveraging user-generated content, but for the sake of simplicity, we will focus primarily on branded content.
Branded content includes any type of video produced by a brand, business, or marketing agency to attract consumer attention and grow revenue. It is the video content you have full control over and the video content that viewers prefer. According to Google,
“While travel watchers on YouTube are interested in community-generated content, the majority of travel-related views (67%) are for brand or professionally released videos.”
Source: Travel Content Takes Off on YouTube
There is no limit to the variety of videos that can be produced, but we will break them down into three broad categories:
Brand Videos
Generally, brand videos are those productions that present the brand or hotel as a whole. These videos are typically presented as the “flagship” videos for the brand and appear prominently on a hotel’s website. A brand video is typically straight-forward in its messaging and focuses on driving overall brand awareness and sales.
This category can include hotel overviews, restaurant overviews, or any other type of video that is designed to represent your brand messaging over the long run. Brand videos are meant to stay relevant for a number of years, so they tend to be the most costly to produce.
Promotional Videos
Promotional videos are those that have a more targeted approach. They may be aimed at a particular market segment or promoting a limited time offer.
This category is typically comprised of more stylized vignettes that tell a story about a particular aspect of the guest experience. In other words, they highlight a single amenity, event, or promotion at your hotel. As a result, they are generally cheaper to produce than brand videos.
Are you trying to attract more local business to your hotel restaurant? Perhaps you would like to showcase a recent wedding at your property to attract more group bookings. Maybe your property is participating in a larger corporate campaign that month. Promotional videos are ideal for these purposes.
B-Roll Clips or “Video Archive” Clips
B-Roll refers to video clips that are supplemental to the main shots in a production. They are usually recorded without sound and are used to cut away from actors or interviewees during a scene. In the case of hotel video, most of the footage captured can be considered “B-Roll”.
Whether it’s a 6-second shot of a spa treatment or a commanding aerial shot of your entire property, make sure you retain all of your B-Roll footage in a video archive. We really cannot stress that enough – Purchase all of your B-Roll footage after any video production. Most video production companies give you the option of purchasing a cataloged video archive after the main productions have been approved and delivered.
At the end of any production, you should be able to gather hundreds of quality clips that can be repurposed for future promotions or posted directly to social media. Short B-Roll clips like this are perfectly suited for simple social media posts, as we will illustrate below.
Social Media Strategy
After reviewing thousands of hotel websites and social media over the years, one problem stands out above the rest – inconsistency. Inconsistent posting schedule, inconsistent quality, inconsistent messaging. From what we’ve seen, it appears that many hotels are attempting to manage their social media presence without any overarching strategy in place.
Posts are made infrequently and don’t share the same voice. Professional photos are mixed in with poor-quality amateur shots. Shaky vertical videos are displayed alongside professional brand productions. All the while, posts that appear on the Facebook page are not featured on corresponding Instagram or Twitter pages. All of this can diminish your social media presence and discourage people from following.
The obvious solution to this problem is a complete social media strategy, which we’ve broken down into the following five steps: Evaluate – Produce – Archive – Schedule – Post. While we are focused on video here, these same steps could easily apply to photos and blog posts.
Evaluate
Before you even set a budget for new video content, it is vitally important that you evaluate your current social media presence and take inventory of all existing video assets.
If your property has produced brand videos in the past, you may already have access to a library of useful footage. On the other hand, you may find that your social media pages are inconsistent or full of sub-standard video that can diminish your brand. Take time to determine the standard of imagery that represents your brand, and scrub your social media of any videos that don’t meet those standards.
Finally, determine what sort of videos your social media is missing and begin producing them immediately.
Produce
Producing high-quality video doesn’t have to be difficult. It is simply a matter of knowing what types of videos you want to produce and setting an appropriate budget. Once you have those parameters in place, you can begin contacting production companies for proposals.
Be sure to choose a production company that understands your goals and works closely with your team to create the videos you originally envisioned. Choosing a dedicated production liaison from your team is a great way to maintain regular communication with your video producers. This will go a long way towards making sure your property looks its best during every shoot.
Archive
Once your videos have been edited and delivered, make sure to purchase the rest of the B-Roll footage to continue building your video archive. Once optimized and cataloged by your producers, these leftover clips can be used in future projects or posted directly to social media to keep followers engaged.
For instance, our team typically generates between 500 and 1000 useful clips during any hotel production. These short clips detail every last corner of the property in high-definition, and many of our luxury hotel clients choose to purchase a Video Archive as part of their initial production package. Just imagine having hundreds of top-quality video clips at your disposal when it comes time to create a new post!
Schedule
There are endless theories about the best times to post or the best copy, but the most important thing to focus on is posting regularly. Scheduling your posts is the best way to ensure that all of your social media pages show consistent activity. As the old saying goes – If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail.
Scheduling also empowers you to post according to seasonal or promotional themes. For example, you can schedule more posts about spa treatments as Spa Month approaches. No matter how you organize your posts, a detailed schedule will keep all of your social media pages active and consistent.
Post
Maintaining consistency in your posts is as much about quality as it is about quantity. If you are marketing a luxury experience, it’s clear that all of your video content should reflect that look and feel. Coming up with an interesting video post is easy when you have hundreds of clips to choose from, but you can do so much more when you repurpose clips.
Repurposing existing clips from your video archive is a powerful and cost-effective way to create custom videos for any promotion. As time goes on, all of your social media platforms will display a robust collection of quality videos for users to view, like, and share.
Social Media Platforms
While quality content is appreciated anywhere on the web, there are some important differences between social media platforms. Here, we will detail some best practices for each platform so you can make the most of your video content strategy.
YouTube
YouTube is the second most popular search engine after its parent company, Google. With over 1.5 billion users and 30 million daily visitors, YouTube is the first place people go to find videos online. It is absolutely essential that your videos be uploaded to your YouTube channel.
Studies from ThinkwithGoogle and others clearly demonstrate that viewers prefer watching branded travel content. Publishing videos on YouTube can result in thousands of views per year. In addition, adding a backlink to your website in the video description can increase traffic and direct bookings. As YouTube’s parent, Google openly ranks YouTube videos significantly higher in search.
YouTube’s free viewership statistics can also provide valuable insight into the market segments that are watching your videos. Be sure to integrate your YouTube channel into Google Analytics, as well.
Facebook boasts an astonishing 1 billion daily users. They also report that over half that number watch videos on their platform everyday. Videos posted to your Facebook page will be instantly delivered to your followers and remain in your video gallery for future visitors to find with ease.
Facebook now offers Cover Video and Featured Video functionalities. The former allows you to upload a 90-second video as your cover image, while the latter presents a large player window at the top of your Video page which plays automatically.
Facebook creates a tremendous opportunity to make the most of your video archive. Periodically posting short video clips to your Timeline will keep viewers interested while offering more opportunities to add backlinks to your hotel website in the descriptions.
Instagram is home to over 500 million users. Its user base is extremely active, with most users visiting multiple times each day. Instagram limits video posts to one minute in length, but those videos get shared to each of your followers instantly.
Instagram provides another great opportunity to regularly post short clips from your video archive. Even a short clip can earn thousands of views in a matter of days!
Twitter reaches over 100 million active users daily, and it reaches them in their pockets. Posting videos to your Twitter account will ensure that mobile users will see the best of what your property has to offer.
Twitter is the perfect platform for posting short video clips from the video archive, as the majority of users scroll through feeds on their smartphones. Currently, the maximum video length on twitter is 2 minutes 20 seconds. A regular stream of interesting videos will keep people engaged and following. Adding backlinks and hashtags can also expose your hotel to a wider audience with every tweet.
As the fastest growing social network, Pinterest is swiftly catching up to the giants of social media. In April 2017, they announced their surpassing 175 million active users. Video pins pointing to YouTube or Vimeo have been available for some time, but businesses are now able to pin and promote video within the site itself.
Pinterest positions itself as a “catalog of ideas” that inspires users to go out and act on those ideas. Many users are young and eager to experience the world. Pinning your hotel to their boards means users can remind themselves to stay at your hotel the next time they visit your destination.
TripAdvisor
TripAdvisor now offers video display for its Business Advantage subscribers. This enables your hotel to provide engaging, informative video to the most discerning travelers. This can go a long way towards setting the right expectations that lead to positive reviews.
More information can be found at: https://www.tripadvisor.com/TripAdvisorInsights/n2789/bring-your-business-life-property-videos
Yelp
Another go-to website for discriminating travelers, Yelp now gives businesses the opportunity to showcase a brand video. The link can be found permanently floating under the first image in the carousel. This also helps to set the correct expectations with potential guests, resulting in better reviews overall.
More information can be found at: https://www.yelp-support.com/article/Can-I-use-my-own-video-for-my-Yelp-advertising?l=en_US
By following these simple guidelines, you will maximize your social media presence and build a loyal fanbase for your brand or hotel. Effective social media management isn’t rocket science. The key to marketing success is a holistic approach to imagery, video, and social media.
About Accommovision
We take a holistic approach to hotel video marketing by providing our clients with all the content and tools they need. After producing brand videos of the highest quality, our clients can request a video archive full of captivating stock footage for use in later projects. Our ongoing editing support means your video content will never go to waste, and we will always be available for updates and special promotions. For more information on our services, simply contact us.
