YouTube attracts a vast audience of viewers and account holders. It is no longer merely the place to watch fearless folk perform stupid tricks that break their bones or observe the wide array of weird animals inhabiting the nether regions of our strange and interesting planet. Manufacturers, integrators, and resellers of industrial equipment and solutions have discovered YouTube’s video marketing potential to brand and market. And industrial buyers and sourcing professionals looking for solutions are using it to uncover resources that help them with their operations and tasks.

To quote digital marketing expert Rob Graham, who has begun a month-long series for ClickZ to help marketers understand and use YouTube effectively: “it’s paramount we create media plans that allow us to reach our target customers no matter where they go.” Absolutely. Whether it’s via an industrial journal, a professional organization’s website, your site, or via social networking sites like YouTube, it is important you are adequately and accurately represented in several key places frequented by your target audience groups so that you avoid passing the opportunities to your competitors.

The initial value of YouTube to industrial account holders is that it does not cost anything to create a branded channel and post videos. But before you post anything to your newly established channel that bears your corporate or product branding organize your videos and think strategically about how your intended users could easily find and interact with your video content. For example, if you sell equipment that helps in manufacturing operations, you may find that organizing your videos by the task that has to be performed works best to attract your targeted audience groups. Or perhaps you need more than one category of organization such as ‘industry’ and ‘task.’ Whichever way you decide to organize your video posts, be sure that you understand why you are doing it that way and that it accurately corresponds to the way in which your intended audience searches for what you offer.

Next you will want to conduct a comprehensive keyword research in order to develop a working list of search terms you know to be used to search for what you offer. You will use your researched keyword list to:

• Title your videos
• Develop your scripts: if you haven’t developed your videos yet, it is a good idea to develop your video scripts using these keywords and phrases; remember keywords are about helping your targeted viewers connect with your material that corresponds to their interests; they are aided in identifying that material by coming across the same language they use to search for what you offer.
• For all textual ad copy and corresponding keyword lists for Pay Per Click search engine marketing campaigns to promote and/or market your product/service videos.

Read the series I mentioned above, which will appear in ClickZ this month, for more detailed information about Pay Per Click search engine marketing campaign opportunities for your YouTube videos.

Industrial Web Solutions…Leads to Sales…(800) 399-9859.

Industrial videos are a great industrial marketing tool. Unlike consumer-oriented videos, however, the content typically appeals to a very narrow audience. In a recent ClickZ post by Sean Carton, the author outlines several qualities held by the Top 10 Viral Ads by Unique Views just published by Advertising Age and Visible Measures. Let’s take a look at some of these qualities and see how they may have a practical application for industrial video advertising:

Element of Surprise: The most striking example is Blendtec’s Will It Blend comic video that blends an iPad to demonstrate its power. Adding an element of surprise should not be too difficult, particularly if you are introducing a new product or service solution. Contrast the way something was done before with how it is done now with your product or service. Focus on what makes it exciting and powerful.

Sex Sells: Hmmm….it does. I suppose having a beautiful, well-proportioned young woman narrating and demonstrating your product or service in the video will keep your male audience engaged!

Destruction: There is an obsession with destruction or destroying things. Destroying something, like the iPad in the Will It Blend video, can be used to demonstrate a point relevant to what your product or service offers. It can be funny, poignant, or provocative.

Music: Music is a powerful motivator and has to be chosen very carefully. Consider your target audience groups and the kind of music that will excite them about your product or service as well as the specific marketing message you are trying to get across. Musical style, level energy, and how it is used are very important considerations.

Sense of Wonder: Filling your audience with a sense of fantastical wonder may work for you depending on what it is you are selling. If the product or service aims to change the way something is accomplished, find a way to make your viewers go “wow” when they see what you are proposing.

Empathy: Allow the viewer to imagine him/herself using your product or service as you are showing it in the video. Viewers have to be able to relate to what you are demonstrating in every way. First, they have to recognize their problem or challenge. Then they have to be able to picture themselves using your product or service as the solution. In other words, they have to empathize with the character in your video.

Let your Audience in on the Joke: Or, in other words, don’t try to be something you’re not. Sean Carton refers to this as being “self-aware.” Regarding industrial videos, I would say that it is best to accurately represent who you are and what you offer. Whether your presentation is comical or serious, you don’t have to conceal that you are trying to sell your product or service.

Behind-the-Scenes Footage: People love to see behind-the-scenes. Show them how you do things.

Spectacle Sells: This is your “Wow” factor. What are you going to show to your audience that is memorable for the spectators within the shot as well as viewers of your video? You want them to feel “I wish I were there doing that or seeing that.” The spectacle is most effective if it leaves them with a good feeling or sense of exhilaration.

Human Kindness: A personal element that demonstrates your humanity is always good to incorporate. People respond to acts of human kindness. Whether you’re shaking a happy client’s hand or rescuing a child who has been injured, demonstrate that you are a company of people not machines.

Your next task is getting your videos out there. Start by establishing a YouTube.com channel with your company or product branding. Organize and post your videos according to how your intended audience searches for them. Be sure to include a link in any online or offline marketing initiatives you have targeting your specified audience groups. Share the links on your Twitter and Facebook pages. Use them in live or webinar presentations and be sure to reference the links in your handouts. And send an email to your clients to encourage them to watch and ‘Like’ them.

Google's Ultra High-Speed Internet Experiment

Back in February of this year, Google announced that it planned to start building ultra-high speed Broadband networks in select locations in the United States. The objective was to experiment with new ways to make the internet faster and better for everyone.

With the popularity of services like YouTube, the streaming of robust applications over the web, and the sheer volume of people accessing the web simultaneously, bandwidth is always a concern because it affects both the rate at which information travels and the ability for it to travel at all. Recently Google announced it made a deal with Stanford University to build an ultra-high speed Broadband network to the university’s residential sub-division, a group of approximately 850 faculty and staff owned homes on campus. The goal is to provide internet speeds at a rate 100 times faster than the rest of us are accustomed to, equaling 1 gigabit per second.

The results of the micro experiment will then be applied to the challenges faced in the installation, operation and maintenance of such a system on a larger scale. Armed with a team of highly skilled engineers, Google is committed to understanding how to accomplish its goal with as little impact on the environment as possible. To make the initial stage of learning fun, they even hosted a micro-trenching competition on their site to award a prize to the ‘trenchers’ who were able to fulfill the requirements of the challenge with the least mess and impact on the road surface.

What will higher internet speeds mean for the rest of us? The ability to communicate in a powerful, high-speed online environment opens up all kinds of possibilities for conducting and marketing your business such as:

• Confidently reach out to more clients and prospective clients with engaging, interactive rich content like webinars, interactive advertising, videos and 3-D illustrations without fear that the media is not transmitting at rate that maintains its sound and image quality
• Global team building for more advanced project development becomes possible with the flexibility of online communications, collaboration, and productivity made possible by ‘cloud computing’ Office Suites like Google Apps for Business and the ever-growing selection of third-party applications

Along with the technology comes the growing responsibility to meet even higher audience expectations. Flat, brochure-like websites are a thing of the past. Audiences expect to be engaged with informative, highly focused, and highly produced media they can interactive with easily and enjoyably. Whether you are emailing it, broadcasting it over the web, or participating in an online advertising or marketing program, your value and level of professionalism will be judged by the quality of the digital media you produce.

What should you do? Start planning for the dawn of the ultra high-speed internet now. Decide what you need to do differently to reach, engage and motivate your prospective and existing clients. Learn where you can save money by utilizing cloud computing where it makes sense. Change your mind-set and meet the new challenges head-on with clarity, understanding and intelligent foresight and planning. There are great rewards awaiting those who are ready when the new information speedway becomes widely available. One of Google’s micro-trenching competitors said it best, “Be first or be last!”

Call Industrial Web Solutions at (800) 399-9859 now to learn about the options that make sense for you.

This is relevant news and happy news! And the only commodity that when down in price is natural gas, hopefully providing end-users with a little savings. Plastics and Rubber products also experienced contraction last month.

Happily the seventeen other manufacturing sectors, including Apparel, Leather & Allied Products; Textile Mills; Electrical Equipment, Appliances & Components; Miscellaneous Manufacturing; Transportation Equipment; Machinery; Computer & Electronic Products; Paper Products; Petroleum & Coal Products; Food, Beverage & Tobacco Products; Furniture & Related Products; Nonmetallic Mineral Products; Fabricated Metal Products; Wood Products; Printing & Related Support Activities; Chemical Products; and Primary Metals reported growth. Many have even increased their new orders by 50%.

I picked up on a great opportunity for manufacturers and suppliers of Computer and Electronic Products based on this comment quoted in the report:

“There is a serious shortage of basic electronic components, and lead times are becoming a problem. We are also seeing dramatic price increases.”

For those of you who manufacture or supply computer and electronic products, now’s the time to take an innovative approach to how you market to your target audience groups. You have leverage but you’ll be competing hard for those contracts. Here are a couple of things to try.

Go niche. Focus on a niche market such as Medical Devices. Prepare a mini-website and collateral marketing materials that are highly focused on your target niche market. Do your research and make sure what you offer and how you present it address the specific concerns of this market.

Don’t tell. Demonstrate. As I stated in my last blog post It’s What Your Customers Say That Matters. Focus your copy (your message) on the ways in which your products have successfully impacted your customers and the markets they serve. Let what you have done and whom you have served speak for you through carefully composed case studies and  white papers, for example, that include statements from your clients about the work you did. Demonstration videos work well here too.

We pay attention to the PMI and the state of the overall economy not so we can get depressed or elated but so we understand what the opportunities are and begin to develop ways to take advantage of them. My two cents: even when things look grim, create opportunities and keep your marketing approaches fresh, focused, and relevant to current needs.

Sign up for a Youtube.com channel. Because Youtube.com is now owned by Google, as with all other Google services, you must have a Google account (yourname@gmail.com) to register for a Youtube account.  Follow the on-screen instructions. You can link your Youtube.com account with your Google account for easy sign on and management.

Once you are successfully logged in you will be able to customize your channel page. You will be able to:

• Upload videos
• Group videos into playlists
• Customize the look and feel of your channel

If you have found other videos on Youtube.com that you think may be of interest to your viewers you can save them here in your “Favorites” as well.

Making Your Videos

If you sell a product or service one of the easiest ways to get the attention of your target audience is to demonstrate how what you offer benefits them. For example, Industrial Web Solutions offers a customizable, editable website Content Management System. We created a different video to demonstrate how each of the available add-on modules a) benefits you (the website solution owner) and b) your site visitors. With the help of the videos, interested viewers can see the features in action making it easy for them to infer how the products offer value to their business.

If you are interested in video marketing for your business contact IWS at (800) 399-9859.