5 benefits of using video for sales

Why you should include video in your sales process

Every good marketer knows that selling is always a process, a path that includes important stages. Aiming only at the finish line, skipping the intermediate steps, is a big mistake, which can sometimes turn out to be a dangerous boomerang.

This has always been true, ever since commerce has existed.

In fact, a good salesperson is first of all a good listener and then a good communicator. He knows the environment where he’s operating, he sniffs out the trends and changing fashions. He tries to educate, to inform, to be useful, even before selling.

Above all, he knows his customers well, one by one. He calls them by name, he keeps track of their preferences, of how they change over time and according to the circumstances, he establishes a relationship and a different dialog with each of them. He makes tailored proposals without being too invasive.

A good seller knows that the most important thing is a lasting trust: because customers themselves can become the first and most credible ambassadors of their products or services, even if only by word of mouth; and this strength should never be underestimated.

So, how does all this translate into the digital world in which we all live, work, and consume? It translates into an unprecedented multiplication of occasions and opportunities. It’s about learning to do old things with cutting-edge tools.

The role of data in the sales process

What does this mean in concrete terms?

First of all, the traditional sales process (with all its intermediate stages) is transformed into a Digital Customer Journey, which is much more traceable (and therefore predictable) than a physical Customer Journey.

It also tells us that the environment and the context in which one moves can be “understood” through an interpretation of data, starting from the right metrics and with the support of analysis and artificial intelligence systems; just think of sentiment analysis, for example.

What’s more, data allows us to get to know individuals, even when the customer base is large. It’s always a matter of collecting and analyzing digital traces: therefore, starting with these “traces,” understanding who is in front of you (and we will return to this a little later).

At this point, a decisive question must be asked.

What is the most powerful (but also the most targeted) means of creating a relationship with one’s own customers aimed at sales?

There’s no doubt about it: it’s video. Now we’re ready to get even more specific and tackle the central theme of this post: the benefits of video for sales.

There are many, but we’ve chosen to group them around the five points that we feel are most crucial.

1. Attracting attention…and keeping it!

Any sales process always starts with a spark at the base: the ability to trigger attention in the potential customer. While this may sound simple, achieving it is actually very complex.

In the digital ecosystem in which we are immersed, attention is one of the most precious assets: we are all constantly bombarded by the most diverse stimuli and through a range of devices. The emails that fill our inboxes, the unending social media news feeds, banner ads on YouTube or news sites, notifications from messaging apps…and much, much more.

This is the playing field where digital marketers and salespeople navigate.

And, fortunately, video is a great ally here. Why?

First and foremost, it’s because video is the type of media that guarantees maximum visibility. On social networks, for example, video is the most visible type of content (to learn more about video marketing on social media, here’s our post on the subject). Search engines also reward videos, especially when optimized for SEO. Last but not least, videos are also great for email marketing. Here is an interesting statistic around this point:

• It’s been noted that just including the word “video” in the subject line of your email can increase your open rate by 6%. This may seem like a small percentage, but email marketers know it can make a big difference (superoffice.com).
• If we narrow our focus to B2B, emails that include video have a 5x higher open rate and an 8x higher response rate than text-only emails (hubspot.com).

In short, there’s no need for further commentary. But it’s not just about visibility. In fact, video is the preferred medium of most online audiences, the one they are most familiar with, and especially when it comes to video for sales.

In this regard, here’s another statistic:

• 69% of those who receive a sales communication say that they prefer video to learn about the features of a product or service. Only 18% a text-based article. 4% an infographic. 3% an eBook or manual. And 2% a phone call (wyzowl.com).

Finally, another important factor: video is not only the best medium for attracting attention, it’s also the one that can best hold your audience’s attention, especially for one-to-one communications.

We’ll come back to this in the next few points.

2. Stimulate understanding

Effective video for sales is not just about attention. Attention is of little use if it is not transformed into a clear and concise understanding of the message.

And what level of performance can videos guarantee in this regard? Here are two statistics that couldn’t be more telling:

• In general, when watching a video, the user understands and believes 95% of the message it contains. When it comes to text only this percentage drops to 10% (insivia.com).
• According to 94% of video marketers, videos have helped increase the audience’s understanding of their products and services (hubspot.com).

3. Personalize

We’ve mentioned it several times: the most effective sales pitches are always those built around customer characteristics. Thanks to digital, these customers can be known and tracked by collecting their data.

The next step is to create communications that are tailored to the individual.

Here’s the good news: video offers enormous possibilities for personalization. This is the turning point of video for sales: personalized videos, which can be created using specialized platforms such as Babelee.

These are videos that automatically adapt to the different characteristics of the various recipients, even shaping themselves based on navigation choices, in real time.

With personalized videos, the time of one-size-fits-all communications ends and that of one-to-one, intimate, close communication begins.

In short, in an ecosystem bombarded with stimuli, effectiveness doesn’t come from trying to shout louder than others, but from the ability to speak in the right tone to the right people.

4. Retain loyalty

Personalized videos, therefore, create a real dialog with customers, who are no longer a passive and anonymous target, as in the past. From data, in short, we move on to creating real relationships.

In turn, all of this leads to one of the most important benefits of video for sales: loyalty.

How important is it to create lasting relationships with your customers? We can’t explain it any better than this data:

• According to a well-known study by Bain & Company, it costs a company 6 to 7 times more to win over a new customer than it does to retain one (inc.com).
• Bain & Company also estimated that a 5% improvement in Customer Retention can produce up to 25% more profit (bain.com).

5. Analyze and recalibrate

Let’s close this post with the benefits of video for sales with a point that basically closes the circle, because it has a decisive impact on all the other points outlined above.

Video is the type of digital content from which the greatest amount and depth of data can be extracted. Technically, this characteristic is called “granularity.”

In concrete terms, it means that sales teams can have at their disposal a very wide range of information, on the viewing of the video, on the different targets with their behaviors and reactions, on what worked and what did not.

This information is invaluable because it allows you to evaluate the results of your campaigns with unprecedented depth and breadth, excluding assumptions based on feelings or narrow feedback, which could be misleading.

The next step is the ability to continually and quickly recalibrate your strategies and the guarantee of continuous improvement.

Here, in conclusion, is another ancient secret of marketing, which is updated with cutting-edge tools: there is no perfect message for everyone. Some messages are more effective than others depending on the audience they are aimed at. Finally, and above all – the effectiveness of each message can and must be continuously improved.

This can be achieved with personalized videos for sales, and all at the same time!