Building Brand Relationships Through Content
Building Brand Relationships Through Content
A users relationship with a brand begins from their very first interaction and grows stronger with every subsequent piece of content. This is why establishing and carefully managing a well thought out content plan for your brand is so important.
Regular content is king. Never forget the importance of every single piece of content you distribute to your audience. While more weight will naturally be placed on some content over others, it’s important to understand that all content is contributing to your brand’s overall message.
This means it is important not to over invest in one piece of content. Obviously investing heavily in a website hero video is different to heavily investing in a video for social media that is recycled constantly. You need to find a balance in your content plan between releasing video content that speaks to your various brand messages, content that focuses on your unique selling points and content that works to build deeper connections with your audiences. This is in contrast to squashing all of these messages into one video and flogging it to death on social media.
Using a diverse selection of video content also gives your brand the chance to mix up the style of video you distribute as well. Some videos should be directly sales focused, while others should humanise your brand and build emotional relationships with consumers. Never underestimate the importance of an emotional connection – people like to buy from people, meaning the stronger the connection someone has with your brand, the more likely they are to convert into a sale.
In world where screens are the first interaction with your brand for many potential clients, it’s easy to forget that we are all humans; many digital brands are being sucked this trap. Remember, your content is being consumed by real life people, so it needs to be interesting and compelling enough to garner a reaction (and hopefully a conversion) from a user at the other end of the screen.
Animation
Often overlooked as ‘goofy’ or not ‘serious,’ animated videos can be an excellent way to introduce diversity and emotion to your content plan. Much cheaper now than in previous times, animation has the potential to embody the true personality of your brand in ways that conventional filmmaking cannot.
Animation doesn’t rely on actors, interviews or locations and it opens up unique possibilities that would never be possible with traditional filming. You are only limited by your imagination – you can set your film in any location, without gravity, rationale or budget to restrain you.
Animation also allows you to develop characters that can help strengthen your brands message. If you decide to go down this track, look at some success stories and consider how animated characters work to hook an audience. Think about Compare the Market’s character Aleksandr the Meerkat. His strong character design and personality is integral to making this brand’s video marketing so successful.
Most videos, whether animated or not, utilise interesting content, striking imagery and upbeat music to greatly enhance an audience’s understanding and retention of information. Captivating videos can even cut through overwhelming amounts of information and make difficult content easily digestible.
The key point in all of this is that relationships take time. It’s important to value and nurture the relationships you have with your audience through regular, diverse content. You can’t expect sales conversations straight away, but stick with your strategy and you will see results eventually. At Glue, we’ve hear clients tell stories of customers who appear and reference videos from six months earlier – we are the stalker generation after all!
Your sales take place long before you meet your clients face to face, so keep your best foot forward in all of your content marketing efforts. If you have a bulletproof content plan and dedicate yourself to regular and consistent content, you are well on your way to ensuring your brand builds meaningful relationships with users.
GLUE Content is a Melbourne based video content production and animation agency, producing content for some of Australia’s leading companies, brands, agencies and sporting organisations.