Build Relationships With Prospects And Customers Using Personalized Marketing

In today’s digital landscape, commanding the attention of prospects has put marketing and sales teams in a bit of a tough spot. Due to the sheer number of people online trying to attract consumer’s attention, getting that attention has become more and more difficult.

One thing that remains a constant though is that consumers love it when they feel special.

Let’s face it. As humans, we are all a little bit selfish. As a result, it is common for us to consider the “what’s in it for me” factor when making purchase decisions. One great way to capitalize on this trait is by using personalized video.

Personalized video isn’t a brand new concept, but it is picking up steam. Traditionally sales and marketing teams didn’t flock to personalized video simply because the barrier of entry was too high.

Everything You’ll Need To Know About Personalized Marketing

Today though, with scalable tools coming on the market to help with the creation of creative, compelling personalized video; it’s hard to ignore. Simply put, those who use it are going to prosper and those that don’t are going to fall behind.

What Is Personalized Video?

Personalized video is video content that is made to look custom-tailored to a specific person. For instance, the video may have their first name in it, or their company name, or even messaging that is hyper-specific to them and their needs.

Here’s a quick Ted Talk that provides a couple of examples of how individuals react to personalized videos, as opposed to the traditional one video for all model.

Make no mistake. Personalized video is important. According to research done by everage.com, 96% of marketers believe that personalization helps advance customer relationships faster than a generalized “mass-produced” marketing effort.

How To Utilize Personalized Video In Your Marketing And Sales Efforts

One very important thing we’d like to point out here is that when we are talking about personalized video we are talking about personalized video in both your marketing and your sales efforts.

Why, you ask? It’s simple. Continuity.

If you attract a prospective customer using personalized video as part of your marketing campaigns, they are going to expect that as they enter your sales funnel, they are going to be treated in the same personalized fashion.

That means your sales teams need to be on board with personalized video strategies to continue down the path of your prospect’s expectations.

Sales teams tend to be a little hesitant when it comes to personalized video, but it’s actually a very powerful tool that can help them with everything from initial introductions, all the way through the closing process. The trick is using tools that allow your sales team to easily scale these one to one communications in a fashion that makes it easy for them to handle the flow of incoming leads.

Vedia, for instance, gives marketers automation tools that help them engage audiences with dynamic video ads that match their specific product interests, buying preferences, location and more.

3 Ways To Use Personalized Videos

So if we all can agree that personalized video is a great way to engage audiences and speed up the sales process for your company, the question then becomes how to use it? Here are three great ways you can start out using personalized video:

1. Engage Customers with Webinars

Webinars are a great way to not only provide education to your audience but to provide value as well, helping you establish your brand as the thought leader in the space.

There are two big problems with webinars that we see companies fall victim to that personalized videos can help alleviate. Personalized video can help you increase your webinar attendance percentage and help you nurture your hottest leads, post-webinar.

Let’s face it. One of the most annoying things in the world is when you have a huge list of people that have signed up for your webinar, but your actual turn up rate at the time of the webinar wasn’t that great. Part of the reason for this is the marketing that companies do in the lead up to the webinar.

Again, we are all a little selfish and want to know what’s in it for us. If all you do to remind your prospects of your upcoming webinar is send generic, bland reminders, this isn’t going to resonate with them and they may likely miss your webinar all together.

What is One-To-One Marketing? Definition, Examples, and More

But, if you use a personalized video, say perhaps embedded in an email with a thumbnail of you holding a whiteboard that says, “I can’t wait to see you at my webinar, Suzy”, that is something that will not only stop your prospect in their tracks but will also make you and your upcoming event memorable.

Secondly, what about after the webinar? Personalized video is great for that too. I can’t tell you how many times we see brands put on compelling, value-added, engaging webinars, only to totally blow it on the follow up afterward.

Here are a couple of tips on how to have a good, engaging webinar.

You see, since the prospects didn’t act on their call to action at the end of the webinar and commit right away, the brand thinks the lead is dead and just puts them on some sort of generic nurturing campaign in the hopes that one day they’ll come around.

The truth though is that not all buyers buy at the first chance they get. Many need to be nurtured on a deeper, more personal level before they are comfortable enough to proceed to the next steps in the relationship. A personalized video is a perfect vehicle to promote this progress.

You can use video as a way to not only recap the main takeaways of the webinar and provide follow-up resources but also as a way to engage your audience by asking a question about their takeaways and asking if they had any specific questions from what they learned. This provides a two-way street of communication instead of just talking at them.

2. Personalized Video for Lead Management

Leads are an interesting thing for every company. Everyone wants to get as many leads as possible and when they do, it’s awesome. BUT, the flip side to that coin is if you get too many leads, it’s nearly impossible to follow up with all of them in a timely, meaningful way.

When a new lead comes in, you need to get in touch with them ASAP. You also need to set a great first impression. Automated personalized video can help you with both these needs.

How to Use Video at Every Part of the Buyer’s Journey

For instance, the moment someone fills out a form or schedules an appointment with you, they should get an immediate, personalized email response. You can do this by setting up an automated lead nurturing sequence that is triggered when someone fills out a form and then sends a specific email to them that incorporates the personalized video you created.

The email will include a video that is personalized to the recipient (you can easily do this by simply using the holding up a sign that has their name on it example I gave earlier in this article).

Here’s a quick video on the importance of lead nurturing by the folks over at Hubspot.

Again, focus on the “what’s in it for me”.  Doing that will catch their eye since most follow up emails don’t include a video, let alone a video with a person holding up a dry erase board with their actual name written on it.

3. Sales Demo Follow Up

Much like the webinar follow up example, personalized video is a great way to nurture a prospect that you’ve done a sales demo for but haven’t yet closed the deal. Again, not everyone buys right away.

Utilize your personalized video to highlight answers to some of the key questions they had during the demo, to reiterate your brand’s value proposition and to give them the feeling that you are 100% focused on them and their needs.

Nobody wants to get a generic, “Following up on our demo” email from a salesperson. It makes the prospect feel simply like a number, and not a real person with real needs and goals.

Dive Into Personalized Video Today Or Be Left Behind

Long gone are the days that you could simply use a canned, uninspired email template, blast it out to every prospect in your database and get their attention.

It is critical that your marketing and sales teams get aligned to pinpoint how to approach your personalized marketing plans in a way that will be consistent from the initial nurturing all the way through the closing process.

As more an more tools come on the market and marketing and sales teams are getting more and more creative with personalized video, consumers are going to grow to expect this one to one interaction.

It’s critical your company stay ahead of the curve, adopt these principles early and get a jump start over your competition.

How Will You Begin Using Personalized Video?

1:1 video marketing is already the norm. Have you already invested in personalized marketing? And have you started using videos to help with your personalization efforts yet? Let us know in the comments below!