How to repurpose video content to save time and increase reach
If you're on the fence about creating video for your non profit, here are some stats to blast you off it.
According to Google's research, 39% of people who watch a non profit's video look up the accompanying organisation within 24 hours of viewing it. And 57% of people who watch a video for a non profit go on to make a donation.*
Pretty compelling stuff.
Video content is a great way to introduce new people to what you do and why it's important. Done well, it can create an emotional connection with the viewer that starts to build that relationship that's so important for long-term engagement and support. And just a note here to flag that if showing beneficiaries isn't appropriate for you, hearing a donor or staff member speak about why they are passionate about your cause can be really powerful too, especially if they have relevant personal experience.
But once you make that initial 'brand' video that tells your story or a campaign video for a particular fundraising drive, how do you make sure that it's working as hard as possible for you?
It's really easy to stick it up on your homepage, not see any increase in donations, and dismiss it as a failure. If that sounds familiar, keep reading - you're missing out on an opportunity. Here's how you can use that video effectively.
On your website. Think of your homepage as a doorway to the information your website contains, and remember it's the first page most people will see. A 5 minute video is off-putting at that point - it feels like a big commitment. But once you've become a little more familiar with the organisation, a 5 minute brand video would be really powerful on an 'Our Mission' or 'What we do' page, for people who have sought out that information. If it's campaign-specific, a similar approach can be taken on your microsite.
On your social media. YouTube is a great channel for long-form video, but if your channels of choice are Facebook, Instagram or LinkedIn look at breaking up your content. Repurposing content is one of the most time-saving and sanity-saving activities you can do in digital marketing because it saves you from constantly feeling like you need to reinvent the wheel. Chop your video into bitesize slices (aim for 30 seconds to a minute) and use them for social posts, with your copy introducing or expanding on the details in the video snippet. Add your logo to the end of each snippet - but not the front as you need those crucial seconds to grab the audience's attention.
One note here: your employees sharing a video posted from your organisation's profiles can vastly increase the number of eyes on your video!
On your social profiles. Facebook, YouTube and Twitter allow the upload of videos as media files, so alongside using the sliced-up content for posts you can also house the main file on your profile. This is helpful for people who have hit your profile page and are looking to find out more without having to move over to your website, and gives the video much more longevity than purely posting all or part of it.
Via email. If email marketing is part of your digital strategy (and if it's not, we should talk about that) then sharing your brand video with your subscriber list is a great way to reinforce the importance of your mission in their minds. You can embed the video within the email or share a link to it, depending on your set up.
On your digital ads. Video is a brilliant format for paid ads - it's simple to engage with, gets messages across easily and catches the eye when you're scrolling. Those snippets you used for your organic social can be repurposed for video view campaigns (amongst others) across the newsfeeds or reels/Stories, to get even more eyes on your video.
So that's one video, used in a multitude of ways across all your digital activities, helping it to reach - and move - the most people possible.
* https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/_qs/documents/666/digital-non-profits-study_research-studies.pdf