Top 5 ways video can boost your social media presence.

There are hundreds and thousands of businesses all competing for your customer's attention on social media sites, so how do you make your social media sites stand out?  The easy answer is video!

Viral videos are all the rage and billions of You-Tubers can attest to that. It was only just recently that smaller businesses really started to look for ways to harness that viral energy. The problem is that for the cost of a 30 second spot, a small business could really only afford one good video per year.

One of the reasons why LileStyle Productions has been so successful is because we are experts at creating videos that fit nicely on the internet. We really started our social media business from the process of creating videos specifically for social media.

Our company became quite good at offering a very low-cost high-quality video product, simply by eliminating extensive overhead and huge video crews. The result is a video that is very effective and leaves small businesses with the funds to do more than one.

Here are top 5 ways video can boost your social media presence and get your company noticed:

1.  People are very visual and with all of the options available to them on the internet, they naturally gravitate towards companies that indulge in their visual cravings.  Even if all you do is show the inside of the store, with shoppers enjoying the environment, you have a significant advantage over a similar business who is not using video.

2. Video can leave a positive impression on your future customers.  Use video to help draw in your customers and don't just try to sell to them. Tell them who you are and get "behind the scenes" with your company so that the viewer can feel like they know you.  This makes it a lot easier to draw them in for special events or open houses.

3.  Use video to capture soundbites or testimonials from visitors to your store.  Even if you use a flip-cam or i-phone video to capture someone's impressions as they are visiting, it can be so compelling to someone who has never visited.  Most people are very willing to share their feelings after they have had an enjoyable experience.

4. The more "real" your video is, the more impactful. In a world of live video capture where we can see turmoil not normally captured by broadcast video, the public has learned to associate the less produced videos as more real.  Keeping your video as real or authentic as possible goes a long way towards your online credibility.

5. Create a video contest that promotes your store or product.  You'll want to make sure that you have a great prize to offer and ask people to create a very short video 1-2 min using their smart phones or webcams and have them post them on your social media sites. You can even use them on your website to highlight what people are saying.

The most important thing to remember about using video is to keep it real, keep it short and keep it simple.  A lot of companies haven't really grasped the idea that social media means transparency. You can't hide what's real about your company, so make sure that what's being shown to people is the real deal. Making is short and simple will also go a long way in keeping your customer's attention.