Video Marketing Online and Making Money
Written by alexey.lyakh on September 19, 2011
How does the average person make money on YouTube? It’s no secret that when given a choice majority of people prefer watching a video content over reading an article or even listening to a recording. Video engages your senses and delivers information much faster than any other medium. Would you prefer to watch an engaging info graphic that conveys a mass of information in less than a minute or would rather go through stacks of reports and graphs? We prefer to take in information quickly, in a concise manner and the fastest most sensory engaging way of doing so is through video.
With the rapid technological growth we are experiencing today, speed, size or quality are no longer an issue when it comes to content on line. HD cameras are cheap and now days come built into most phones. You no longer need a high production shoot or a marketing budget to make a quality video and distribute it to thousands of people. The playing field is completely levelled to the point where a 14 year old with a phone can get more exposure on his video than a million dollar budget advertisement. You can literally wake up, film something funny with your phone, upload it to YouTube with a push of a button and get tons of exposure.
The Quest for Viral
Video on the internet is incredibly social and is the most shared form of media. Only about 10% of youtube’s views come from the site, the majority happens off site embedded on social networking sites and blogs. And yet YouTube is the worlds second largest search engine and 3rd most visited website after Google and Facebook. Though video sharing sites are abundant, YouTube towers above the rest by a mile. It’s no wonder that so many companies are now building their own YouTube channels and trying so hard to make that next “viral” hit. But perhaps that’s the trouble, people can tell if you’re trying too hard. Even the old spice “I’m on a horse” commercials have run their course. Old spice keeps on making videos with a different spin on their first one but none to the same grandiose effect as the original. The videos no longer surprise or shock people, it’s something everybody is used to by now. So what’s the secret to popular online videos? How can brands use this powerful new medium to promote their products and get the same amount of exposure as your typical “Charlie bit me” home made viral online video?
There are many routes to success, here are a few examples:
Use Awesome Celebrities and their Characters
Use an Awesome Song with a Hilarious Video.
Though, not all of us may have easy access to celebrities or hundreds of models, almost everybody is capable of creating funny music and videos with a relatively low budget. Which brings us to the next topic…
How Can You Make Money on YouTube?
Online video and YouTube can provide many streams of revenue for anybody who can consistently create unique and original content. The formula is pretty simple, the more views you get and the larger your audience grows – the more money you can make. Some of the top YouTubers make well over a six figure income.
1. YouTube Partnership and Revenue Sharing. If you can consistently make original videos that gain a lot of views and subscribers you can apply for partnership. If your content meets their guidelines and you are accepted into the program, you will be able to place ads on your videos and make money every time someone clicks on them. This is done through Google’s Adsense program, in the same manner as placing Google ads on your website. You will also get a lot of extra perks, like custom thumbnails on your videos, a custom header on your channel, and in depth analytics among other things. You can read more about it here: http://www.youtube.com/partners
2. Product Placement. If your audience is large enough and your videos consistently get lot’s of views you can partner up with companies such as Cloud Meida (http://thecloudmedia.com/) Companies such as this bring together YouTube partners and brands with the aim of incorporating products into the videos of successful YouTubers.
3. Merchandising. If you look at the channels of many successful YouTube personalities you will often find a link to a store or a website that sells T-shirts with their logos. Services such as cafe press or zazzle allow people to upload their designs, choose their mark up and forget about it. These companies will take care of all order fulfilment, e-commerce, shipping etc. If your audience is large enough and your designs are cool enough, this can often be a huge stream of revenue.
4. iTunes. If you create a song along with your video, you can place it for sale on iTunes, YouTube will recognize it and put a link directly below your video. You can also create the link yourself in the video description.
5. Opportunities. YouTube can help you gain millions of views and achieve massive exposure. Almost all successful YouTube partners have had real life opportunities come their way thanks to their online success. From appearances on daytime or late night television, to worldwide tours and live shows, to tv commercials, acting and other movie industry careers.
Brands and Creators
The above 5 monetization methods are just the begging of the success and exposure online video can bring to a content creator. These are also the methods that brands and agencies keep in mind when creating content and running campaigns. However there is much potential for growth in this emerging industry. It’s important to take example of brands that are doing a very good job to stay with the curve such as redbull and cadbury. Neither over promote their product in their videos, yet because of how memorable their content is we remember the product and share the content, usually because it either amazes us or makes us laugh or in extreme cases both!
Facebook and Google – Diving Deeper
Written by alexey.lyakh on July 4, 2011
Together these two are the largest and most used Iinnternet companies in the world. Google with 150 million monthly users and Facebook hot on Google’s heels with 140, add Youtube to the equation which is also owned by Google with 125 million and you’re nearing a half a billion of monthly users. No doubt that these three websites are where the majority of us spend our free time on line. But although you might be used to thinking of these as simply a search engine or a social network you might not be fully aware of the things that go on behind the scenes of your computer screen…
What Google and Facebook are Hiding
Though the above video is quite eye opening it looks at these two giants from the perspective of an average user who isn’t getting the full picture as a result of algorithmic adjustments catered specifically to what they assume you are looking for or are interested in.
However it is important to remember that there could be other uses for the information these companies gather about you. Your entire identity is up on Facebook and Google memorizes your search habits. What are the potential uses for such a vast amount of personal information and who else could possibly have access to it?
We know that Google and Facebook use this information for making money. 97% of income of these companies comes from advertisements. Advertisements catered specifically to you based on your likes and interests derived from the vast amount information that you have wittingly or unwittingly shared with these two companies. Try paying attention to the ads you see in your gmail account. Do they change according to the content of your emails or their recipients? Privacy concerns are a disturbing issue on the Internet. We have become so accustomed to these companies and have learned to trust them so completely that we no longer question the security of our information on line. Watch the videos below and keep in mind that as positive and helpful as these sites are, it is a leap of faith on your part to fully trust in their noblest intentions.
Google Trying Not to Be Evil
The Truth About Facebook
Google Plus, Panda and Social Integration
Written by alexey.lyakh on June 30, 2011
If you’ve used google to search something this week then chances are you’ve noticed some minor cosmetic differences they have implemented, such as the black toolbar at the top and the options on the left of your search results. As an average user this might be all that you have seen and not taken much notice, but the reality is that this is just the tip of the iceberg of an entire suite of new products and changes that Google is rolling out this summer. Changes that will affect what you use Google for, how your search results are delivered to you, what makes certain websites rank higher than others, and your overall activity on the web.
Google Becoming Social
Google Plus is an entire suite of social products that in a way integrate the functionality and features of Facebook, Twitter, Skype and then some. All under one roof with one account. Here is a short video overview of the platform:
The three main elements of google plus are circles, sparks and hangouts. These three features are the social elements that are going to rival companies such as Facebook, Twitter and Skype as the platform picks up momentum. And considering that Google is the largest internet company in the world traffic and exposure shouldn’t be a problem. The coolest element of Google plus has to be hangouts. Imagine if Facebook chat was done via video and you could talk to 10 people at once. Google hangouts:
Will Google Plus Succeed?
This isn’t the first time Google has made attempts to break into the social space. Google Wave and Google Buzz were million dollar projects that were launched before with similar intentions that have made practically zero impact on how we use Google. The Google +1 button has been around for months now but it is still not clear what purpose it actually serves. It is essentially Googles version of the Facebook Like button but unlike the latter it doesn’t share anything or have any residual value, it is just a button that you click that seems to have no impact on your immediate experience. Only time will tell, but the amount of commitment and back end changes involved with Google’s venture into the social element of the web it is a good guess to say that the large social media companies now have another heavyweight competitor to share it’s user base with.
Down the Rabbit Hole…
As an ordinary user the new layout or the new social products don’t really impact your life in any way other than giving you the ability to do even more cool stuff on the internet that you weren’t able to do before. But as a business owner or somebody who utilizes the internet to some degree to generate revenue or leads this leap into the social space brings with it a heap of new problems and opportunities.
Google has been focusing on location based search over the last few years and has succeeded in delivering relevant results to users based on their geographic locations. By doing this it has also succeeded in practically putting all phone book companies out of business. It has diminished local newspaper advertising revenues and taken on an entirely new type of media. The leap into the social space has brought with it the time and relationship factors. Bing has tied in Facebook search a while ago where if you are logged into Facebook any searches you type into Bing will return Facebook related results specific to your social network. Google has been giving you Twitter results for certain topics for a while now as well.
The sidebar on the left of your search results now lets you choose a date range for your search results. So if you are looking for the latest sports scores you can search your teams name and filter by 24 hours thus getting the latest updates on the topic.
If you use Google analytics you can now set it up to track your social media efforts as well as your website interactions:
The implementation of social elements into analytics tracking and webmaster tools is much more than a set of new features, along with Google+ and other new social products it’s a clear statement of the direction in which the company is headed. It is also an outrageously blunt hint as to what factors are being looked at by the new search algorithms updates when ranking certain sites above others in search results.
Google Algorithm Update “Panda” 2.2
If you have noticed that your search engine rankings are all over the map these last few weeks, going up and down twice daily or if your website has disappeared from Google’s results completely then you are experiencing the full wrath of Google’s Panda 2.2 algorithm update.
Google is about relevance and user experience. The main objective is to give the user the most relevant high quality result for their search query. SEO or search engine optimization is nothing more than at attempt at telling Google that your site is more relevant than the other sites about your specific subject. Link building and and keyword placement on the site have been proven factors in ranking your site higher in organic search results since the very beginning. However, people have learned through trial and error what elements the Google algorithm looks at when deciding which sites rank highest and have begun to take advantage of their knowledge by concentrating primarily on black hat techniques that work exceptionally well in raising their rankings. However once this became the focus the content quality has began to decline. People would rank mediocre or poor content sites at the top for high search volume key words in order to make an extra buck. This in turn makes Google look bad as the quality of the results it delivers to it’s users suffers as well. The answer – Google Panda.
SEO Practices are Changing…
Google panda focuses on filtering out those sites that have thousands of poor quality spam links and those with duplicate or poor quality content out of it’s search results. Unfortunately it isn’t possible for Google to make an algorithm that will de-list all the websites that use these bad practices because that would give spammers a weapon against good quality sites that they could sabotage via the same methods. So what’s the answer? Avoid the whole situation all together, rather than punishing sites with poor practices they will reward sites that have good practices. And with all of the new social media features and directions that Google is taking you can bet that your social media efforts are now of direct relevance to your keyword rankings on Google. As noble as the attempt and idea is, it has millions of website owners around the world pissed off as they watch their rankings disappear completely for 2 hours and come back better than ever 2 hours later only to drop again to the bottom of the pile the next day. If you have a web store or a business that relies on the internet to generate leads or income you will definitely feel uneasy while these changes are happening. The ripple effect from the panda update and the social media direction can be felt most by those websites who have relied on link building more than content and social media before. This is likely to go on for the next few weeks as the dust begins to settle and your rankings begin to solidify again.
So what will work now? The same concepts apply: quality content, quality link building, quality website, etc. Everything works just as it did before but with more emphasis on one thing: quality. However there is now a social layer added to the equation. If you are up against a website with a bigger social media presence and activity in your industry, you can bet that they will be ahead of you in the search results as well.
