How to Use Video to Generate More Sales Opportunities

The hardest part of the sales process has always been engagement. With the increase in competition and the over-saturation of communication through popular channels, it’s no wonder the best sales reps are constantly looking for the next evolution to leverage. One of the ways to build more sales opportunities today is to use communication mediums that stand out, like sales videos, to reach your prospects.

If you limit yourself to simple text in your outreach, then you’re consigning yourself to a level playing ground with the thousands of other brands clamoring to be heard.

Images can help increase engagement, but video is engaging enough to stand on its own and it’s definitely something every sales team should be adding to their processes.

Why Video is Important in Sales

Simply, video is a more effective communication medium than anything else available right now.

– Video is processed 60,000 times faster than text by the human brain (source)

– 98% of professionals have watched a video to learn more about a service (source)

– According to Vidyard, brands that leverage video grow 49% faster than those who don’t (source)

We’ve tested this at HubSpot in marketing with our free CRM software.

Just take a look at this example of a short 70-second sales video built for outreach. Nothing fancy, just a quick explanation of what’s being offered in a screen share type format.

Not only did this sales rep receive a 93% CTR (click-through rate) and 28% response rate, but this led to an extra $3,150 in MRR (monthly recurring revenue) from 3.8 hours of prospecting.

That’s an $828 monthly earning for each hour spent on this strategy.

Using videos in your sales processes is one of the highest return actions you can take. It is, without doubt, the next thing you need to put on your to-do list.

The question is, where should you start?

Here are a couple of ideas I’ve put together for you.

Micro Demos

Live 1-to-1 demos take up a ton of time because you’ve got to work it into your prospects schedule.

Sales reps can “produce” short videos, book-end them with custom greetings and farewells, and send them to specific prospects for a more personalized experience that easily fits with their schedule.

Because the only highly customized areas are the greeting and farewell, the sales team saves time without compromising on quality. Below is a quick example of what that personalized opening could look like.

Follow-Ups

Follow up emails are, generally speaking, pretty dull.

Adding a specific video from your vault can drastically improve the value of your outreach.

You don’t even need to change the script much. You lead with a quick recap, mention an issue, and say you have a video that targets that problem before including the pre-recorded video. An easy amendment which drastically increases engagement.

Check-ins with Existing Customers

This is a great way to bolster relationships and float the idea of a relevant cross or up-sell.

Once again, this is something that could be better achieved through video.

You could create a completely personalized video to check in on a client’s recent success or campaign. Otherwise, take the personalized lead into a pre-recorded video that explains how service B is the perfect complement to the service A they’re already using.

Breakup Videos With Prospects That Have Gone Cold

Top performing salespeople rarely walk away from a deal that’s cold. They’ll try to reach out in a creative way and work towards the sale.

Video can be a great way to re-highlight the customer’s pain point and how your service will be able to remove it.

Video is a more personal experience. The addition of a real person, talking directly to you adds an emotional element text lacks. It allows for you to leverage your charisma to turn elements that could sound dull into incredibly compelling messages.

How to Create High Converting Sales Videos

The above is a simple run-down of the types of videos you could produce.

Now I’m going to detail a couple of steps you need to take to ensure each and every video you send hits the mark.

Know Your Audience

Knowing your audience is key to success in any sales or marketing role. However, when you’re producing highly personalized video, you have to take it to the next level.

You can’t just go with the usual buyer persona elements we’re all so used to. Education, location and the like are all useful, but you’re creating a video to speak to an individual.

We’ve found the best results come from videos targeted at individuals, and we go to great lengths to understand what issues that individual is facing.

Look into the results of any previous communication, use social media monitoring tools to round out the picture of that individual and use it all to create an opening they can’t ignore.

Keep it Short

With cold outreach emails, we find that 200 words is pretty much the maximum limit you want to hit.

It’s a similar concept with video emails. You want a quick and simple video that gets straight to the heart of the problem.

The ideal time length for a video we’ve discovered is within the 60 – 90-second range. Any longer than 90 seconds and you’re going to struggle to hold user attention.

Pick the Right Setting

Think about the kind of customer you’re reaching out to and what they’d expect of you as a service provider.

Then, ensure that your surroundings for the video fit with what they would expect. Its not about wearing a three-piece suit in a Manhattan penthouse suite if you’re talking to mom and pop stores.

You’ve got to align your setting and image with what the user would expect. You can’t hide behind a keyboard with video, and the way you appear will count for a lot.

Make it Personal

If there’s one thing guaranteed to turn off a potential customer it’s a generic outreach email.

We’ve all received them, and we all know how quickly they find their way to the trash or spam folder.

With video, you’re also sending through a link to an unknown page. A lot of folk won’t click on links to unknown pages without a little prompting. So you’ve got to make sure that, from the outset, you’re building a little trust and showing the user that this video is for them.

An idea for personalizing video would be to include an image of the person in the video with a sign including the prospect’s name.

Test and Measure

This shouldn’t be news to anyone who’s spent any time in sales. If you want to continue growing your success rats, you’re going to have to continually test, measure, and optimize your actions.

When first implementing video at HubSpot, we ran a number of tests and measured the outcome of it against that of traditional email and phone prospecting.

It was because we kept continually testing and measuring through these channels that we know video created 4X the number of sales opportunities than the other channels combined.

And even though we’re seeing 4X the sales opportunities with video, we’re still continuing to optimize and improve our video marketing to see what other jumps we can make.

Video is Part of the  Future for Sales

Whether you’re a small brand with a handful of clients, or a huge multi-national looking to continue your growth, video is something you need to experiment with to make sure you’re ahead of the game.

When leveraging video strategy correctly, you can massively increase success without having to drastically increase your time investment.

You don’t have to start big, but you do have to start as soon as possible.