Video has become a mainstay of content marketing. Especially on social media, video has proven to be an effective way to engage and educate consumers. As of the third quarter of 2023, digital video surpassed TV for consumer viewing time. While creating video content is more accessible than ever before, filming without first setting a strategy can be costly and cut into a brand’s effectiveness. Read on to learn why and how to create a video content strategy to maximize this popular medium.

What Is a Video Content Strategy?

A video content strategy outlines the goals, audience, process, plan and measurement framework for your video program. It should complement your broader content strategy. While you may have specific video goals or use unique metrics to measure video, all video you produce should support your business in some way, whether it be to raise brand awareness, promote a product or grow subscribers.

Why You Need a Video Content Strategy

Video can be one of the most expensive-to-produce content types in your content mix, so you’ll want to be intentional with every dollar you spend. Starting with a video content strategy can help avoid costly hiccups, such as re-shooting. Your strategy helps you take the guesswork out of what to film and the platform you should optimize it for.

Even the best video can be missed or ignored by your target audience if it’s not distributed and promoted strategically. The audience section of your video content strategy will provide details on which channels your viewers watch video on and what length of video they prefer.

How to Create a Video Content Strategy in 6 Steps

Once you’ve decided to incorporate video into your content strategy, follow these six steps to create a content plan. 

Step 1: Define Your Video Goals

Your video goals should support and ladder-up to your broader business goals. Some business goals might be:

• Grow revenue in a certain product line by 5%
• Register 300 people for an upcoming event
• Acquire 50 new customers

Your video goals will be framed in terms of video metrics, but they should follow a logical path toward helping you achieve your business goals. For example, to achieve the above business goals, your video goals may be:

• Nurture warm leads by including a customer testimonial in all sales follow-up for the product line, and aim for a 25% monthly click-through rate
• Generate interest in the event by producing a sizzle reel that garners at least 50 clicks per week on LinkedIn
• Raise brand awareness by filming a commercial and getting at least 1,000 impressions per week

Each video goal should be specific, measurable, achievable and time bound.

Step 2: Define Your Audience

Your audience will guide your creative decisions about the duration, style and content of your videos. And you may have more than one audience, with different characteristics according to the product or service you’re promoting or the channel on which you’ll promote your video.

Developing personas will help you understand your audience’s likes and dislikes, interests, viewing preferences, etc. As you define your personas, include information on which platform(s) your audience uses to watch video. Are you trying to reach viewers who scroll TikTok or consumers who browse YouTube? Different platforms cater to different kinds of viewers, so it’s unlikely that the same video will resonate across all of them.

Step 3: Create a Video Production Plan

If you’re just breaking into video, document in your strategy how you will acquire the resources needed to produce your videos. Will you produce them in house or work with a partner, such as a video production company? If producing in house, what equipment will you need to invest in? Does your team have the skills required for all the phases of video production from storyboarding to scripting to filming to editing? Document all your needs and how you will meet them before stepping behind, or in front of, the camera.

Step 4: Identify Video Topics

After you document your goals in step one, topics should flow naturally. Aim to strike a balance between topics that showcase your expertise or your brand’s value with topics that interest your audience. For example, if your organization provides continuing education courses, and your audience is interested in professional development, you might make a video about ways to advance your career and include your courses as one option.

Once you’ve defined your topic list, use a content calendar to plan out when you will tackle each topic.

Step 5: Determine a Video Promotion Plan

Promoting your video is equally important as producing it. There are a plethora of media channels, websites, and other media platforms. Deciding where to promote and advertise your video is key. Using the media preferences you documented in your audience personas can help you decide where to promote your video for maximum views and engagement.

Your plan should include a mix of owned, earned and paid media efforts. Video is a medium with great potential for repurposing. You can promote it with sound bites on your podcast, teaser clips on social media or transcripts on your blog.

Step 6: Establish a Measurement Framework for Your Videos

Tracking your videos’ performance is key in determining if you are accomplishing your goals and whether your investment is paying off. While views and engagement are common metrics shown on most video platforms, you should be able to quantify your success that with metrics such as downloads, subscriptions, purchases, etc. If views aren’t translating to new leads or new business, consider how you can modify your videos or your strategy to include stronger calls to action or link to pages with higher conversion rates.

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