Pump up your e-book sales volume with a product video

Pump up your e-book sales volume with a product video

Pump up your e-book sales volume with a product video on YouTube, and why not? Most companies selling tangible goods use video to promote their products. For example, in 2009 Samsung launched a product video featuring sheep wrapped up in the company’s latest LED technology.

To date, the Samsung sheep video on YouTube has received 14.5 million views and still counting. In short, Samsung’s product video has reached out and continues to reach out to its customer base with a tantalizingly effective marketing message which has translated into an overwhelming demand for its LED technology and other electronic products. So if Samsung can do it, why not the e-book author?

Creating a product video is not that difficult. There are plenty of software packages available that will allow you to produce a good quality video for distribution over the net. However, getting people to watch your product video is another matter.

One advantage that mainstream companies have over first-time e-book authors is worldwide brand awareness. Unless you are a very famous author, it is unlikely that you will have a global following. If you did, you wouldn’t need a product video.

So how do you overcome the problem of getting your product video noticed? The answer to that question is to create a video that is unique, funny or has novelty value, and which can carry your product message to the marketplace. Remember, the idea is to get as many people to watch your product video as possible. You want your product video to go viral!

Often as not, the most successful product videos are those which resonate with audiences. In other words, identify the audience’s problem and then offer a solution, but do it in such a way that is not contrived or comes across as chalk and talk. Don’t tell! Instead, your product video should entertain and inform.

One of the funniest and perhaps most entertaining series of product videos I have watched in recent years is the Budweiser ads, in particular, those ads where animal and human interaction takes place. Animals are cute and cuddly, but when they are employed to usurp the human intellect, the results can be extremely funny.

Unlike Budweiser, you probably don’t have millions to spend on video production and well trained animals, so capturing a funny moment between animals and humans is not an option for your product video. Ultimately, budgetary constraints will impact on what type of product video you create, but this does not mean you should limit your imagination.

In my next article, I will be looking at how to generate ideas for an e-book product video.