As a resource, video offers a great opportunity to connect and engage with your current and potential association members. You can use video to both retain and gain new members. Videos can also be used to educate and demonstrate member value.
If you’re worried about the cost of video engagement, worry not, as there are many low-cost solutions to produce high-quality video content. For example, one way to produce video content is by taking a clip from an existing presentation by a speaker, which involves basically no cost at all.
Video engagement is personal as well. It allows you to share testimonials, staff insights, and personal messages from leaders. The personal touch goes a long way to engaging association members and gaining new ones.
In this article, you will learn how to engage association members using video; it’s broken down into eight nice simple tips.
Quick Reads
- Create a Welcome Video for Your Team Member
- Promote Exclusive Member Benefits
- Educate Members
- Circulate Powerful Messages
- Show Day-to-Day Organizational Activities
- Promote Offers
- Run Social Campaigns
- Show Conferences
Create a Welcome Video for Your Team Member
When a new team member joins your association, you want to create a good first impression and ensure they feel welcome. A well-made welcome video is a great engagement tactic. The welcome video can feature the association’s president or equivalent role, but you can also use team members.
The first type of video you can make is a personal message from the president. A personal touch and a brief overview of the association's aspirations make the member feel welcome and inspired. The fact the leader has taken the time to make a video also shows new team members that the association is invested in its members.
You can also make a meet the team video, where key members introduce themselves and give a first-hand experience of being in the association. This kind of welcome video makes new members feel more settled and assured that the association is a positive thing to be part of.
Another alternative is a short video demonstrating association members in action. A video like this can be used with other types of videos to engage the new team member further.
The video features different association members to welcome new members. They also point out what the new members can expect from their new exciting journey.
Promote Exclusive Member Benefits
Video can be used to promote exclusive member benefits and content to new and current members who may be unaware of all the benefits of their membership. Promoting member benefits using video helps attract new and retain current members, so it’s well worth doing.
Using actual association members in your videos is always a good idea. It highlights the human side of your association and helps show the watcher how the benefits can help them personally. So combine a breakdown of the key benefits with a human touch to achieve the most powerful member benefit video.
For example, the American Bar Association (ABA) uses videos alongside written testimonials. In these videos, the association members explain the benefits they reap from having full membership in the ABA.
Educate Members
Video is a good medium for educational content as you can demonstrate with both audio and visual aids. According to TechSmith, 83% of people prefer educational video content to text or audio. Also, the preferred video length is between five and 19 minutes long, so bear this in mind when you make your educational video content.
One good format to use is a frequently asked questions video. Within a particular topic, there will be lots of common questions that can be addressed through a video.
You can also create step-by-step guides to educate and engage association members on products, equipment, processes, and tasks. These step-by-step video guides should engage users by taking them through a detailed process of achieving a particular result. On this note, you need first to know the knowledge level of your target audience so you can create a video that will be useful.
Check this out:
2015 ASBMB Annual Meeting from ASBMB on Vimeo.
The American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology uses videos to explain to its members why they should attend annual meetings.
Circulate Powerful Messages
It doesn’t matter how slick your videos are. If the message isn’t powerful, it won’t have the impact you want. One way to deliver a powerful message is by using video testimonials.
Video testimonials are a great way to engage as they allow you to share intimate stories with your audience. The content can cover experiences within the association. Members are more likely to trust online content coming from a real person, which makes video testimonials relevant content and a powerful tool in your toolbox.
You can also share advice videos like the American Heart Association’s material. For example, here is one of their videos discussing how to prevent cardiac arrests:
The message is powerful and engaging. The member is told about how the association plans to prevent cardiac arrests from happening with the latest medical technology and advanced training.
Another type of compelling video content is a response to a big event that affects your membership. Using the example above, if a new development in cardiac arrest technology was found, the American Heart Association could make a video explaining the breakthrough to its members. Because the information is new, it will be more likely to engage association members.
Show Day-to-Day Organizational Activities
Videos can be used to show association members everything about an association. You can introduce the association with welcome videos, show day-to-today activities, and showcase exclusive networking events. Any association updates can be made into a video format as well.
Having all your videos in one accessible place for members means they will understand the benefits of the association conveniently. Also, it’ll make it easier for potential members to access all the resources they need to make the decision to join your association.
Here’s an example of an association using video to show what they’re all about:
Create a series of such videos showing the different aspects of your association and answering some of the questions potential members might have.
Promote Offers
According to Forbes, the average user spends 88% more time on a website with video. Therefore, the video format is more likely to entice potential members to make your offers more compelling.
Instead of just writing a blog post or sending emails about your offers, create a video. These will likely perform much better, as one of your executive association members discusses the offers in a video. They can explain why those offers are a big deal helping to capture and pique the interest of association members.
Here’s an example of a video used to attract new members:
The video shares the Dallas Safari Club’s offers while also providing an exciting prize draw to new members. Combine sharing information about your association with incentives for joining for the best results.
You can also promote your video material to potential members using email campaigns. Email finder tools can be helpful here as they can help you get the contact details of potential members and even verify your email list.
Run Social Campaigns
An incredible 97.8% of US internet users aged between 18 and 24 consider themselves social video watchers. So having an online presence that utilizes video is a great way to engage association members, particularly young ones. Just make sure you’re doing social campaigns the right way.
The best way to run a social media video campaign is first to set clear goals for your campaign. How many members do you want to engage? Is there a particular demographic being targeted?
The next key decision is which social media platforms to use. Different social media sites host different types of audiences. Therefore, the platform you use will depend on the type of audience you want to target.
But it’s also important to consider which video format and features you should utilize. Take Facebook as an example. According to Statista, 81.8% of users only use Facebook on mobile. So it makes sense to format your videos to accommodate mobile users.
When it comes to features like captions, stories, and playlists, you first need to evaluate if the feature appeals to your target demographic and if it will be effective. For example, captions are crucial for all video social media posts, as Facebook videos will often appear with the sound off. A good caption can trigger your online community to engage with the clip and turn the sound on.
Therefore, write engaging captions for your videos, especially when posting them on social media. You can use copywriting tools and Grammarly or an alternative to Grammarly to write engaging and accurate captions.
You can schedule the video to be posted at the perfect time it is most likely to be seen by members. Analyzing your key metrics like view count, watch times, shares, likes, and comments is important, too. The conclusions you draw from analyzing your key metrics can help you create more effective future social media video marketing content.
Show Conferences
Using videos of speakers helps engage association members as well as promote specific courses and talks. Videos of speakers do not have to be professionally produced; all you have to do is collaborate with the speaker to film a video during the talk. The video can then be edited into shorter clips and distributed across social media and other channels.
Also, the talk can be one-on-one style or just a clip from a presentation. You can also share random thoughts from the conference attendees. It’s really up to you!
While creating clips from conferences, it’s important to know what would be of interest to your association members. This is especially critical if you want to show a clip from a presentation. Be keen to pick only the segments that are relevant or helpful. This may also be the time to consider what can and cannot be shared on public platforms.
For example, if the speaker shared tons of actionable advice from the conference, would it be okay to share that entire talk with everyone on social media? Would that affect the perceived value of being a member when such materials are shared for free on social media?
Ideally, you want to strike the perfect balance - where you can share just enough engaging material from conferences but not too much to devalue the essence of being a member.
Now you know how to engage association members using video. But, like with all marketing, you must keep a consistent brand voice and style. So follow a style guide while producing your video content to ensure it remains consistent with your other marketing assets.
In Closing
Video is a great content format to engage association members. You can reach out to new members and show the value of your membership to current members. You also use videos to educate and inform your members.
To maximize engagement, you should also circulate powerful messages like a response to a topical event or an update within your field. But video can also help both members and potential members better understand the association.
You can show potential members the benefits of membership and put real members in your videos to show an authentic portrayal. Don’t forget to run social media video campaigns as well. Video campaigns on social media channels can help you reach new audiences.
Using videos of speakers at your events is an advisable engagement strategy for several reasons. The content is cheap to make, effective, and drives engagement.
Use a video today to engage your association members. Internet users are shifting to video-based content, so get ahead of the curve and incorporate video content to reap the benefits for your association.
Author's Bio
David Campbell is a digital marketing specialist at Ramp Ventures. He helps manage the content marketing team at Right Inbox. When he's not working, he enjoys traveling and trying to learn Spanish.
