We all remember Gary Vee and his 10-year old “If you are not creating video, you are losing” philosophy.
Sadly, it took B2B companies almost a decade to adopt video marketing.This is both good and bad — bad because the competition is increasing, and good because very few B2B SaaS companies have fully embraced video as a consistent part of their marketing strategy.
But the crucial question is, what caused B2B marketers to suddenly start implementing video strategies, and which video format should you invest in?
Quick update, this article is now in video form as well, and you can find it embeded bellow.
Keep reading as we will answer this and many more intriguing questions.
If you want to start with video marketing, we've put together an actionable video marketing checklist to for sofware companies.
Is TikTok causing you FOMO?
We get it, TikTok is the new big thing.
With Duolingo, RyanAir, Canva, Grammarly, Adobe, and other businesses becoming TikTok famous, many companies, including the B2B SaaS ones, have tried their shot at it. Are they successful at it, though?
No.
That’s because TikTok is HARD. It’s a tricky platform because the messaging and format have to be creatively unregulated. Something corporates aren’t historically successful at.
When you think of TikTok, what comes to mind?
Snappy entertainment, leisure, and fun.
And most of your target audience doesn’t want to think and do business when they scroll For You page on TikTok.
If you look at the successful TikTok business accounts, they are almost always B2C, and very oriented toward younger generations, primarily Gen Z — who are typically not a part of your target demographic.
This aimless chase for organic reach, backed by narratives like “SEO is dead” and “short videos get the most engagement,” pushes companies to invest in trendy video content without a strong, well-thought strategy in place.
So, TikTok is not for companies:
- Looking to attract direct leads and sales.
- That want quick results.
- That can’t afford to have at least one person working on it full-time.
Rather, TikTok is a great perfect for generating brand awareness and increasing reach over the long course of time.
We've created a video covering the 5 types of Saas video content that drives results
Are you chasing the organic reach?
Since the beginning of the pandemic, organic reach on written content is steadily decreasing.
TikTok was the most popular website for months, beating Google and inherently lowering the performance of your typical blog post on Google.
Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, and even Reddit rushed to introduce their own short-video formats to accommodate this trend.
Algorithms started to push video content first, and when algorithms change, the rules of the game change too, impacting the B2B SaaS market — but not in a direct manner.
People don’t necessarily expect to see AirTable and Lemlist on their TikTok For You Page. Rather, they want:
- Explainer videos on your website, just like we do at Videodeck do.
- Helpful, complementary videos on blog posts and YouTube, like Airtable has.
- Tutorial and onboarding videos within apps and software, like Figma has.
- Software update videos across relevant social media channels, as Ahrefs posts.
This is well backed up by data: 96% of people watched an explainer video to learn more about a product or service, and 78% of people say they’ve been convinced to buy or download a piece of software or app by watching a video (Wyzowl).
Science of human psychology: Why do we consume video so much?
Videos spark attention much faster than written content, and they allow people to retain up to 95% of the information consumed, in comparison to 10% we retain form text.
Background music in videos has also been shown to increase dopamine levels in the viewer, while facial expressions invoke empathy. When we see happy and successful people in product videos, we subconsciously imagine ourselves in their position.
That’s why you should attach a video alongside your proposal or have a spokesperson explainer and demo videos.
At Videodeck, we have trained actors who can easily explain your service to potential customers and seal the deal. So, if you need any help with your videos, give us a call 😉
Watching videos with people in them further humanizes the brand allowing customers to subconsciously create a personal connection with it.
Besides psychological reasons, there’s also a hidden practicality: you can convey more in a 90-second video than in 2,500 words blog post.
People want to see all the important features of your product in action, and describing that is onerous and boring — videos allow potential customers to know what it feels like to use your product without using it.
Studies revealed that 85% of users want to see video content on landing pages, since watching videos helps them better understand brands and products (Explainify).
73% of people said that they prefer watching short videos to learn more about the service rather than reading text-based posts.
And not every video has to be created with a goal to sell — building relationships is equally as important.
Potential customers seek trust and reassurance that you can help them down the line, and plenty of various videos can help with that. Seeing educational and engaging videos, product updates, and even podcasts signals that you are working on the product.
Attention span of a goldfish: Long format vs. Short format
Wether the video is considered short or long depends on the publishing platform.
Anything shorter than 10 minutes on YouTube is short format, but anything longer than 60seconds on LinkedIn is long format. For TikTok and Instagram, short content is 15-30 seconds.
How do you decide the ideal length of a video?
1. Audience
Experiment by posting different video lengths across channels and track their performance. If you find out that your audience spends the most time watching long form YouTube videos, that’s what you should create.
2. Type of video
Some ideas require more time to b e properly communicated.
- Long-form:
- Event videos: Apple event
- Tutorials: Mailchimp tutorial 2022
- Documentaries: How brands are influencing your decisions
- Podcasts & Educational: Cold call tear-downs with Owen Richards
- Short-form:
- Product videos: Monograph overview
- Onboarding videos: Community welcome message
- Feature tutorials: How to create email campaign in Mailchimp
- Customer testimonials: Hubspot customer testimonial
- FAQs: How experienced is our travelagent marketplace
3. Goal setting — Start with the end in mind.
- If your goal is to boost sales and showcase your product, you can:
- Create short form explainer or product demo videos for website.
- Create short form promotional videos for Instagram, LinkedIn, or YT Shorts.
- If your goal is to establish authority, then:
- Start a podcast.
- Share new, unique solutions with your audience, both in short form on social media for boosting awareness, and long form on YT for nurturing community.
4. Platform
Algorithms dictate how long your videos can be. Here are the ideal lengths:
- TikTok: 10-60 seconds.
- YouTube: No set restrictions, length depends on purpose and type.
- LinkedIn: 30-90 seconds.
- Facebook: 15-200 seconds.
- Twitter: 44 seconds.
- Website home page: 30-60 seconds.
Brands that are crushing video production
1. Ahrefs — All-in-one SEO toolset
Source: Ahrefs, home page
Ahrefs has demo videos on their home page, which showcase how their features work.
This type of video is essential for SaaS companies that don’t offer free trials, since they allow visitors to get familiar with the software’s UI and UX without paying a subscription.
Here are software demo and explainer video scripts that convert users like magic!
Ahrefs also has an extensive YouTube marketing strategy focusing on hub-type content.
The videos are educational and intended to help SEO specialists, which further promotes Ahrefs’ service and increases their awareness.
They embraced the short-format explainer videos for social media as well, with the goal of quickly informing their target audience about new features and updates.
Besides promotion, Ahrefs uses social media for content distribution, too:
Based on the analysis, Ahrefs’ video marketing strategy centers around educational YouTube content, which is later distributed across LinkedIn and Twitter.
They have separate YT channels for product updates, SaaS marketing, and other languages (Russian, German, Spanish, Italian, and Japanese).
Neither of those channels has been updated for the last 8-24 months, probably because the majority of their target audience speaks English, and going into depth on one channel generates far better results than spreading across numerous ones.
👉 Key takeaways from Ahrefs’ strategy:
- Use demo videos on your website to help TA understand your product.
- Help your audience through educational and entertaining videos on YT.
- Use short format videos for product updates on social media.
- Distribute video content across social media channels.
- Great strategy for companies with deep pockets. 💵
2. Veed.io
Veed.io doesn’t use any explainer video on the website, but they offer a free plan so interested customers can easily test it out.
🗒 Note: Even if your software has a free plan, explainer videos are still recommended because most customers won’t go through the process of account creation just to learn how it works.
What we liked about Veed’s approach is the straightforward “Watch & Learn” section presented at the Home page within the Workspace.
It shows you the process of creating videos in Veed - reducing customer support tickets, and improving product adoption.
Tutorial videos are 30 to 90 seconds long, teaching new user the basics in under 10 minutes.
Check our Software Onboarding Video Script and Software Tutorial Video Script to learn more about making great video scripts.
Their YouTube and IG video strategy is sharing knowledge, tips, and tricks around video creation with the target audience, which helps them build authority, credibility, and ultimately community.
👉 Key takeaways from Veed.io’s strategy:
- Embed 30-120s short videos within the app to enhance user onboarding and product adoption.
- Focus on one-two channels, especially if you are operating on a budget.
- Strive for community building and experience.
3. Canva
TikTok shows great results if you are a horizontal SaaS, or operate in a design niche.
Canva creates native TikToks that are funny, engaging, and relatable.
The upside of creating videos for TikTok is that you can easily repurpose them on IG and YT.
Canva also actively uses Facebook and LinkedIn for lives, presentations and webinars.
If you were to closely inspect what type of content they share across channels, you can notice that it’s not just sharing the same content over and over again — while a good portion is repurposed, each channel has its own video marketing strategy.
This is important because rules for creating attention-grabbing content differ among platforms, and users expect different forms and types of video content. For example, the audience on LinkedIn looks for more professional content than the audience on TikTok.
👉 Key takeaways from Canva’s strategy:
- Optimize and tailor video strategy to each social channel — don’t just copy and paste content from one channel to another.
- Use Facebook or LinkedIn for hosting Live videos which can be cut later and repurposed across other channels.
4. Lemlist
If you are looking for a B2B SaaS company that said B2B doesn’t have to stand for Boring to Boring, here it is.
Lemlist is a cold emailing B2B SaaS known for its actionable user-oriented content marketing and in-bound LinkedIn strategies. They are one of the first companies that pushed employees to build their personal brands online and further promote the product.
Their video strategy reflects that too — industry leaders with new, unique ideas.
Podcasts and educational videos distributed primarily on YouTube are the pillars of their video marketing strategy.
Once the podcast is up and running, they chop it down into dozens of short-form videos.
This allows them to put bits of their podcasts in front of an audience who isn’t enthusiastic about 1+ hours of listening seance.
Another integral part of their marketing strategy overall is having an interesting brand persona — in lemlist’s case, that’s their CEO and founder, Guillaume Moubeche.
Many B2B SaaS founders aren’t extroverted enough to be in front of the camera 24/7, but if you are and feel like you could be the next Gary Vee, please do it.
People love to listen to other people and relate to them. Radiant personalities are like lead magnets — if you manage to position yourself as an industry influencer, the sales will skyrocket.
👉 Key takeaways from lemlist’s strategy:
- Put your employees in front of the camera — people love seeing and interacting with other people, not logos and animations.
- Repurpose podcasts into short-format videos.
- Create videos with unique POVs and ideas; be a thought leader, not just a content creator.
5. Airtable
Airtable has a wide use — from B2B to B2C across all industries — you can’t possibly answer all the questions your broad target audience has.
But, you can focus on common problems each segment might face using your product.
Airtable’s video strategy focuses on 2 things:
- Bigger picture: software tutorials and helping people solve problems and enhance their workflows.
- Customer-specific: determine your biggest customer base, i.e., content marketers, and create content tailored to their pain points.
Once those videos are created, Airtable distributes them on LinkedIn, and IG Reels + Airtable has a dedicated IG video strategy.
👉 Key takeaways from airtable's strategy:
- Embed videos within blog posts.
- Create walkthrough and explainer videos to introduce new features and integrations.
- Invite your customers to show how they use their product — here’s how Frame.io runs product development & sprints in Airtable. Check our Testemonial Video Script to ensure high ROI on this type of video.
“We don’t have time” and “We don’t know how” are just excuses
Video format is the hardest one to get done right — it requires a person who’s good in front of the camera, who knows how to script, film, and edit videos, and tailor them to different channels.
Sometimes, it’s not one person, but multiple people handling video production.
Even tough video has been widely democratized — meaning everyone can easily create satisfying video content — we understand that not everyone has the needed time and creativity to do so + you want top-quality video content, not mediocrity.
If you're looking for a saas video production company, perhaps Videodeck can help!
All you have to do is send us the script, we have the studio, cameras, and actors — you'll get a video in under 10 days.
Curious to learn more? Schedule a free consultation with us!
Want to DIY? Check out our Video Script templates ✨
