Live Video and Marketing: Where the Industry Is Heading

Interested in using live video for business?

Have you considered creating a live video show?

To find out what live video can do for your business, I interview Brian Fanzo.
More About This Show
The Social Media Marketing podcast is an on-demand talk radio show from Social Media Examiner. It's designed to help busy marketers and business owners discover what works with social media marketing.

In this episode, I interview Brian Fanzo, a tech evangelist who specializes in live video. He's the founder of iSocialFanz and host of the FOMOFanz podcast.

Brian explores live video, where it's headed, and how it can help your business.

You'll discover whether to use Facebook Live or Periscope if you're just getting started.

Share your feedback, read the show notes, and get the links mentioned in this episode below.
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Here are some of the things you'll discover in this show:
Live Video and Marketing
What Live Video Means for Business

Whether yours is a small business, a brick-and-mortar store, or an ecommerce company, you need to shrink the distance between yourself and your customer, Brian explains. Live video is much more than a marketing play because it shrinks that distance by humanizing your brand and business.

Live video is also the gateway to technologies such as augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR), which Brian believes will be huge by 2020. To embrace AR and VR, he says, companies and brands will need to have a live video strategy already in place.

He says today's consumers want you to convince them that you can be trusted, that you're a resource, are invested in them, and can understand them. They don't want to be marketed or sold to; they want to engage and have a conversation with you. Businesses need to spend time building rapport, a relationship, and trust with their audience, and live video is a great vehicle for that.

With regard to building trust, Brian believes the most valuable statement anyone can make on live video is, "I don't know." If a brand admits they don't know something on live video, it adds validity to what they do know. (When you're stumped, you can also ask audience members to send you a message on Twitter or Facebook, and say you'll have your product manager get back to them.)

Listen to the show to hear more about the strategy behind using live video to break down barriers with your audience.

Getting Started With Live Video

Brian says that according to Cisco, 79% of Internet traffic in 2020 will be video. Nowhere did anyone say that's going to be great video, good video, or live video, Brian continues. However, he believes most brands are thinking about video.

Many people think live video is scary because they picture themselves on the video. Brian has to remind them that the best live videos are often made when you're celebrating customers and employees. And if your live video brings people access they can't get anywhere else, the camera doesn't even need to be on you.

For example, say you use live video to interview a client, a customer, or a celebrity while they're in the office. As the person behind the camera, you can watch the comments for questions and decide which are important enough to ask the guest. With these kinds of live videos, all of the scary elements of being on air are taken away.

Listen to the show to discover my process for doing live videos.

Innovative Examples of Live Video

Brian says Cisco has done an amazing job with their We Are Cisco campaign. Employees in different offices are trusted to take over the company's social media accounts, including Snapchat and Instagram, to share their point of view.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oMjEzVH1d0k

Not only does the campaign celebrate Cisco's employees, it's also a great recruiting tool. The company doesn't have to convince job applicants that they trust their employees; the proof is v...