Executive Summary While the production elements (ammo) are critical to a video’s success, video content must be engaging and relevant to your viewers in order to make an impact. For this reason, selecting the proper video content to align with your target viewing audience can be the most powerful ammo for your video. This How-To Guide discusses how to align your video content choices with your audience, the most successful types of video content and the benefits associated with each content type. This 5-page guide includes the following sections: Understanding Your Audience Video Content Types An Action Plan for Selecting Content Types for Your Videos Demand Metric's How-To Guides are designed to provide practical, on-the-job training and education and provide context for using our premium tools & templates. If there is a topic that you would like to see covered, please contact us at info@demandmetric.com (link sends e-mail) to make a content request.

1. How-To Guide
© 2014 Demand Metric Research Corporation. All Rights Reserved.
Selecting Content Types for Videos
By Kristen Maida, Research Analyst
January 2014
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
“If a picture is worth a 1,000 words, than a video is worth a 1,000 words,
25 times a second” (www.distilled.net). As we have all experienced,
images speak louder than words. Is this because an image produces a
more powerful message than words? Not necessarily. However, due to
the actual time invested in viewing an image versus reading a page of
text, our brains are able to process the meanings and emotional responses
associated with viewing an image much faster.
Video content functions in much the same way; with much more depth
and complexity than a single image. Videos string together a potent
combination of elements (ammo) – audio, cast/speaker(s), images,
graphics and text. The addition of each element in a video exponentially
increases the power of the video itself, which explains why a one-minute
video is worth 1,500,000 words.
While the production elements (ammo) are critical to a video’s success,
video content must be engaging and relevant to your viewers in order to
make an impact. For this reason, selecting the proper video content to
align with your target viewing audience can be the most powerful ammo
for your video.
This How-To Guide discusses how to align your video content choices
with your audience, the most successful types of video content and the
benefits associated with each content type.

2. How-To Guide
© 2014 Demand Metric Research Corporation. All Rights Reserved.
UNDERSTANDING YOUR AUDIENCE
The key to selecting the proper content type for your video(s) is to truly
understand the needs and behavior of your target audience. Many
organizations conduct demographic studies to understand key target
markets for their product/service. The information retrieved from those
studies is very useful for the purpose of marketing your video content.
However, it is even more important to take those demographics a bit
further to understand the behaviors and personas of your clients and
prospects.
Here are some key questions you and your video marketing project team
should ask yourselves about your target audience at this stage:
 What does your audience need? Do they need information,
education, advice and/or fun/diversion?
 What are the key challenges your viewers are trying to address?
 At what stage in the buying process are the majority of your
viewers?
 What buyer persona(s) will you encounter through this video?
 What are the media (Internet, TV, radio, etc.) habits of your
audience?
 What are the social media habits of your viewers?
VIDEO CONTENT TYPES
Once your project team has settled on the answers to the questions above,
you will be prepared to discuss the different content types that may align
with your audience.
While you can view a wide variety of video content types on YouTube
and various websites, there are four main content groups that have the
most success for organizations. These video content types are as follows:
 Promotional – A promotional video typically involves an
advertisement for a product/service. This content type can be
comparable to a television ad in all aspects including message,
images and branding. Organizations create promotional videos to
focus on new products, product updates and/or overall company

3. How-To Guide
© 2014 Demand Metric Research Corporation. All Rights Reserved.
information in order to engage existing customers and gain more
interest from prospects.
 Benefits: can be used for targeted campaigns to specific
demographics, enhances brand perception and assists in
lead generation
 Fills Need For: Information
 Example: View Demand Metric’s Corporate Overview
Here.
 Instructional – For an organization, instructional videos can be
used to educate customers and prospects on a specific product or
on new features for an existing product. This content type can be
promotional; however, it is more beneficial to focus on how your
product/service functions to ensure viewers gain knowledge/skills
after watching the video. For professionals with little time for
attending workshops, instructional videos are a convenient and
flexible way for professionals to learn new skills.
 Benefits: supports customer learning and enhances
customer experience
 Fills Need For: Education
 Example: Learn how-to use a Demand Metric tool
(product) Here.
 Thought Leadership – Becoming a thought leader in a particular
industry/market is one of the main goals of a video marketing
program. The purpose of thought leadership videos is to provide
your audience with insights and best practices in a given
industry/market. Typically, organizations engage subject matter
experts (SMEs) in their industry/market to speak about important
topics for their audience.
 Benefits: positions organization as an industry leader, helps
clients/prospects understand key topics and supports
viewers in an effort to optimize best practices
 Fills Need For: Advice

4. How-To Guide
© 2014 Demand Metric Research Corporation. All Rights Reserved.
 Example: View a pre-recorded Demand Metric webinar
with a SME Here to understand how to utilize industry
experts for your video content.
 Entertainment – This category is where you will find your “viral”
videos. Videos that are deemed “entertaining” or “humorous” are
usually used to draw attention to a company/brand. These videos
tend to be more outrageous and creative than the other three
content types listed above.
 Benefits: attracts attention to an organization/brand and
enhances an organization’s intended brand perception
 Fills Need For: Fun/Diversion
 Example: View one of the most viral, entertainment videos
made by a company in 2013 Here.
ACTION PLAN
In order to select the video content that is best suited to your audience,
follow these steps:
1. Obtain Demographic Study Results – As a marketer, you most
likely already have access to this information. If you do not have
immediate access to the study results, you can most likely contact
someone in your Market Research or Product Development
department to acquire this information.
2. Define Your Audience – Use our Customer Profile Template to
organize the demographic information you have retrieved. At this
stage, you should have enough information to choose which
customer profile your video will geared toward.
3. Understand Your Audience – Download and complete our
Buying Process Stage Template and Buyer Persona Template.
These two templates allow you to assess your potential audience
and gain a deep understanding of your viewers’ needs.
4. Align Content Type(s) with Audience Need(s) – Once you
establish your audience need(s) – information, education, advice
and/or fun/diversion – review the video content types listed above
to see how they align with the associated need.

5. How-To Guide
© 2014 Demand Metric Research Corporation. All Rights Reserved.
5. Manage Your Video Content – As you engage in your video
marketing program, it is important to remember that the needs of
your audience may be different for each video you produce. In
order to manage the different videos and video content in your
program, utilize our Video Marketing Assets Database.
BOTTOM LINE
Videos are an extremely powerful marketing tool that can ignite interest
in your company/brand, generate quality leads and provide a new line of
revenue for your organization. Therefore, selecting the proper type of
video content to attract and engage your viewers is vital to any video
marketing program. In order select the video content best suited for
your audience, your video marketing team must have a deep
understanding of the audience, comprehend the different types of
video content and align the audience’s need(s) with the related
content type(s).