Become the go-to-accountant with this 5 step video marketing strategy
Use this framework to create video content that attracts your ideal clients
Are you currently using video marketing for your accounting firm?
I asked this question as a poll in a webinar this week and the answer was a resounding ‘no’.
Look, I don’t blame you. Video marketing is hard work.
It’s hard enough to sit down and figure out what to write on Linkedin some days!
But video marketing (and content marketing in general) doesn’t have to be hard work.
Today, I want to change that for you.
I want to give you a simple framework you can follow to start creating video content that positions you as the credible expert you are and helps you to attract your ideal clients.
I ran this as a webinar on Wednesday for the Accountant’s Wealth Academy and the next day several members posted their first videos on social media. Follow this process to start posting your own video content…
But first, let’s look at why video marketing is so important.
69% of people prefer watching videos over reading
That’s 69% of your target market on social media that would rather watch you on video than read your content.
There’s more:
49% of people watch a minimum of 5 videos per day
4 billion videos are viewed every single day on Facebook
Reels are shared 1 billion times per day on Instagram
Videos generate 300 million impressions per year on Linkedin
And TikTok takes the crown with the average user spending 95 minutes per day watching videos
Hopefully, you see my point - video consumption is at an all-time high.
But that’s not why I think you should do video marketing…
The real value of video marketing for accountants is that video is one of the fastest ways to establish credibility and build trust online.
The online world is full of fraudsters, fake influencers, and wanna-be gurus spouting nonsense on social media.
Mix in recent developments in AI and Chat-GPT and what’s the result?
People are more sceptical than ever.
Your primary goal with any form of online content is to help prospective clients to:
Know you
Like you
Trust you
Video is now becoming one of the most authentic ways to do that (unless you use tools like SynthesiaAI to create them).
So how do you get started? Here are the 5 steps you need to follow:
Who are you creating for?
Where are you posting them?
What are you talking about?
How do you record them?
How do you promote them?
Most people skip steps #1 & #2 which is why they get to step #3 and have no idea what to say. I’m going to share 3 content strategies with you shortly so that you never run out of video marketing ideas.
Let’s get into it:
1. Who are you creating for?
Content for everybody is content for nobody.
Knowing who you’re creating for will make:
Choosing which channels to use
What to say in your videos
100x easier.
Think about the types of ideal clients you want to attract:
Are they in a particular niche?
What size of business are they?
Where are they located?
What are their biggest challenges & pain points?
What are their big goals & aspirations?
Spend 15 minutes writing this down in as much detail as you can.
2. Where will you post your videos?
You want to share your video content where your ideal clients spend time.
Now that you know who you want to target, ask yourself, why do my ideal clients spend their time?
Roughly speaking:
Instagram: Content creators, hair & beauty, hospitality (food & beverage)
Facebook: Media companies, freelancers & contractors
Linkedin: Professional services, most B2B services
There’s also a nice breakdown from the Khoros 2022 social media guide here:
It’s worth doing a bit of your own research though.
Just because a company is active on Instagram, it doesn’t mean that the person using that account is the Founder/CEO of the business. It could be a marketing exec or social media team in which case your focus should be elsewhere.
When choosing which channel to use for video content, you only need to pick one.
Lots of businesses fall into the trap of spreading themselves too thin across multiple social media channels and doing a below-average job on each.
It’s much better to pick one and own it. For the majority of firms, you will see enough growth in client numbers from one social media channel without breaking your back trying to manage several.
3. What do you talk about?
This is probably the biggest objection to all content creation, not just video.
The truth is that content inspiration & ideas are everywhere. You just need a process and a framework to capture them.
Here are 3 content strategies you can use to create video content for your firm:
1. Beginner content strategy
This is a content strategy every accounting & bookkeeping firm can get started with today.
The source of content ideas? Questions your existing clients are already asking you.
If a client is asking you a question, the likelihood is that other clients (and prospects) are also thinking about the same thing.
Here’s how it works:
Create a spreadsheet/Asana/Trello board to capture client questions
Get everybody in your team to update this whenever clients ask common questions
Don’t worry about questions being too big or too small
1x per month review the list and prioritise based on how frequently they’re asked + relevance (e.g. is it a timely topic)
Record videos answering these questions
You now have a batch of video content you can use to answer questions for both prospects and current clients.
2. Advanced content strategy
This is the same content strategy we help our clients to implement at Troika.
You start with your core content themes which are always:
Education - sharing your knowledge & expertise
Showcasing - social proof, testimonials, case studies
Timely - what’s happening in the world/industry right now?
Leads & sales - yes, you’re allowed to pitch sometimes!
Community - brand, behind the scenes, your place in the community
Thanks to Alan Dibb’s 1-page marketing plan for these 👌
The education theme will be your primary focus. From here, break it down into two content buckets:
Bucket 1 - things related to your service offerings
Bucket 2 - things related to your ideal clients
Then for each bucket, you list out at least 10 subtopics you can talk about.
For Bucket #1, that could be things like bookkeeping, cash flow forecasting, outsourced finance, funding, tax etc. For each of those, there are plenty of angles you can take to talk about.
3. Chat-GPT content strategy
I’ve got to include Chat-GPT in here somewhere, right?
A quick shout-out to Nidhi from Credfino for sharing this one with me.
If you publish content on your blog, you can take the link to that content and drop it into Chat-GPT with the following prompt:
Here is a blog post I wrote <insert link>
I want to turn this into a series of 2-3 short videos I can record and share on social media.
Please can you:
break this into 2-3 short videos
create an outline for each video of key talking points
write a basic script for each video
Each video should last no longer than 30 seconds.
Chat-GPT will then do the hard work and give you some video outlines & scripts you can use to repurpose blog content into videos.
Nice eh?
4. How do you record + edit your videos?
Recording & editing your videos don’t need to be complicated.
In fact, you can probably avoid editing altogether, to begin with.
Here are 2 ways to approach this:
1. DIY approach
I’m guessing you have a decent phone right? Or perhaps a HD webcam?
Both of these can work great for recording videos, to begin with.
Don’t worry about investing in any fancy equipment right away, you’ve got to get comfortable with the process first.
Here are some DIY video recording tips:
Check for good lighting on your face
Put yourself in the middle of the frame
Look at the camera not the screen
Ideally put the phone on something so it doesn’t move
Here’s a bad example - notice I’m not looking at the camera, my arms in shot, and there’s light coming from behind me.
And here’s a better example - good framing, lighting is better, and most importantly I’m looking at the camera.
In terms of editing, there’s not too much you need to do.
The key thing to make sure your videos have are captions.
The majority of videos online (85% on Facebook) are viewed without sound. If you don’t use captions, you’re losing a chunk of your potential audience.
If you upload your video to Linkedin they have a new auto-captions feature which is pretty good.
If you wanted to add your own captions or add text, different background, or adjust the video size, I’d recommend checking out Kapwing, Inshot, and Descript.
I have no video editing experience and these are all really intuitive and easy to use.
Here’s a nice example of what an edited video can look like from Hannah Campbell.
2. D4U approach
If you’re serious about video marketing going forwards then it could be worth looking at recording them professionally and getting them edited.
There are lots of studios around with pro equipment where all you need to do is rock up and do your thing. They can then manage all of the editing & production afterwards.
This is obviously a more costly strategy so I’d only recommend this if you’ve seen some early success with video and want to start creating more.
Video recording tips
I’m no video expert - I don’t create anywhere near enough myself.
But here are some video recording tips that have really helped myself & others in the past:
Record in batches 1x per month
Record a few practices first to get warmed up
Don’t worry about it being perfect
Look at the camera
Talk slowly
Showcase your personality/humour
5. How do you promote them?
Getting this part right is just as important as getting the content right.
When promoting your videos, you need to keep one thing in mind:
Contextualisation.
What this fancy word really means is making sure that your video content is optimised for the channel that you’re sharing it on.
That means:
Posting videos natively (stop sharing Youtube links on Linkedin!)
Using the correct video sizes for each platform
Choosing the right video length for each platform
If your video is 16:9 format (think TV) and longer than 5 minutes, that belongs on Youtube not Linkedin.
BUT - you can share it on Linkedin if you:
Cut the video into 2-3 smaller snippets
Resize them to be 1:1 format or 9:16 (vertical)
Post them natively on Linkedin
Share a link to the full-length Youtube video in the comments
Getting this stuff right is important because it increases the chances of your prospective clients actually seeing your videos.
You can learn more about contextualising your video content here.
Quick recap + your next steps
Want to start creating videos as part of your marketing strategy?
Following these 5 steps will help:
Who are you creating for?
Where are you posting them?
What are you talking about?
How do you record them?
How do you promote them?
So what next? Here’s your challenge…
I want you to think of a question a client has asked you recently, pull out your phone, and record a video answering that question.
Keep it short & sweet, less than 30 seconds. And once you’ve done it I want you to post it on your Linkedin profile. Feel free to tag me as well.
Don’t overthink it. Linkedin will add auto-captions so no need to stress about editing.
The first video is always the hardest, and this is a great way to overcome that initial fear and start posting more video content.
Until next time,
Jordan
P.S. Will you be at Accountex or Digital Accountancy Show in the UK? Come say hello :)