4 Ways Video Is Changing the Email Marketing Landscape

For those of us of a certain "vintage," it can be easy to forget that email is not considered at all cutting edge. It's the less glamorous cousin of texting; the loner to Twitter's social butterfly. Although its cool rating may have fallen, email continues to be one of our most powerful marketing tools.

Now the trend toward incorporating videos into email is making this channel more fun again. Here's how:

#1. Engaging users

The practice of linking to a short video within the body of an email has taken off in recent years. It's a fresh way to break up the monotony of text and engage your customers.

And it's effective: in a study by GetResponse of nearly one billion emails, those containing video had a 96 percent higher click-through rate than those without. Just including the word "video" in your subject line can increase click-throughs by as much as 65 percent!

#2. Getting the message across

So including video in your message makes it much more likely that the message will be seen. It also leads to better retention of the information. Your message lingers in the contact's mind longer when it comes through video. Research shows that audiences retain information better in video form than in text.

Don't just auto-play the video in the body of your email. This won't work with some email clients, and creates loading issues. Instead, use a thumbnail with an animated GIF and a play button. Your thumbnail should be engaging and fun. It's a good idea to feature people's faces. Clicking this will send the user to the page where the video is embedded, instead of trying to play it inside of the email.

#3. Driving web traffic

Be sure to also add the video to your website. That way you can link your lead directly to your website so they can look for more information right away while their interest is high.

#4. Enhancing marketing stats

There is a range of providers that can make it easy to integrate video in your marketing emails. Many also track use, so you'll know who watched the video, and for how long. This is really valuable information for gauging the video's effectiveness as well as each client's level of interest.

Making it Work for Real Estate

Wise Agent partners with BombBomb to give our users a seamless process for adding compelling video to email campaigns. BombBomb is a service that lets you easily record, send and track video email.

You can create videos quickly, with no special tech skills, send them to your chosen recipients, and get instant notification when the message is opened and the video played. You can use existing videos, or even drop a YouTube video right into your email, with no fuss, from your phone or any of your other go-to devices. Take that, Instagram!

To view the original article, visit the Wise Agent blog.