It’s clear that video marketing is more than a mere fad—Instagram now prioritizes reels and TikTok was named the top social media app of 2022 by Forbes. Increasingly, market-savvy companies are embracing the switch from staged photos with pristine product placement to more genuine, relatable video content—including flooring dealers.
Floor Covering News spoke with several social media and digital marketing experts in flooring to get their take on video and how more flooring retailers can utilize the medium to their full advantage.
When is the best time to utilize video via social media marketing and how can it be done successfully?
“One of the best times to utilize video on your social media is with paid advertisements. Any movement on the screen, even if it’s a short animation, will get people’s attention and catch their eye as they’re scrolling through their newsfeeds. If you want to do a promotional video, your ads have to 15 seconds or less, on Facebook.
“When it comes to organic social media posts, you should be using videos in your stories and reels because they are popular right now and will help you reach more people without spending ad dollars. Organic videos can be longer so you can use them for instructional purposes, such as to talk about a specific type of flooring and its benefits. You may want to walk through your showroom, or even talk about an upcoming promotion.”
—Gretchen Murray, social media analyst, Mobile Marketing
Instagram prioritizes short video posts over photos. How can businesses adapt?
“Social media is constantly changing and evolving. While this latest Instagram update of prioritizing short-form video stems from an effort to keep up with the popularity of Tik Tok, it’s also reflective of a larger trend across platforms—which is simply that short-form video is more interesting and engaging than reading a written caption or scrolling through carousel posts. If reach is a primary concern (as opposed to engagement rate), then this update will likely negatively impact reach if you don’t adapt to incorporate more reels.”
—Jenne Ross, marketing director, Karndean Designflooring
How do you create an impactful video?
“I think it’s important that you don’t just create a video to create a video. There needs to be a purpose behind every video that you create. I think the No. 1 thing you need to ask yourself is, ‘Ok, what pain point is this going to be solving for my customer?’ or ‘Is it going to be important for my customer to see this video?’ You can’t just throw random video content out there and hope that it’s going to catch attention. If your customers have concerns trusting new companies or new flooring stores, make a video with testimonials or your store’s story that shows that they can trust you. If a customer is worried about how the products that they’re purchasing are going to look, make a video that shows how to install [your products] and what they will look like in a home. I can’t emphasize how important a purpose is.”
—Aerin Ogden, director of marketing, QFloors Software
What’s the best way for businesses to stay up-to-date on their digital marketing efforts?
“We subscribe to a handful of digital marketing and/or social media-based newsletters for the latest updates across digital platforms. As marketers, many of us are also consumers of digital and social media in our personal lives, so we often look to pages we follow for inspiration and new content ideas.”
—Ross
“It’s important to stay on top of trends and new features that are added to your platforms so that you stay relevant. No matter how many followers you have or how engaged your followers are, if you don’t stay up to date on algorithms, your audience won’t see what you post, no matter how good your content is.”
—Murray
“It is very critical to stay on top of [trends] just because the social media and content marketing industry is constantly changing. First I would suggest being on a social platform yourself because when you’re on it and the more you’re engaging with the platform, the more you’re going to see how companies target you.”
—Aerin Ogden
