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Using YouTube to Promote Your Business

You may have noticed recently that I've been adding various videos to my blog here. Why? Because one of the coolest social media and guerrilla marketing tools out there is YouTube. From uploading videos of your own business, staff or services to showing demonstrations, snippets of classes you've taught or even just sharing other people's videos, videos help get people involved in your site, blog or other social sites very effectively. They also help you to educate and connect with your potential clients more directly than through a static webpage, flyer or even a written blog.

Other than the cost of your video equipment (I use a small, inexpensive digital video recorder designed just for videos like the one below), your main cost is your time and effort - two primary ingredients in all guerrilla marketer's toolboxes. Of course if you get nervous or tongue tied on camera, you may want to prepare a script or cue cardsin advance to use as a guide while you are taping.

As an example of how I am using YouTube in my own business, I have uploaded a video onto YouTube from my recent class, Waterless Spa Treatments I, that gives a brief introduction to one of the treatments from the class. Take a quick look at it and feel free to share with others!

Here's the link for the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C4Nf2nsPZgo

By the way, this class will be offered again in Greensboro, NC on October 25th and in Asheville, NC in September 2010. For a current list of other classes (including marketing and ethics) and dates, please click here or email me at Felicia@spalutions.com to get a list of all classes or add your school or business to my itinerary for 2010.

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Comment by Felicia Brown on October 29, 2009 at 6:36pm: Great ideas and comments. I am continuing to learn about YouTube and plan to post many more videos as time goes on. The next one up will be on draping as a part of a class I taught for soon-to-be therapists.

I really like the idea about adding videos to promote the school - I'll have to share that idea with the director of Natural Touch here in Greensboro (where I use Susan's book by the way:-) Thanks!

Comment by Susan G. Salvo on October 16, 2009 at 4:30pm: Also, we require students to give a presentation on one specialty technique (e.g., Trager, acupressure, sports massage).

Youtube is a great resource for their presentation.

Students are sharing what they find on youtube with the class. It's nice for students to see some of the heavy weights as part of a presentation (e.g., Benny Vaughn, David Lauterstein, Ruth Werner, Sandy Fritz, etc).

Comment by Trevor Chisman on October 16, 2009 at 4:11pm: Ryan, I've been watching those videos of yours since back in the days of metacafe, I've loved them all and learnt some interesting stuff too.

Susan,
just going to have a quick look at your schools videos, but love your web site, very fresh and inviting!

Youtube is brilliant, I can't see me using it myself as I'm looking for a very local audience but maybe that will change in the future, my current marketing focus is Twitter.

Comment by Mike Hinkle on October 16, 2009 at 3:57pm: I believe !!!!!

Comment by massagenerd on October 16, 2009 at 3:46pm: I've been using youtube to promote my business for over 3 years now and at 1,500+ video clips later, I still want to upload my videos, ideas and thoughts so the world can benefit. Honestly, I started uploading to www.metacafe.com back in the day to make some extra money (I was in the top 5 of earners until the profit sharing program stopped this past June) and I realized something during that whole time...all the video views were building traffic to my website! I was not paying my models tons of money and I was using normal recording equipment, so it was not breaking my bank. In the past 3 years, I've racked up over 35 million views of my video clips and built a name for myself in the massage industry. To post videos on youtube, you don't have to compete with a Hollywood budget and youtube is all about the little guy that wants to get his view points seen by millions on a crackerjack budget :)

Ryan Hoyme
www.MassageNerd.com
www.youtube.com/massagenerd

Comment by Susan G. Salvo on October 16, 2009 at 3:38pm: Oh yeah. Youtube is the bomb.

We started doing youtube videos for students/grads who wanted a review (e.g., headache routines, Swedish gymnastics, seated massage, how to position and drape a pregnant client).

They LOVE them

Apparently the public at large likes them too. Our chair massage video has 20,000 hits in 3 months.

We also let prospective students view them to learn about the profession.

Comment by Jackie Wilson on October 13, 2009 at 7:57pm: I watched your videos..they are very nice..I think it's an interesting treatment that I know nothing about..