Video Marketing - Why Being a Tease is Crucial

No one likes a tease, right? Wrong! We’ll fill you in on a little secret … When it comes to video marketing, teasers are crucial for success. Not following? A teaser is a short snippet – a quick glimpse at the information, images, sound and video that paints a picture in the minds of your audience. They’re excellent for a pre-launch campaign and there’s a good reason they’ve been utilized for years – they work! Discover how you can take your marketing campaigns to the next level by being a tease.

Let us tease you with some history ...

The successful teasers you see today come from the approach used in Hollywood movie trailers. The key was to sell the viewer on the emotion they were trying to depict and give you just enough to give you a good idea of what was to come and leave you wanting more. The world of television also used teasers as a way to sell a concept to a network before they were given the big bucks for production.

Since the wonderful world of the internet has grown, we see the same tactics being used in video marketing campaigns all the time!

How to make the perfect teaser

1. Introduce them to your brand

The viewer may not have heard of you before so you want to make yourself stand out from the first second. If they have a connection to your brand already, you’ll want to hold true to the tone your audience is used to – consistency is key!

2. Play on their emotions

To achieve a successful teaser you need to tap into the audience’s emotions. Find a way to tug on their heart strings and you’ll find yourself at the top in no time! If you’re struggling to find a way to draw emotion from your concept, think about how you can connect on a deeper level. See how Kraft connects the concept of Canadian’s and a shared love of hockey here!

3. Focus on the visuals

Video marketing should, you guessed it, be centred on the video. While words are important when it comes to tying everything together, let the images and video create a story for those watching. Storytelling is proven to be a much more engaging way to capture an audience’s attention, so do what works!

4. Create suspense

If there’s one thing that gets the people going, it’s suspense. A great way to create suspense with teasers if by chopping it up into different parts. You can see an example of this with our Aphria teasers. This will have your audience crawling back for more each and every time! If you have stakeholders or investors waiting on the final product, a teaser is the perfect way to keep them excited about what’s to come while you wrap up the rest of the production.

5. Avoid spoilers at all costs

I think we can speak for everyone when we say that there’s nothing worse than a spoiler. You read a tweet about who won the Bachelor, overheard a conversation about the finale of Game of Thrones and life is practically over. That’s how you need to think about your teaser. Create some mystery without giving it all away. I mean we don’t say curiosity killed the cat for no reason!

6. Timing is key

It’s not a true teaser if you don’t have the timing right. The best timing would be before the launch of a product, service or event. Something that’s exciting and will get the people going! Whatever your teaser may be centred around, the timing is everything.

7. Keep it concise

The most noticeable difference between a teaser and trailer is the length. Trailers allow you to go more in depth and provide the audience with more detail. With a teaser, you want to keep it short and to the point. Remember, we want to keep it suspenseful and that’s hard to do if you make it too long so keep it to 60 seconds or less!

8. Don’t forget a call to action

Once you’ve got the timing down pat, you can’t forget about a call to action. How can you expect people to buy into your product, service or event without asking them to do so? Now, you need to get a little crafty here because there’s a fine line between a strong call to action and being over salesy. Try being direct and sending them to your website, blog post, event page, etc.

Ready to take your video marketing to the next level?

It wouldn’t be in true teaser style if we gave away all our secrets. Crucial Pictures is a content agency that has worked with the biggest names to produce killer teasers and video marketing. Want to know more? Head to our contact page to get in touch!