How to use video marketing and social media to create sales.
Late in 2020, McConks premium inflatable stand up paddle boards approached Unit Creative with a genuine need – pre-sales.
Pre-sales are the lifeblood of McConks. Without this seasonal revenue R+D / ordering would not be an option and despite a genuine self-grown online presence the company needed professionally produced digital content to compete with other water sports brands. Brands who were either ahead of the marketing curve or currently operating out of very deep pockets, definitely not the budget of a family run genuinely sustainable company.
Who were McConks talking to?
Water sports enthusiasts and the ever-increasing stand up paddle boarding community. McConks used Facebook, Instagram and their own website to converse, but none of those presences used original professionally produced video or photography to demonstrate their offer and to tell people who they were and why buyers should invest.
What did McConks conversations look like ?
Engaging but with room for improvement. Thanks to in-house tenacity and hard work their Google rankings were slowly climbing, but as Google knows, nothing ranks like video. So to begin Unit recorded opening statistics to give us an idea of what people were talking about and how they were communicating.
What did McConks want to say?
Show people who they were, tell people what they were about and give people a reason to buy – a trustworthy sustainable company with genuinely excellent customer feedback. A classic banner video / about us brief brief, with on exception.
At Unit Creative we know gossip doesn’t work. What does that mean? It means posting video or content without a clear marketing strategy won’t sustain a meaningful conversation. It’ll get a click on Instagram but that’s about it. Every video, every piece of content and every photograph needs to answer a good old fashioned marketing question - why buy?
What did we hear?
We heard the opportunity to create a campaign hook linking all McConks up and coming conversations. A way to get people to think about a time in the future when the UK would come out of lockdown and people would want to set themselves free – to unlock their freedom.
What did we produce?
Despite the time of year and shortage of daylight we offered McConks 2 videos and a set of marketing stills. The videos would be:
- A full length “about us” video featuring the McConks family brand, a conversation around sustainability and the “no models” ethos of inclusivity.
- A shorter cut down to be used as a mute banner video highlighting core values using graphics.
Using Unit Creative’s unique offer we produced everything in-house. Al Livingston was the DOP, David McHigh photographed and David Ludlam created a beautiful grade making even the deepest darkest of winter light look gorgeous.
Results
The videos went live at the end of November / December:
- By the end of January McConks had increased conversions and lowered bounce rate.
- Clicks were up to 35.8K
- There were a million impressions
- Organic search was up by 63%
- On Facebook conversations had more than doubled
- Most importantly sales were up to 200%. They had out sold pre-sales.
And this was just the beginning. McConks now had:
- Enough video and photographic content to start a content library.
- Footage which they could repurpose for on-going social conversations.
- Great looking video content which could be used regardless of season because the campaign creative wasn’t limited to “models on inaccessible beaches”.
Conversations = Currency.