Today’s businesses have more ways to engage with customers than ever.
Social media, blogs, and videos all hold the power to boost online visibility, but the latter is incredibly effective. For example, 25 percent of people watch videos on the internet every single day, while mobile data traffic has seen a 4,000-fold growth in the past decade. Pre-recorded videos are an effective technique for businesses to deliver information or valuable messaging, yet live-broadcasting is gaining significant traction.
Any business can use live broadcasting to improve their business, but how?
Broadcast Live Events
Events such as trade fairs and conventions are vital to today’s business world. Businesses and consumers can visit venues across the globe to learn more about various products and services, but when tickets sell out, disappointment is inevitable.
However, by live broadcasting an event your brand is either hosting or attending, you can provide your current or potential customers with a valuable insight they may otherwise miss. Interactive video also enables users to ask questions and learn about specific elements of the event, directing the broadcast itself rather being passive viewers.
You can walk viewers around the event in person, guiding them from one area to the next, meeting other exhibitors, and show them the most exciting features. You can ask viewers what they would like to see most, what questions your host should ask the exhibitors, and really make them feel part of the action.
Not only will this encourage a stronger sense of loyalty to your brand, it will also show that you value them enough to let them in on activities they may otherwise be excluded from.
Address Problems to Minimize Damage to your Reputation
For any business, a simple mistake in a product’s design or a delay in services can damage their reputation.
While companies can use social media, a blog update, or emails to notify customers of the issue at hand, live broadcasts are a much more effective method of damage-control. Being interactive, these videos allow customers to ask questions and have their say in a convenient way, rather than having to complain through more time-consuming methods.
By handling a crisis in this way, you can earn greater trust through your transparency, provide real-time answers to the questions everyone will be asking, and show how much you value your customers’ input by taking their complaints seriously.
Showcasing Products with Expert Insights
Demonstrations can greatly improve the customer’s’ experience, showing them how to get the most out of specific products and reducing the time they have to invest into experimenting upon purchase. Businesses have long used instruction manuals to convey essential how-to information, but reading these can feel like a chore, especially when loaded with jargon.
Live interactive broadcasts allow businesses to provide real-time product training to any number of customers, combining expert tutorials with Q&A sessions. Visualizing information is incredibly important to maximize its value, as 90 percent of the details we remember is based on its visual impact (which helps to explains why infographics remain so popular!).
This can also be used to promote products due to hit the market shortly, such as a new smartphone, tablet, or other gadget. Viewers will have real-time access to an expert, and your brand will generate further anticipation for the forthcoming product by showcasing its features.
Conduct Interviews With Industry-Leaders
Interviews enable customers to learn more about your brand, your products, and overall industry.
You can boost customer engagement by interviewing thought-leaders in your sector, such as big-name entrepreneurs with their own fan-base. These can act as a powerful way for consumers to get a deeper insight into a topic of interest via your brand.
You may also host interviews with key employees from your own business, who can answer viewers’ questions on a range of products and services. This helps to put a human face on your brand and cultivate a stronger bond with your customers. Take care to answer as many questions as possible, address questioners by name, and don’t be afraid to adopt a more informal tone (after all, do you want to sound like you’re conducting a dry business seminar or a relaxed chat?).
One of the most important aspects of interactive live broadcasting? Investing in a quality video service.
Your video’s quality is incredibly important to your viewers’ QoE (quality of experience), and sub-par service will cause frustration. Tony Zhao, CEO of interactive broadcasting company Agora.io, highlights the damage poor video can cause to a brand’s reputation:
“If a company uses a poor connection to broadcast their videos, viewers are likely to experience dips in audio and visual quality, find their signal interrupted, and lose their connection altogether. The worse this is, the more unlikely your customers are to use it again – potentially chasing them away to your competitors.
“Just imagine how irritating it would be to ask your host questions when they cannot hear you, and vice versa – would you give that brand a second chance? Investing in the right video service now will lead to greater engagement down the line.”
Today, keeping customers happy is crucial, given the ease with which they can spread word of negative experiences. By helping to make your clients feel more valued, familiar with your team, and trusting of your business overall, you can establish a positive reputation for years to come. Embracing live interactive broadcasts now, before others in your sector, gives you an edge over your less-cutting edge competitors.
Have you considered what interactive live broadcasting can do for your business? Let us know!
