Video – the hot new way to get noticed on the web
Tuesday, 29 April 2008
Last Updated: Tuesday, 29 April 2008
By Brad Howarth
The huge popularity of websites like YouTube, and the ease with which video can be made, has put online broadcasting into the marketing toolbox of most businesses.
Getting yourself heard as a small business is rarely easy. But with the rise of broadband internet and the plummeting cost of audio and video production, some Australian businesses are spreading their message by using the tools once only available to much larger companies.
Internet broadcasting is a small but intriguing segment of smaller business online marketing. Numerous websites now offer tools for creating podcasts and videocasts, while services such as The Podcast Network and iTunes provide a place to host and distribute them.
The key however is in having something to offer an audience above and beyond an advertisement for your business.
The Sydney-based executive head hunter Stan Relihan has packaged his expertise in sales, collaboration and business networking into The Connections Show on The Podcast Network.
Relihan’s guests have included senior executives from companies including Cisco and Oracle, as well as Jay Bhatti, the founder of the US-based social networking company Spock.com.
Advertisement
He says the show has surpassed both BusinessWeek and Wired magazine as the most popular business podcast on the content aggregation site Digg, with 20% of his audience coming from outside Australia. In November 2007, the show was downloaded 1403 times, growing to 2207 in December and 5712 by January.
While the pitfalls are practically nil, Relihan says he is careful that the show does not take over from the business it is supporting. The shows themselves take only a couple of hours to produce on a weekend, using a personal computer and some simple audio editing tools. Because he is not reliant on the show for income, there is little danger should listeners move on.
The marketing benefits are hard to quantify however. Relihan expects to sign a sponsor shortly, but even without one, he says the podcast is doing wonders for business development.
“My profile has grown a lot, and I am increasingly being approached by high level clients,” Relihan says. “It’s a great way for me to promote the activities of the industry that I’m in.”
Continues next page...