30 Day Multi Media Blueprint
In today’s world of online marketing, content does not solely revolve around the written word. It used to be prevalent, but not more consumers are showing their preference for audio and video consumption, so you need to meet the needs of that demographic, too.
Some marketers are intimidated at the thought of creating audio and video files. Usually, this comes down to either a lack of knowledge about the process or a lack of confidence about how they look or sound.
The fact is, seeing and hearing you can help your followers create a stronger bond with you than static text can. You can even bypass the requirement of being on camera for video if you use slide presentations, which allows you to be competitive with the use of multi media formats.
Day 1: Grab Your Video Platform Profiles
Video channels are something you can create an entire brand around. So you want to stake claim to your channel name as soon as you can. There are many video platforms, like Vimeo – but YouTube is one of the most popular, and also the second biggest search engine in existence.
You also want to grab the profile on any other social site that allows video, live or recorded, such as TikTok, Instagram, SnapChat and Facebook. You can use your real name, a keyword phrase or a brand name but make sure it’s the same on all platforms.
Day 2: Go to a Pro for Video Channel Branding
Branding will be an important part of building a following. Like an eCover is for a book, the branding for your video channels helps people recognize your work and see at a glance what your videos are all about.
If you’re not comfortable creating graphics yourself, hire someone on Fiverr or UpWork who can create a channel header, thumbnails and other brand elements you need for your video channel.
Day 3: Set Up Space for Recording Videos
Video recordings don’t have to be produced by a professional, but there are some minimal expectations your audience will have. For example, when they’re watching your videos, they expect you to have good lighting where they can see you.
They don’t want to watch a video where there is clutter and a mess behind you or all around you. So create a special place in your home where you record that looks nice and allows for good lighting.
Day 4: Invest in Lighting and Recording Gear
Sometimes, your home’s lighting isn’t enough to create a well-lit environment. So you may need to purchase some inexpensive gear that helps illuminate your surroundings whenever you plan to record.
Sometimes, all it takes is picking the right time of day to record, when natural lighting is at its strongest. To record, you can use a smart phone camera or any type of recording device, as long as it delivers a clear picture that isn’t grainy.
Day 5: Download or Create a Template Slide Series
For those who opt not to be on screen, you can use slide presentations or capture your online screen instead. If you’re teaching people how to do something, like how to set up a blog, then you can use screen capture software.
If you’re wanting to talk about a topic, but don’t want to record a blank screen, you can use a PowerPoint or Canva slide template to type out some main points and talk in the background as you go through the slides your viewer will be watching.
Day 6: Choose a Tool to Edit Your Videos
Regardless of how you’re recording or what’s on the screen, you’ll want to edit it after the draft is complete. You can either buy a tool like Camtasia, or download the free version called CamStudio.
Using this tool, you can add an intro and outro video clip, add text on the screen, transitions from one part to another, and even highlight the cursor to show what you’re doing better.
Day 7: Map Out the Content for Your Video
Start today with an idea of what your first video is going to be about. You can get a general idea or outline as you would the chapters for a book. Sometimes, it helps to outline so that you have something to reference and keep you from getting offtrack or forgetting where you were going.
You can create an informative video that educates your audience, entertain them, answer questions, conduct a product review and more. You can even create a response video to someone else’s video where you share your thoughts about something.
Day 8: Make Your First Video and Edit It
Once your outline is ready, start the recording process! Don’t worry about doing any retakes. Just keep recording at each point if you mess up because you can go in and remove the parts that have errors in them.
A few things to keep in mind are that, while your space is neat and tidy, you need to be, too. Be presentable onscreen. A niche leader should look clean – not disheveled like they just rolled out of bed. Save the video you create as an MP4.
Day 9: Create a Call to Action and Choose a Thumbnail
Just as your eye is drawn to an eCover that looks professional on Amazon, the same rings true for thumbnails on YouTube. Whenever people search for a topic on this social media site, they look for a thumbnail that looks promising.
Learn how to create thumbnails with text and don’t just choose whatever pre-filled image looks best from the options they give you from the video stills. You also want to make sure that when you upload your video, you have some sort of call to action included.
Do you want them to download their free gift? Click to read more? Buy something? Leave a comment? Share the video with others? Have a call to action that gives them directions on what to do and have it written at the end of the video for clarity.
Day 10: Make Sure Your Video Is Search Engine Optimized
Optimization of your video content is a great way to help make sure it gets chosen to be presented to consumers who are searching for that information over the content of your peers.
Make sure your video file name includes a keyword or phrase, like ketotips.mp4. In addition to that, use keywords in your description effectively (not like spam) and in the title of your upload, too.
Search engines also like for video content to have captions enabled for those who can’t hear well, and they want your upload to be placed in the right category, to help people navigate to your content better.
Day 11: Choose the Option to Let Others Share Your Videos
Because YouTube is a social network, it’s important that you honor the social sharing abilities it’s giving you access to. Some people who create videos are stingy in allowing people to share their content.
You want to enable sharing and embedding options. If you have your branding in place within the video, both verbally and written, you’ll be able to enjoy the traffic perks of letting your competition use your videos to educate and inform their audience.
Day 12: Put Your Video in the Feeds of Social Media Followers
Start the sharing process yourself once your video is published. Start by embedding it on your own blog. You can add your own commentary to go along with it and then share the link to your blog post on other social sites like Facebook.
Some social sites will allow you to share the link directly to the video itself, so if you’re not trying to get them to your site, but instead get them to subscribe to your channel, you can use that option.
Day 13: Conduct an Analysis on Your Videos
You never want to ignore the effectiveness of your video marketing efforts. It does you no good to create and publish video content unless you see how it benefits your business.
Look at the analytics today to see which videos are working well for you in terms of getting people to watch longer and engage in the comments section. Look to see when people are watching, so you can upload at the right time, too.
Day 14: Put Yourself on a Video Creation Schedule
A content creation publishing schedule will help you manage your tasks and time better. Look at how long it takes you from start to finish – from brainstorming the idea to final upload – and then make a publishing plan that fits in with your daily or weekly schedule.
You can create videos one at a time or record in batches to make the process easier. It all depends on your surroundings, your family schedule and other factors. Make sure your content is varied for your channel, unless you need it to all be one type of recording or slant.
Once you’re ready, you can use an automation tool to publish the videos for you on a schedule you decide. That way you don’t have to constantly log in and publish them every time.
Day 15: Turn Your Video Into Other Forms of Media
Your video has great potential as is, but why not make it go further? You have it uploaded to YouTube. But you can extract the audio portion and turn it into a podcast episode, too.
Another thing you can do is turn it into a text-based transcript and use that content as a written blog post or post on your various social media accounts. You can also chop it up into smaller snippets for social media, like 60-second soundbites for TikTok.
Day 16: Get Good Gear for Recording Podcasts
Video isn’t the only hot media format making inroads with consumers. Audio is just as popular. People love listening to audio files on the go, and it’s a relief for many not to have to be glued to the screen as with text or video.
To start using audio in your marketing efforts, start with some decent recording gear. If people are listening only, you need to have good recording equipment, like a Blue Yeti microphone and a stand – or even one that’s cheaper, but of good quality.
You may want to hunt down some royalty-free music you can use for intro and outro clips, just like a radio station uses for talk radio channels. You also may want to get a pop filter to eliminate any extra recording noises from the way you speak.
Day 17: Make Sure You Have a Soundproof Recording Area
Having background noise can ruin an otherwise wonderful recording. You can ask people in your house to be quiet, but it never sounds quite as good as making sure your recording space is somewhat soundproofed.
Don’t worry – you don’t have to have an entire room professionally soundproofed into a studio. You can strategically place things like cushions and flooring in your room to absorb echoes.
You can also buy a foam stand that surrounds your microphone area but that’s small enough to sit on your desktop, so that distracting sounds are eliminated from being picked up by your mic.
Day 18: Choose a Show Topic Based on Your Niche
Today, you want to map out a topic for your podcast channel. You can go broad or narrow. For example, you can do a show on relationships in general or dating for millennials.
Your show can be all about gardening or just about container gardening. Come up with an overall idea for a podcast. This should be broad enough so that each week, or whenever you upload a new show, you’ll have something to talk about without a struggle.
Day 19: Create Bulletpoints for Your First Show
Once your main idea is ready, outline the notes for your first show. You can jot down a few reminders like bulletpoints to keep you on track with your topic and help the show flow smoothly.
You want to aim for approximately 20-30 minutes, but there are shows that are more or less than that amount, so don’t worry if yours falls outside those parameters. Don’t write a script because it will be obvious that you’re reading.
Day 20: Go Through the Draft Recording Process
Before you hit the record button, you want to double check that your space is set up correctly to filter out noise. Make sure you have your notes in front of you and a glass of water to keep your mouth hydrated while doing a lot of talking.
Give it a little test run for a minute and play it back to see if there’s anything you need to fix before you start recording in its entirety. Remember – you don’t have to start over if you make a blunder. Just be quiet for a couple of seconds so you’ll know where to edit that part out and resume recording.
Day 21: Edit Your Episode to Perfection
Even though you may feel as if you recorded a flawless presentation, chances are it needs to be cleaned up a bit. You can use audio editing tools like Audacity to do things like clean up places where you said “um” too often or “uh.”
You can also use it to insert any promos as well as an intro and outro recording to help brand your podcast for your listening audience. Learn how to use the tool you’re working with and bring your podcast to perfection.
Day 22: Choose a Podcast Platform and Upload Your Episode
You’ll need to choose where you want to host your podcast and then upload it. There are so many different platforms, and many of them have built-in monetization options so you can start profiting from your subscriber list.
Consider some of the most popular ones, like Anchor.fm, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, and Spotify. Working with a platform like Anchor, they’ll ensure your podcast is syndicated on other platforms for you.
Day 23: Employ the Use of SEO for Your Podcast
Just like text content, your audio files need to be optimized for search engines, too. You’ll be able to do this by using keywords and phrases in the episode titles, file names and description area, too.
Day 24: Make the Most of Your Description Area
In your description area, not only do you want to make sure you have keywords and hashtags included, but you want to really let the audience know what the show is about. Your show notes can include other things, too.
You can link to anything you specifically discussed, like websites and products (including your own or someone else’s). Any time you mention in the podcast that you’ll include a link to something, make sure you add that in the notes so you don’t forget.
Day 25: Use Snippets of Your Podcast as Teasers
You can use portions of your audio show to bring listeners onboard. Pick some really interesting moments and extract them for teasers and trailers. If you use Anchor, they have this feature built in.
But instead of just a snippet of audio, they put the words to a slide presentation and turn it into a video you can share on social networking sites. They only grab up to 60 seconds, so choose carefully.
Day 26: Create a Guest List of Potential Co-Hosts
Sometimes, you don’t want to shoulder the burden of carrying the entire show on your own back. It helps to have someone else to banter with, and if you don’t have a call-in audience yet, then a co-host can alleviate the pressure you feel.
They also bring another level of expertise and opinions, which makes for a more interesting podcast. Look for people in your niche who have experience with podcasts or who don’t mind being recorded for one.
Day 27: Transcribe Your Episodes Into Blog Posts
You started your podcast with some bulletpoints to remind you of what to say. Once your podcast recording is complete, you can transcribe it word for word (extracting any awkward pauses like “um” or “uh,” and turn it into a traffic-pulling blog post.
You’re basically repurposing your audio content into text. You can also include the link to the episode in the blog post. Another thing you can do to repurpose it is use the transcript to paste it into a series of slides and record a video presentation of it for your video channels.
Day 28: Learn How to Use Microcasts for Audience Building
Small bits of audio are growing in popularity. Some people use microcasts, which are anywhere from 0-10 minutes in length, instead of longer podcasts. These are perfect for people who want bite-sized tips or inspiration, so see if you can create something like this, too.
Day 29: Bring on Sponsors for Monetization
While you may be using podcasts to broaden your exposure to your target audience, you probably wouldn’t turn down the opportunity to make money from those efforts. You can monetize your audio recordings by finding sponsors to support your show.
They’ll want to know how many subscribers (listeners) you have, your topic, the length of the show, and more details. Let them know what you charge and for what placement – like the beginning of the show, middle or end.
Day 30: Analyze Your Podcast Data and Make Improvements
As you record more, don’t forget to stop periodically and check the stats for your podcast so that you can make improvements wherever necessary. Spotify will show you analytics for your episodes.
You’re going to find out whether they listen to the entire episode or leave midway through. Go back and listen to where they dropped off so you can remedy future episodes.
Using multi media in your online marketing efforts is a smart way to expand your reach, brand your business better and ultimately increase traffic and sales. If you’re intent on sticking with a text-only approach, don’t be surprised when the competition soars ahead of you because they were willing to put themselves out there and try something new.