What’s the difference between a human and a goldfish? Besides the obvious, recent data shows humans have a shorter attention span at only eight vs. nine seconds.

Due to the nature of our increasingly digitized lives, you now have less time than ever to catch the eye of your self-storage prospects. That’s why this has become the year of video marketing. With so many stimuli and distractions pulling at your target audience, you need to ensure your information is easy to digest. How? By making it more interactive and visual. Video not only accomplishes this goal, it can help your facility rank higher in online searches.

Do It Now

If it isn’t already, video will become a crucial element of your marketing strategy. Did you know that by 2020, 82 percent of all mobile traffic will be video? It’s one of the fastest growing forms of marketing available. Soon it will no longer be a question of if you use video but when. The time to start is now.

If a picture is worth a thousand words, then a video is worth a million. It gives you an opportunity to showcase your company’s personality and unique value proposition. For example, StorQuest Self Storage recently created a 30-second video of surfer Kelly Slater discussing why he stores his surfboard collection. It emphasizes the company’s brand and motto—to “make room in your life for awesome”—and projects an active persona. It also prompts the viewer (a prospective customer) to think about our industry differently by promoting the use of long-term storage as an extension of the home.

Fortunately, video is no longer restricted to large companies with a robust marketing spend. The barrier to entry is lower than ever with new platforms and do-it-yourself tools that can help businesses churn out professional-quality content on a tighter budget.

Optimize It

After you’ve created your video, to get it found on the Web, you need to optimize it. Platforms like YouTube and Facebook can help. YouTube is the second largest search engine after Google, processing more than 3 billion searches a month. And since its owned by Google, the videos on this site rank favorably on search engine results pages (SERPs). Facebook is another great place for video. As the largest social media site, its users watch more than 8 billion videos, or 100 million hours of video, every day.

Following are some things you can do to make the most of these sites and ensure your video ranks high in online searches.

On YouTube

Research video keywords. This is something you can do prior to creating a video that will go a long way. The trick is to determine the keywords that produce YouTube video results on the first page of Google. The types of videos that usually appear on the SERP include how-tos, reviews and tutorials.

Make the most of metadata. First, you want to focus on your video title. It should be a few words long and include the keywords you’re trying to target. Next, you’ll create a heavily detailed description that includes key points from the video and uses targeted keywords. This should be like a short blog post so YouTube and Google can crawl your content, understand the video and rank it accordingly. Finally, you’ll add relevant tags to help categorize your video. These tags can be single-word, multi-word (long-tail keywords) and broad-term (relating to a broader topic). Aim to add 10 to 20.

Create a call to action (CTA). After someone has watched your video, you have his full attention, so add a CTA with a link to keep him engaged and potentially convert him into a customer. You can do so by adding a “card” to your videos with a link to your website.

On Facebook

Grab attention. Native Facebook videos begin to play the moment users scroll through their feed. The goal is to develop compelling content that will capture your prospect’s attention immediately. And it should be short. Facebook and Nielsen Media Research have reported that as much as 47 percent of the value in a video campaign is often delivered in the first three seconds, while up to 74 percent of the value is delivered within the first 10 seconds. Also, choose an enticing video thumbnail to capture attention.

Make it mobile-friendly. Since most Facebook scrolling occurs on mobile phones, make sure your video is optimized for smaller screens. Test out vertical and square videos that take up more screen space.

Use subtitles. Eighty-five percent of users never turn on the sound; and mobile phones will only auto-play sound if the phone isn’t on silent mode. This is why you should use subtitles or create a video that conveys your story silently. Captions have proven to increase view time by an average of 12 percent.

Add a CTA. While Facebook no longer has the CTA functionality for videos, you can add a link in your copy or via text overlay. Having a CTA is a great way to increase engagement, drive traffic to your website and create leads.

Without incorporating video into your marketing, your self-storage facilities risk losing potential leads. Since video production has become more accessible and affordable, consider implementing video as part of your strategy.

Ashleigh Hinrichs is the marketing campaign manager at G5, which provides Digital Experience Management software and marketing services to the self-storage industry. The company’s offerings include responsive-design websites, search engine marketing, social media, reputation management, lead tracking and management, analytics, and client-performance management. For more information, call 800.656.8183; visit www.getg5.com.