Using video in e-mail marketing

As you might have noticed online video is growing rapidly. More and more people are watching video on the web.

Recent studies also suggest that video articles in e-mail actually get higher click trough's than traditional text articles.

You can use video for many purposes; demos, customer testimonials, education, in sign-up forms etc.

Content
Start looking internally to see what video material you have today. Some of it might be useable.

If you don't have content internally start thinking about how you could get started. Perhaps your next customer testimonial should be a video clip instead of a printed piece of collateral? Or a supplement to the printed version.

Or your next trade show invitation should include a video greeting from the key note speaker? You can choose to host the video content yourself or you can create an account on i.e YouTube. It's free and quite easy to do.

Video in e-mail
Video in e-mail can be devided into two categories:

1. Link to the video is in the e-mail
2. The video itself is embedded in the e-mail and will play in the e-mail client. Since this is still in it's infancy we recommend you keep embedded video content out of the e-mail it self.


Heres a simple recipe to be successful adding video in your newsletter:

1. Take a screenshot of the video displaying in a video player.
2. Place a prominent "play" button to the center of the image.
3. Put the screenshot in your email, linked to the page where the video is hosted.

I recommend that you put a still image that triggers interest so the reader wants to know more. You should also provide text links with call to actions.