Updated on 22/02/2023
Guerrilla marketing can be defined as the set of unconventional tactics used to achieve conventional goals (above all: profit) within a small budget. The guerrilla needs only three things: “time, energy, imagination.” But how to integrate this type of marketing into a broader digital marketing strategy? Is it possible to combine guerrilla marketing with video marketing?
Integrating guerrilla marketing into a digital marketing strategy
Evolution of word-of-mouth
Over time, guerrilla marketing has managed to adapt to the changing world by exploiting new technology resources and carve out important spaces both online and offline.
In a good guerrilla marketing strategy, the creative idea frees up “unusual” sensory inputs through carefully designed “surprising” actions, placing them at the key areas relevant for the target audience, such as in public places, on networking platforms, or on social networks.
From that moment on, content lives on in media, multimedia, and, above all, digital: on social networks, blogs, online magazines, corporate websites, and sharing platforms through different forms of participation such as reviews, comments, likes, and posts, all that inevitably impact SEO.
Guerrilla marketing and content marketing
Guerrilla marketing is thus part of a broader content marketing plan: it contributes to the stratification of the collective memory of the brand together with other tools. Its communication through advertising allows you to experience the brand in a largely participatory way. At the heart of this multifaceted plan, video is a pivotal element, used by guerrilla actions to perform multiple functions.
The video can be a curiosity activator, trailer, narrator, a tool for unveiling information, a tool to explain complex concepts in a simple way, an avatar, or as a helper. In any case, the video represents a powerful mode of engagement.
Guerrilla marketing and video marketing: the search for engagement
The guerrilla marketing requires an effort, even minimal, of participation: “it happens,” “it intervenes,” “it imposes itself” in moments in which the advertising consciousness of the consumer is not active. It interrupts the flow of daily actions, raises awareness, invites the target to interact in a way and in a precise direction, that may redefine how the brand itself is perceived. It symbolically places the first brick toward building solid Brand awareness.
For this reason, it places itself at the beginning of a general tendency to engagement that today unfolds in all its scope and that sees the current strategies of video marketing content present similar distinctive features: communication, engagement, interaction.
According to data in the Wyzowl report:
– 96% of people say they have watched an explanatory video to learn more about a product or service;
– 79% of people say that a brand’s video convinced them to buy a software or application;
– 68% of people say they would rather watch a short video to learn about a new product or service.
Video is an extremely popular learning tool, much more popular than infographics, presentations, and pitches (which each collect 4% of preferences), text articles (preferred by 15% of respondents), manuals, and e-books (chosen by 3%).
This data suggests some conclusions: video content facilitates and multiplies opportunities for interaction. It allows you to get in touch with users in an increasingly simple and immediate way. Brands, on the other hand, increasingly choose to invite customers into their stories, calling on them to express themselves about their products and values. This article, “11 Trends That Will Shape Marketing In 2019” from Forbes, also gives further strength to this statement:
“Building brand awareness and successfully interacting with consumers is a crucial part of doing business today. Customers enjoy and expect a personalized experience, and delivering just that will set you apart from your competition.” It also emphasizes the need for the audience to be part of the brand’s story: “The ability to engage with audiences (that is, making audiences part of the brand story) will have a huge impact.”
The synergy between video and guerrilla marketing
It is true, therefore, that guerrilla marketing and video marketing have a lot in common: the ability to capture attention and build brand awareness, visibility that increases over time, the search for engagement, and a strong narrative dimension.
They are also different: while the former seeks to break the equilibrium of a limited environment, video is, from the beginning, open to a wider distribution. They are not alternative or competing tools: in order to maximize their distinctive qualities, they must coexist within the same communication system, establishing interesting and as yet unexplored synergies between them.
For both guerrilla marketing and video, the future is personalization. A recent study by Gartner shows that offering “tailored help” to consumers is an “opportunity for brands to deliver tangible customer value in the forms and functionalities consumers seek.” Don’t do this, and you risk losing 38% of your customers.
We have mentioned the danger of a progressive weakening of the creative charge of guerrilla marketing. To revitalize it, the path could be that of an ever greater synergy with videos and animated communications, completely personalized. The Doxee platform provides all the tools necessary to put such a strategy into action, starting from our personalized videos, which help you to write engaging stories to enrich the experience of your customers.
