Native video has arrived on LinkedIn, and can now be incorporated into your Sponsored Content. Plenty of companies are already taking advantage. Are you ready to join them?
The benefits of B2B video are unmistakable. It presents a differentiated way to stand out on business-oriented social media feeds, and data tells us that executives and decision-makers value this content highly while researching solutions.
Although video for LinkedIn Sponsored Content is still relatively new, we’ve already seen some great success stories. Today, we thought we’d look more deeply at a few of them in search of takeaways you can apply to your own B2B video marketing campaigns.
Schouten & Nelissen Finds Resonance in 15 Seconds
Seeking to build awareness around its educational services for professionals and organizations, the Netherlands-based company turned to LinkedIn for its precision targeting. Goals included boosting engagement and driving traffic to the corporate website.
Having identified the exact types of professionals they wanted to reach, Schouten & Nelissen’s team developed video content that directly addressed the needs of its prospects, avoiding a sales-y or promotional slant. And their audience responded.
The campaign produced a clickthrough rate twice as high as initially forecast, and proved cost-efficient with a €0.03 CPV. You can watch one of their ads here to get an idea of why it worked, and if you don’t speak Dutch, here’s the rough translation: a woman receives a work request via text, and then laments about how she always ends up saying yes, even when it causes her own work to suffer. “Learn to stand up for yourself and show what you’ve got,” the narrator encourages.
What Made This B2B Video Effective?
- Short and sweet! The ad delivers a complete message in the span of 15 seconds. This is a great way to combat waning attention spans.
- Subtitles. A high percentage of social media users watch videos on their feeds without sound. They can still easily follow along with the brief speaking portions.
- Call to Action. “Overcome your obstacles,” the final frame urges, with a short link to visit the campaign landing page. This next-step provided a measurable action and outcome.
KLM Elevates Its Employees
Highlighting your workers is an excellent angle for B2B video, and KLM Royal Dutch Airlines found a good way to tie this approach to a fun promotion. Various employees from different roles in the organization become the stars of the ad below, modeling the snazzy Christmas jumpers that were at the heart of this campaign. The moving runway is a perfect touch.
KLM specifically wanted to target a professional audience for its Worldwide Business Class offerings, making LinkedIn an ideal fit. Running this video, among others, through Sponsored Content resulted in a $0.06 Cost Per View (62.5% below the average benchmark) and an exceptional 33.85% view rate:
What Made This B2B Video Effective?
- Clever Promo. The festive blue jumper – available through KLM’s online store – was a great hook and a big hit, selling out quickly.
- Excellent Sound Design. Intertwining recognizable airplane sounds (lifting off, pilot speaking over the intercom, etc.) with upbeat music produces a harmonious on-brand medley. But viewers can still easily follow along with the sound off.
- Human Connection. As a business that has so many customer touchpoints with its reps, showing these smiling faces in their actual work environment signals a happy experience for travelers.
Microsoft Canada Hits the Bullseye
Microsoft is obviously a very large company, with a robust marketing department, so its Canadian branch has the luxury of tapping into a number of existing video brand assets. As part of a localized campaign framed around customer stories and empowerment, the Microsoft Canada team curated videos that best fit with this purpose, infusing custom content with high relevance to regional markets.
Taking advantage of the ability to target specific job functions on LinkedIn, Microsoft Canada was able to strike a chord with viewers on multiple levels. The video campaign earned the attention of members, achieving a 28% view rate and 20% completion rate on average.
What Made This B2B Video Effective?
- Hyper-Relevance. Localization, combined with filtering by professional parameters, enabled Microsoft Canada to precisely align its content with the people consuming it.
- Full-Funnel Strategy. Incorporating the right mix of top-of-funnel videos and targeted assets speaking straight to decision-makers helped bridge prospects from awareness to consideration.
- Test for Success. The team ran tests to determine which lengths and audience segments worked best, progressively refining the campaign and improving KPIs.
Ready to Jump In?
The power of B2B video marketing is clear. The companies above, and others, have demonstrated how to maximize the impact of your videos on LinkedIn. We encourage you to apply these principles in your own campaigns and achieve your own exemplary results.
You can learn more about LinkedIn video ads, and find best practices on our video ads tips page.
