With the increase in smartphone ownership and the digital transformation of society, the environment for viewing videos has improved, and opportunities to get information from videos have also increased in recent years. As more and more people prefer them, videos are used more frequently in internet advertising, and the use of videos is projected to grow even more in the future.

In this article, we will explain how to use videos in marketing to expand your visibility, and how to translate your videos to make your global business succeed.

The Expanding Video Marketing Landscape

The time following the COVID-19 pandemic has seen a reduction of traditional face-to-face sales meetings, and with the promotion of digital transformation and improvements in telecommunications environments like 5G wireless capabilities, the use of internet advertising, and video advertising in particular, has greatly increased. According to research by digital advertising company CyberAgent, the market size of video advertising is increasing every year*. There has also been proactive investment in video media in recent years as watching video content has taken root across many age groups and users of major video advertising media have increased.
Not only are video advertisements preferred by users, but they are also more informative than just text or images and have a greater marketing effect, making them an attractive way for companies to reach out to prospective customers.
*Reference: CyberAgent Releases Results of 2021 Survey on Domestic Video Advertising Market | CyberAgent, Inc. (cyberagent.co.jp) (Japanese only)

Video Formats and Using Videos in Marketing

Targeting is critical to getting the most out of videos. If you’re off the mark, your message will not reach your target audience. For example, a video for business-to-consumer (B2C) sales promotion and awareness will be different from a training video for internal use. Choosing the best way to show your video to your target audience and making sure viewers get the intended message from your video is the key to effectively using videos for marketing.

Features of Recent Applications of Video

One characteristic of video marketing in recent years is that short-form videos are often being used in B2C marketing. Users will drop off if the video seems too long, so it’s best find ways to keep videos short so viewers have no issue watching them to the end. Another trend is using content that resonates with users, rather than having advertising colors front and center. Plus, using social media to link from videos to purchasing avenues is also broadening applications, rather than just showing off a video.

In addition to advertisements, videos are also used in a variety of business-to-business (B2B) applications as a digital communication tool for internal manuals, training, presentations and more.

Video Translation for Global Business

Global business needs translation to eliminate language barriers, and the more videos are translated, the more opportunities there are for video translation. One way to translate a video is to simply add subtitles or voice-overs, but this alone isn’t enough to make it appealing.

To increase the impact, it’s best to use a translation method that maximizes the benefits of the video medium, such as changing or optimizing the content to suit the target customer and region. This can be done most effectively with a careful combination of localization, modifying the content to adapt to the region in question, or a form of creative translation called transcreation.

Additionally, differences in culture and tastes mean that it’s often more beneficial to have completely different videos for your home country and a particular target market in order to appeal to a variety of audiences, so you may want to consider creating new videos from the ground up.

Video Translation at Toin

Toin offers both video translation and video creation. We can provide you with a full range of services, from video script translation, adding subtitles and other on-screen text and narration dubbing, all the way to creating and editing the final video. Depending on your budget, we offer dubbing by a narrator, or the lower-cost alternative of text-to-speech narration. We can even provide services that go beyond the scope of translation, including video editing after dubbing, planning, filming and editing.

We can also meet your needs on other video creation and editing projects, such as localizing audio-visual and voice content for online training, e-learning and practice problem sets; replacing and fixing on-screen text, materials and visuals to suit the target locale; creating background music for content and even creating specialized CG.

Please feel free to reach out to us to learn more about Toin’s video services, including video translation and translation services for multilingual videos.

Summary

At Toin, we use over half a century’s know-how to produce translations that convey what makes your products special, and the image you want your company or brand to portray. We are ready to support your company in promoting itself on the global business stage so that you can convey your product’s or brand’s story through everything related to video, whether it be subtitle translation, dubbing, video editing or creating audio-visual materials.

See here for Toin’s Full Video One-stop Service.