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The 8 Best Tactics to Promote Your Live Streams With Video

By Harmonie Duhamel | Posted on by Harmonie Duhamel | 13 min Read
Best Tactics to Promote Your Live Streams Image

Since the pandemic, live streaming has seen unprecedented growth. Through social media platforms including Facebook Live, YouTube channel, and others, companies and more have successfully pivoted to offer their customers live streams in the form of live events.

This has created a new audience who have become accustomed to streams like live video, product promotion, entertainment, education and everything in between. Consequently, there’s more competition between streamers, making video live stream promotion vital.

Table of Contents

  • 1. Time Your Virtual Event Announcement
  • 2. Create a Mailing List
  • 3. Surveys and Polls
  • 4. Share Highlight Clips
  • 5. Keep Them Waiting
  • 6. Collaborate
  • 7. Promote During the Stream
  • 8. Follow Up
  • Final Thoughts

Learning how to grow your live streaming viewership can be a challenge. However, there are plenty of tried and true methods for sharing quality content and increasing your live stream audience size. This is where video live stream promotion becomes a necessity. A good promotion can engage your audience and ready them for the stream to come, increasing the intrigue and chances of more viewers once the online video content goes live.

In this article, we’ll cover some best 8 tested tactics and practices for the promotion of your live streams.

1. Time Your Virtual Event Announcement

Timing is a very important part of live stream marketing to get more viewers to watch your live events. If you start your video live stream promotion too early, your audience may have forgotten about or lost interest in your upcoming live stream. They can also become fatigued by promotions for the stream if the promotion period goes on for too long. On the other hand, if you don’t start promoting your live stream early enough, there is a risk that not enough people will see your promotions in time to join in.

The right time to start video live stream promotion depends on your content strategy and approach to streaming.

Virtual Events

If you are running a one-off or annual virtual event, then it can be a good idea to start promoting several weeks beforehand to ensure viewers has enough time to book and your tickets sell out.

Regular Streams

If you’re live streaming more regularly such as weekly or monthly, promoting each stream this far in advance could wear out your audience. Although a longer promotion push can help establish an audience when you start streaming, after that, you may only need to post about upcoming streams a day or two beforehand.

2. Create a Mailing List

Creating a mailing list with a reputable email marketing service for your live streams gives you a dedicated channel to stay in touch with your viewers or people who are interested in an upcoming streaming event. As a result, you can send them more information about the stream to maintain their interest.

Both email and SMS event marketing can be useful for keeping in touch with your audience due to their different strengths. Email enables you to send detailed messages, images, and video with few restrictions, while the text is more useful for shorter, faster communication. Email marketing for events and entertainment has an average open rate of 37.29%, while 97% of texts are opened within 15 minutes of sending.

Interactivity is one of the biggest draws of video marketing, and creating a mailing list for your online video event helps to keep that interactivity going between streams. With a mailing list, you can nurture leads generated during the stream, share relevant content, and keep your viewers engaged. You can boost interaction for your video content by responding to frequently asked questions or polling your audience about what they want from future content. It also lets you send out alerts and reminder notifications when you are about to go live on the video platform, helping to ensure your audience is ready and waiting when you start streaming.

Email Live Stream Promotion Ideas

Share your full schedule of upcoming streams
Always include a call-to-action button that lets your audience book a ticket or set a reminder
Respond to your subscriber’s most asked questions each month

SMS Live Stream Promotion Ideas

Text your subscribers with an alert when you are about to stream
Send multiple-choice questions that subscribers can quickly respond to with a keyword

3. Surveys and Polls

Surveys and polls can be an effective video live stream promotion approach both during and between your streams. Besides gathering feedback to make informed decisions, these have numerous uses to engage your audience and draw more attention to your stream.

For example, running public polls about topics related to your content on social media can spark a discussion that you can follow up on in a later stream, giving another reason to watch and get your responses or thoughts on the issue.
You can also use live polling to put questions to your audience in real-time. For example, if you are teaching an online class, live polling can enable your audience to take a quiz as a team effort or select the next topic for discussion.

4. Share Highlight Clips

One of the best ways to convince people to watch your streams is to show them what they could be missing out on. Highlight clips from past streams with a good video quality can provide a growing resource of content you can use for your video live stream promotion.

Look for parts of your virtual video event that last for a couple of minutes or less in which you address or sum up your viewpoint on an important, attention-grabbing issue.

The online videos with the highest average engagement are less than 2 minutes long at around 70% audience engagement. Just a few minutes longer and the average audience engagement rate drops below 50%. If you are using a video-sharing site like YouTube to post your stream clips, your average engagement rate can have a big impact on how visible your channel is on content-sharing platforms.

Here are some quick tips to ensure your highlight clips help grow live streaming audience:

Give each clip an attention-grabbing title and description
Add an intro and outro to the clip itself
Introduce your channel and schedule
This ensures that people get your stream info when your clips get shared on social media or messaging apps even if they don’t read the description.

5. Keep Them Waiting

This sounds counterintuitive, but it can be a good video live stream promotion idea to let your viewers wait for 5 or 10 minutes on a pre-stream screen or video after the scheduled stream starts.

There are a few benefits to doing this:

  • Latecomers won’t miss the start of the show.
  • It gives you a chance to send out some last-minute alerts and reminders.
  • Your pre-stream card can share extra details like your social media profiles, streaming schedule, or links to your website.
  • Your audience can chat and create a pre-stream buzz.
  • It gives you the last chance to discover and resolve any technical issues without any disruption to the show.

6. Collaborate

Someone who already watches video content and streams by other relevant figures in your industry or specific niche will be easier to convert to your own audience. As a result, collaborating with other people who attract a similar demographic can be an effective video live stream promotion strategy.

This could involve working with someone who has a different but related subject matter to present a complete picture on a topic that touches on both of your areas of expertise. Alternatively, it could mean reaching out to discuss ideas or host a guest speaker. For example, Dacast provides a range of features to enable religious stream audiences to benefit from sermons and discussions with religious leaders worldwide.

Collaborations are a lot more successful when you have genuine chemistry with your guest or another streamer you are collaborating with, so get to know someone and see that they are a good fit for your audience before inviting them or asking to be part of their stream. Before a collaborative stream starts, it can be a good idea to chat with your guest for 10 or 20 minutes before beginning the stream. This can enable a smoother start after your stream intro, as you can get back into or quickly recap the chat you were having before going live.

7. Promote During the Stream

Video live stream promotion shouldn’t stop once your online video starts. Aim to bookend each stream with your streaming schedule and upcoming content plans, as well as giving out this information at least once in the middle of it. This can help your viewers know what you are up to and when to catch the next stream even if they miss the start or end of your current one.

Besides keeping your audience updated on your schedule, don’t forget to ask your viewers to share your videos, and remind them that they can subscribe to your mailing list for updates and notifications. If you are new to streaming or online content creation, this bit might feel a little uncomfortable.

However, asking your audience to share your video content works for advertising video streams. Numerous YouTube channels have confirmed that asking their viewers to like and subscribe to their videos results in a significant improvement to their engagement metrics, and the same applies to streaming. Keeping these requests to once an hour or less will help avoid becoming repetitive.

8. Follow Up

Successful live streaming will result in a bunch of new subscribers, so don’t miss the opportunity to engage them immediately by following up after it. This is a great time to share links to other content related to your latest stream, let your audience know where they can find out more, and prompt viewers for questions and feedback.

For example, if you are using Dacast to run an educational stream:

  • Your follow up message could recap the most challenging parts of the lesson,
  • Give a test or quiz for viewers to complete,
  • Ask viewers if they need further explanation of a topic.

Don’t only follow up with the people on your mailing list, however. Use retargeting ads to reach out to everyone who visited your stream. Like a follow-up email or text, these should be specific to your most recent stream so that they are focused on the same subject matter that brought people into that stream in the first place.

FAQs

1. How do I promote my upcoming stream?

There are several video live stream promotion methods you can use to promote your stream:

  • Social Media Channels: Create graphics or teaser videos to announce your live stream on platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and even YouTube. Use features like Stories and Shorts to build hype. Include the date, time, and a brief description of your live stream.
  • Email Marketing: Reach out to your existing audience via email blasts or newsletters. You can generate excitement by highlighting the topic and any special guests you might have.
  • Livestream Platform Features: Many streaming services offer built-in promotion tools. Schedule your stream in advance and leverage their notification systems to automatically alert your followers.
  • Website Integration: Embed the live stream link directly on your website for easy access.

2. Can I get paid for live streaming?

You can generate revenue for live streaming through different video monetization options such as:

  • Donations: You can monetize video content by allowing viewers to donate directly during your live stream through platforms that offer tipping features.
  • Subscriptions: Offering premium content or perks to live streaming followers with a subscription fee is another video monetization strategy.
  • Branded Content: You can partner with brands to promote their products or services during your virtual events using sponsored video ads to monetize videos.
  • Sell Products: If you have merchandise or other products, showcase them during your live stream and provide a direct purchase link.

3. How can I stream live for free?

Several platforms can allow you to stream your video content for free, such as YouTube Live, Facebook Live, Twitch, and Instagram Live. Simply create an account on the video hosting platform of your choice, set up your streaming settings, and start broadcasting.

4. How do creators build live streaming followers?

Building a growing online video audience takes time and dedication. Here are some essential tips to consider:

  • Be Consistent: Stream regularly and stick to a schedule to keep viewers engaged.
  • Share High-Quality Video Content: Deliver valuable and entertaining content that resonates with your target audience.
  • Maintain User Engagement: Interact with your viewers by responding to comments, answering questions, and hosting giveaways.
  • Optimize Your Channel: Use a relevant title, video description, and tag to improve discoverability on video hosting platforms.

5. How do you promote a live event on social media?

Here are some video live streaming promotion techniques you can use to promote your event:

  • Create a Buzz: Use social media strategically in the days leading up to your live event. Post teasers, graphics, and countdowns to build anticipation.
  • Utilize Hashtags: Include relevant hashtags to increase discoverability and attract viewers interested in similar live streaming content.
  • Run Contests or Giveaways: Encourage engagement by offering prizes or incentives for viewers who share your live stream promotion.
  • Partner with Influencers: Collaborate with influencers in your niche to promote your live stream to their specific audience.

Final Thoughts

Your ability to interact with your audience is a key element to live streaming success. By capitalizing on the live stream promotion strategies and best practices we mentioned in this article, you’ll better engage your audience, increasing the chances of them joining your stream.

Whether you’re new or a veteran, you can grow your live streaming channel with the right professional platform. Dacast is just such a professional-grade, high-quality streaming platform. Try Dacast’s wide array of features to help your video live stream promotion and interact with your audience in real-time for 14-days.

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Harmonie Duhamel

Harmonie is a Senior digital marketer with over 6 years in the Tech Industry. She has a strong marketing and sales background and loves to work in multilingual environments.