Company Profile
Company: D-Link
Product: Networking equipment
YouTube channel: www.youtube.com/user/DLinkTV
Websites: www.dlinktv.com, www.dlink.com
To demonstrate that YouTube is an ideal marketing vehicle for companies of all sizes, let’s look at one of the biggest companies using YouTube today. D-Link is probably familiar to most readers, being one of the indus-try’s largest manufacturers of networking equipment. The company produces routers and wireless adapters and all the pieces and parts you need to put together a home or business network.
D-Link uses online videos on a number of sites to promote its full line of products. YouTube is just one of the channels for D-Link’s videos, dubbed D-LinkTV; the company also hosts its own D-LinkTV website and puts its videos on a host of partner sites.
How did D-Link get the idea for its D-LinkTV videos? According to Daniel Kelley, senior director of Marketing, the company recognized in the market a need for customers to learn more about D-Link’s products and to learn how to use them. As Daniel admits, networking products can sometimes be complicated, even though D-Link works on engineering them for the customer. The company’s first step is getting the consumer to understand what the product does and making that customer feel comfortable making a purchase. Industry trends show that streaming video on the Web was becoming more accepted and popular, especially with the widespread adoption of broadband and improved streaming technology, so company management knew it was a type of media it could leverage.
The first video D-Link shot was an informational video on the need to secure a home network. But that was just the tip of the iceberg. When the D-LinkTV site officially launched in February 2007, it had more than 50 videos available.
Why so many videos at the start? As Daniel notes, “It went live with so many videos to get a competitive start on other competitors in the market. We knew we were taking a risk but we were also trying to take a leadership in the industry of video tech help.”
Those first videos garnered big viewership and acceptance and, equally important, got widespread press coverage. D-Link had accomplished its goal: immediate recognition as a leader in this type of content. And that press coverage resulted in even more viewers, with a spike in viewership levels after the first month or so, and continual growth in viewership thereafter.
As I mentioned, D-Link displays its videos not just on YouTube but also on its own corporate website. D-Link also has its videos on the sites of many of its largest retail partners, including TigerDirect (www.tigerdirect.com), Buy.com (www.buy.com), Costco (www.costco.com), and Best Buy (www.bestbuy.com). Dan notes that they receive a lot of views on these partner sites “because customers can watch a video before actually buying the product.”
Of all these sites, the most important is the company’s own corporate website, which is where consumers and business owners tend to go for product information. It’s also the most logical place to host and promote the company’s videos.
That said, Dan says that putting all the company’s videos on YouTube “was a great business plan, because of the potential for viral sharing of these videos from person to person.” He goes on to note that viewership has increased steadily due to reviews coming from YouTube and other social networking sites: “Sites like YouTube really hold the potential for any video to take off and become widespread, due to accessibility of the Internet around the world.”
D-LinkTV is not a small endeavor. As of May 2008, D-Link had produced more than 260 videos. They receive 5,000 to 10,000 views per day on the corporate website, with viewership on YouTube and other partner sites being somewhat more difficult to track.
How have all these videos and viewers affected the company’s sales? As Dan admits, “It’s hard to tell, because you cannot track a connection between someone watching a video and then going out and buying the product. But as far as feedback goes, we have seen many emails and positive feedback based on the videos. Emails including statements like ‘I’ll never buy a non–D-Link brand again’ are common. These videos show us that we are building good customer loyalty due to the helpfulness of the videos.”
One of the keys to D-LinkTV is that the company doesn’t just produce one type of video. Instead, it produces product videos, Q&A videos, D.I.Y. (doit-yourself) videos, and so forth. Of all these videos, Dan says that the product videos are the most popular:
We believe this is because people are more careful about the product they buy. When they are making a purchase of $100 or more they do their research to make sure they are getting the most and best for their money. The product videos are great research for consumers because it is a media they are very comfortable [with]. The popularity of television and YouTube shows that people like to see what the product can do and see a person interacting with the product before they go out and buy it.
Dan goes on to note that the company has also received good feedback on its D.I.Y. videos. These release weekly and because of the helpful content shown in a comfortable environment, they are positively accepted.
Bottom line, D-Link uses its videos for education, to inform customers about its products, and to benefit its customers via helpful information about D-Link products. That makes D-LinkTV a big part of D-Link’s marketing mix, especially with new products; the videos help generate publicity about what the product does and how it works.
Like most businesses using online video to promote their businesses, D-Link’s videos started out rather inexpensive at the beginning, with minimal investment in equipment. However, given the aggressive schedule of new videos, the company is investing more and more in video production, to the point of having built two studios in the company’s main building. D-Link also updated its equipment to include HDTV cameras. That said, the biggest part of the budget is personnel, which is difficult to put a price on per video. The company uses almost exclusively D-Link employees on camera.
Even with that investment in equipment and personnel, D-Link has learned over time that more relaxed, impromptu videos do better than tightly scripted ones; the more unscripted the video, the better it comes across. As Dan Kelley notes:
In the beginning, we were trying to script every sentence and it came off too scripted. Now we use bullet points to make it more casual and personal. We also have expanded the large range of videos that we do. We have learned that the need for YouTube is entertainment and funnier videos. The dry informational videos on products are not as popular as the more ‘infotainment’ ones. The more entertaining and exciting the better the video and the more views we receive.
Dan also has this advice for other businesses seeking to make online videos part of their marketing mix:
You need to get the videos up and make them part of your normal marketing plan, because you never know what the response to a certain video will be. There are great opportunities to share and make videos that are very helpful. Don’t overlook YouTube because it gets a ton of hits on a website separate from your own—which can help even the smallest business.
Good advice from a marketer benefiting hugely from YouTube and the online video revolution. Can you match D-Link’s success?
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