In the photography business, getting in front of your target audience often and effectively is key. Video makes it easy to connect with new audiences on social media, drive awareness for your business, and showcase your brand personality. What’s more, it can help you foster a human connection with your current clientele. Here are three examples of photographers who did all of the above using video.

Teri Fode runs a very successful portrait business. She crafts portraits for individuals, families, and—especially—high school seniors. With that young client base, Teri realized the importance of standing out on social media to connect with high school senior clients.

Since she was already using Animoto to create slideshows of each photo session, she decided to create a short, social-friendly video that would grab the attention of her senior portrait audience. Teri used behind-the-scenes video clips, photos, and text to showcase the experience of booking a senior portrait with her.

Next, she spent $50 on Facebook to target the moms of Sacramento high school students, along with another $50 to reach 16-to-18 year olds in the same area. The one video ad resulted in 3 new clients and $10,000 in sales—a 10X return on her $100 investment.

After every newborn session, Kelly Brown used to give every client a baby cookie. It was a small thank you gift that only cost $11 per cookie, but when she did the math she realized that it was costing her business over $1500 per year. When she discovered Animoto, she started giving video birth announcements to each client as a gift. Unlike the cookie, which was eaten and forgotten, the videos live on and serve as a tool for clients to share and spread the word not only about their new bundle of joy, but also about Kelly's business.

The videos turned out to be a great source of brand awareness, and led her clients to do the marketing for her. Once Kelly's clients receive their video birth announcement, the first thing they usually do is share it on Facebook. Kelly puts her logo at the end of the videos and most clients also tag her in the post. Since she's started doing this, her bookings from referrals have seen a dramatic increase. "It's the simplest way I can possibly think of to have my work seen by more people and have my clients love me for giving them this fabulous gift. Animoto makes it possible for me to create this opportunity at minimal cost."

Kristina Houser is a wedding and portrait photographer and owner of Kristina Houser Photography & Cinema in Tampa Bay. To expand her reach and bring in more business, Kristina decided to experiment with video ads on Facebook. The video paired some of her strongest headshot photographs with big, bold, eye-catching text that highlights the benefits of booking a shoot. "We wanted something that felt professional and on-brand, so it was great that we were able to use our own colors for the text to tie it back to the studio," says Kristina. "The layouts also made it easy for us to show off a lot of our work at once without the video getting too long."

The studio books 10 headshots in an average month. The month the Facebook video ad ran, they booked 16. Seven can be attributed to the Facebook video. Additionally, on the day the ad ran, the Kristina Houser Photography & Cinema website saw 415 visitors. That's more than 27X the average daily visitor count of 15.