Video increases website conversions when it is built into a marketing plan with a defined audience and a defined call to action. On its own, posted with no plan behind it, video rarely converts.

Video increases website conversions, but only when it is part of a marketing plan with a clear audience and a clear call to action behind it. Video by itself almost never closes anyone. It moves people along, builds trust, and shows what words cannot show, and then the rest of your marketing has to do its job.

The numbers back this up on both sides. Wyzowl's 2026 survey found 83% of marketers saying video has directly increased sales, and 82% saying it delivers good ROI. Landing pages with video convert at rates up to 86% higher than text-only pages. They also describe video that was placed on purpose, aimed at a specific buyer, and pointed at a specific next step.

Video is one piece of the plan

I have been shooting commercial work in Chicago for about 30 years. A business that treats video as one part of a larger effort gets results. A business that treats video as the effort gets views and not too much else.

Think about where the video lives. A video on a product page has a different job than a video running as a paid ad, which has a different job than a video on your About page. Same camera, same crew, completely different purpose. If nobody decided which one you were making, you end up with something that does none of them well.

How much video matters also depends on what you sell. Some products are visual by nature and video carries most of the weight. Others are sold on specs, price, or a relationship, and video plays a supporting role. Knowing which situation you are in before you spend money is most of the battle.

When video does most of the selling

One of my favorite examples was a marketing video for a vacation home in a mountain state. The property was the product. No amount of copy was going to communicate the setting, the light, the space, and the feeling of being there. The video did it in under two minutes.

It pulled thousands of views and bookings jumped. That is a case where video genuinely moved the needle, because the thing being sold was visual and the video showed people exactly what they were buying.

Food works the same way. So do venues, real estate, physical products, and anything where somebody needs to see it to want it. If that describes your business, video is not optional and you should invest accordingly. How much to spend is its own question, and when a more expensive video is worth it covers it in detail.

The mistake I see most often

Businesses make a video, post it, and wait. Then they decide video does not work.

A video is an asset. It is not a campaign. Posting it once on your homepage and once on social is not distribution. Before anything gets shot, somebody needs to answer where this video is going to live, what traffic is getting pointed at it, how long it stays in rotation, and what happens to people who watch it. Building a video into a marketing plan covers the process from start to finish.

The video that gets cut into six pieces for different placements and gets pushed for months will outperform the better-looking video that lived on a homepage. Distribution beats polish more often than anyone wants to admit.

Start with the call to action and the audience

In every discovery call I run, two questions shape the whole project.

What do you want the viewer to do? Request more information, click through somewhere, buy, book a call, or nothing at all because the video exists for brand exposure. Every one of those answers produces a different video. If a business cannot tell me what the viewer should do next, we are not ready to shoot.

Who is watching? A video aimed at a procurement director is a different piece than one aimed at a homeowner scrolling on a phone. Length, pacing, music, and the amount of explaining all shift based on who is on the other end.

Answer those two and the creative decisions mostly make themselves.

Casual look, professional execution

Plenty of marketing video is supposed to feel unpolished now. Phone-style framing, natural light, somebody talking straight into the lens. That look works, especially on social.

Casual look and casual execution are two separate things. Audio still has to be clean. Exposure still has to be good. The edit still has to work. People cannot always name what makes a video feel cheap, but they feel it, and they leave. A video that looks off-the-cuff and is actually well made takes more skill than one that looks expensive.

How this works at Pierson Studios

Every project starts with a planning conversation before a camera comes out. Goal of the video, audience, where it is going to be posted, what the call to action is, and how it fits into the broader marketing effort. That conversation is where the money gets saved, because it keeps us from building the wrong thing.

From there we handle pre-production, the shoot, and post. Corporate video, food photography, and B2B work are the areas where we spend most of our time, for local businesses and national brands alike.

If you are weighing whether video belongs in your marketing, the honest answer is that it probably does, and it will work in proportion to the plan you put around it.

Key Takeaways

Video increases website conversions when it is part of a marketing plan, not when it stands alone.
Landing pages with video have been measured converting up to 86% higher than text-only pages, and 83% of marketers report video has directly increased sales.
Highly visual products like properties, food, and venues get the most out of video because seeing the product is the sale.
The most common mistake is making a video with no distribution plan behind it.
Define the call to action and the audience before production starts, because both change what gets shot.
A casual look still requires professional execution on audio, exposure, and editing.

Does Video Increase Website Conversions?