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Five things that make a marketing video effective.

December 15, 2011 By 3 Comments

This video is very effective.  It’s fun, it’s memorable, it’s evocative and it’s something that you want to share.  It informs you, it engages you, it moves you and it’s very well done. Wow.

Sponsored by RIOTUR, the City of Rio de Janeiro’s tourism authority, this video was created to support RIO’s bid to host the 2016 Summer Olympics. RIO won the bid making it the first South American city to host the Olympic games. I have to believe that this video contributed in at least some small way to RIO’s successful bid.

Like Paris, San Francisco, Vancouver and Venice, RIO is blessed with iconic scenery and natural beauty so an argument could be made that creating a video to promote the city shouldn’t be that difficult. There’s more to it than beautiful shots, however. This video works for a number of reasons:

1. There’s a strong story-line that carries the video. By story-line, I don’t mean ‘boy meets girl, boy leaves girl, etc.” The story-line is much more subtle in this video, but just as important. Music is at the heart of the video. Music not only sets the mood and pace of this video, it becomes clear that music is a core element that makes up the character of the city and the people of RIO. That’s the story being told. Music is an integral part of the culture. That’s a very compelling story.

2. The video is engaging. You want to watch the video, you are interested to see what comes next. This is a difficult thing to do in a video – make the viewer want to keep watching.

3. It solves a specific business problem. The business problem for the Olympic committee was ‘what city do we chose for the 2016 Olympics?’ RIOTUR provides ample reasons for IOC judges to consider RIO as the 2016 destination city: RIO is a ‘lifestyle city’ as evidenced by the myriad of activities shown in the video; RIO has a strong and obvious tradition of sports; RIO already has existing sporting facilities that could accommodate some of the different events; RIO will be a huge draw as a destination for travelers which will ensure that the games are well attended; and like the Vancouver Winter Olympics, the natural beauty of the hosting city will certainly have a halo effect on the games themselves.

4. Simple message. Show me don’t tell me. No talking heads, no spoken words, no happy talk or marketing bluster, just a compelling video highlighting the people, the lifestyle and the beauty of RIO all centered around a theme of music and culture.

5. The video is very well produced. From the inclusion of familiar iconic scenary like the cable car to Sugarloaf Mountain and the Christ the Redeemer statue overlooking the city to an array of lifestyle and beauty shots of the city and it’s inhabitants, this video covers all bases.  A clever concept interweaving a combination of sound and music is complemented by beautiful cinematography and great editing.

I don’t know the name of the company that produced this video but they deserve a lot of credit for helping RIO win the 2016 Olympic bid.

Filed Under: General, Marketing with Video, The Effect of Video on Your Brand, Video and Government, Video Marketing Tagged With: , , ,

10 Reasons Why Your Marketing Video Isn’t Working?

September 7, 2011 By 2 Comments

You just spent $2,000, $20,000 or $200,000 on your most recent corporate video project and it didn’t move the dial. What happened?

The creation of your corporate video should follow a structured development process. When it doesn’t your chance of success is low. Here are ten common mistakes made by companies developing marketing videos:

1. Poorly defined objectives.
Can you easily fill in the following blanks?: This video will help ___{this audience}____  understand that our product or service solves ___{this problem}___  and provides ____ {these benefits)____ . We will measure the success of this video by ___{this rating mechanism}____.
If you can’t clearly and succinctly fill in the first three blanks chances are your video will fail to achieve any measurable results.  If you can’t fill in the last blank you’ll never know what was achieved.

2. No clear message(s).
 “Expertocom is a world leader in the provisioning of leading edge solutions and robust, mission critical systems to it’s global client base.” Uh-huh. Even if you have a well defined audience, problem statement and benefit, you still need to communicate in clear and convincing manner. Some common mistakes:
- The video is all about you. No one cares about you, they only care about how you can solve their problem.
- B2N (Business to No one) If your message is so general that it applies to everyone it probably won’t resonate with anyone. Be specific. Pick one audience and deliver one really strong, concise message tailored to that specific audience’s needs.
- Jargon-loading. If you “utilize leading-edge best practices to incentivize and leverage your best-of-breed base through groundbreaking, synergistic and outside-the-box thinking” then… no one will understand you.
- Saying too much. “I’m sorry I wrote you such a long letter but I didn’t have time to write a short one” – Mark Twain. It’s really difficult to be succinct. It also seems risky. Script-by-committee is death to most video projects. In video, shorter is almost always better.

3. Your video doesn’t resonate with your audience.
The best messages work on a visceral level. They make you think, even better, they make you feel something.  If your video is dull (i.e. a talking head) and if you don’t use video effectively (show me, don’t tell me!) then you will quickly lose your audience. Facts are important but a good story is better. While it may be interesting to note that your lubricant is 27% more viscous than any other on the market it may be more interesting to show that your product is the one that your local fire department depends on. Translating the key benefits you are trying to illustrate into ideas and building that into a compelling visual story is done before any crew show up to start shooting.  This is the most important part of the video development process and it’s also the hardest to get right, yet it’s usually the piece that gets the least attention. How do you find a company with this type of experience? Look at their previous work. If it’s not engaging, yours won’t be either.

4. Loose, or no processes at all to develop and promote the video.
The most important part of the video production process is pre-production. Chances are that if you are either surprised or disappointed by the results of your video it is because the planning process was flawed. A well defined storyboard should tell everyone involved exactly what is being said and what visuals are being shown to support those messages. A shotlist tells you exactly what needs to be shot, with whom and when.  When the video is shot and edited a marketing plan tells you exactly what the video is supposed to accomplish, how you are going to get your video in front of your intended audience (…who may or may not ever show up at your website) and how the results of the video should be measured. Again, all of this happens before anyone shows up with a camera. If your video production company tells you what your video should look like with little or no input from you – it probably won’t help your business.

5. You started with creative.
“Our President has this really cool idea!” Just like graphic design is the last step in the pre-development phase of a website (often it is first),  ’creative’ is the last step in the development of a video script and storyboard. Again… too often it is first. Creativity is an essential part of the video production process but it should never be be the tail wagging the dog. Sure, if you have a budget to create a whack of branded entertainment, that’s a different story – but for most corporate video projects, branded entertainment is not the goal.

6. Your video doesn’t support your brand.
 Too often, videos are created in isolation. Your brand is the sum total of all of the experiences people have with your company, that includes video. Your video has to support and complement the tone and key messages that you want associated with your brand. {Warning: Wacky viral videos often do more harm than good.)  Video production is not an isolated activity. Your video production company has to understand how you are marketing your business and has to be keen to engage with your marketing department and /or the marketing agency that is helping guide your brand.

7. Budget isn’t large enough.
“We took a couple thousand out of our cleaning budget to do this video.” “Yep, that’s all we’ve got, but we still want it to look like Avatar.” “My cousin Eddy said it would only cost him $400 to make the same video.” The cost of video production has decreased dramatically over the last five years. That said, there is little point in developing a video if you haven’t allocated a reasonable budget for the project. What does a video cost: Here are 25 factors and their prices that go into the cost of developing a corporate video.

8. Wrong type of video.
There are many different styles, structures and purposes for corporate video. Here are 51 different types of video you can develop to promote your business.  A thirty second pre-roll promotion video is probably too long and a one minute recruitment video is probably too short. Hiring actors to speak to a technical audience isn’t a good idea.  Putting your President on camera may (or may not be) a good idea. A talking head is often a waste of time.  A detailed technical video won’t resonate with people in the awareness phase of the sales cycle but can work very well for people in the consideration phase. What type of video you develop and what structure you use for the video is just as important as what messages you chose.

9. No call to action.
What do you want people to do after they have watched your video? If you don’t know, your viewer won’t either.

10. No distribution, SEO or promotion plan.
 Even if your video is great, if no one sees it you’ve wasted your money. Are you optimizing a webpage with keywords to help promote the video? Are you promoting the video on industry portals or other related sites where you intended audience might be? Have you developed an email campaign to promote the video to key audiences? Do you have a process to move prospective viewers through your sales cycle once they have viewed the video? Have you tested the video before widely launching it to make sure it accomplishes what you want it to? Do you have any budget for changes or do you assume that you’ll get it exactly right the first time through? Do you have a social media campaign, a PR campaign, a media campaign or some other promotional activity to build interest and awareness for the video?

The video production piece (shooting and editing) represents about 1/3 of the total value in the video development process. Planning (building the right messages for your audience) and promotion (making sure the video is seen) are both equally important.

 

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{Note: regarding ‘Jargon -Loading’, thanks to Lindsey McCaffrey for inspiration on ‘Words and phrases I don’t want to see in your copy‘}

Filed Under: Corporate Video Production, General, Managing Video Projects, Marketing with Video, Resources, Starting a Video Project, The Effect of Video on Your Brand, Video Marketing, video production Tagged With: , ,

Marketing lessons from presidential candidacy videos.

May 16, 2011 By 1 Comment

Barring a political catastrophe, President Obama will likely be re-elected in 2012. So while discussions around the outcome of these videos are probably moot, it’s still instructive to see how the committed (or nearly committed) presidential candidates are using video (not just news interviews or TV spots) to position themselves. Companies large and small would benefit from both lessons learned and mistakes made in these videos.

Newt Gingrich {Grade: F}

As John Stewart pointed out last week – it looks like Newt’s video was shot in a Sears portrait studio. This video is all Newt. Nothing to see but Newt’s ample cranium for over two minutes. Talking heads are one the most common and least valuable uses of video.  Most are dull and forgettable – like this one. The message, if you listened to it, is pretty much a litany of cliches and generic promises. Video is a visual medium. Show people what you are talking about. Better yet, get other people to talk about what is important to them. No one wants to hear your company president blather on for two minutes about your product or service either. Show people the benefits of the product. Appeal to the buyers emotions. Get satisfied customers to gush about how your product changed their lives. Sure, if your candidate (or CEO) looks like JFK or Ronald Reagan then a bit of camera time is probably a good thing. This video is old school, it’s dull and there is absolutely no reason to share it with anyone.

Mitt Romney {Grade: D+}

This video has a number of things going for it that Newt’s doesn’t: 1. Mitt took the time to shoot the video somewhere (no doubt this video will solidify the New Hampshire High School football vote), 2. Let’s face it – Mitt looks like he was pulled out of central casting (“hey, we need a presidential looking guy… and not Martin Sheen”), 3. Mitt makes reference to conversations with people and speaks about their concerns. 4. It didn’t looked too staged. (Of course it’s staged – all of these things are staged. There is no ‘real’ in reality TV) but at least he made the effort to be seen in a fairly natural setting. The video felt comfortable – that’s a good thing. But in the end it is was still dull and there were very few messages or ideas that really stick with you in this video. People understand and remember if you tell them and show them what you are talking about. If you sell fertilizer (a purely coincidental choice of analogy…) it would make some sense to get your spokesperson out on a farm delivering your message – so kudos to team Mitt for that. But wouldn’t it be better hearing a farmer describe how and why your fertilizer is the best stuff around.

Tim Pawlenty  {Grade B}

I give this video a lot of credit, it has it all: Epic soundtrack – check. Lots of special effects (especially ‘lens flare’) – check. Lot’s of quick cuts and shaky camera – check. This would have made a good movie trailer or John Mellancamp video. No question it’s slick, maybe too slick, but there is no denying it gets and keeps your attention, it delivers well on a few key messages and it is something you would share, or at least want to watch all the way through. Problem is Tim is going to find it difficult to live up to the hype of this video. I’m not sure he’s really that cool in real life.

President Obama {Grade B}

I really like this video because it focuses on real people saying real things (sure it’s staged… this is marketing we’re talking about) but it does what the Obama campaign team do so well and what few republican teams seem to grasp – it seems to relate to people on a human level. It makes a real connection. (Those connections drive involvement which wins elections.) Obama isn’t even in this video (he’s got a day job that precludes him from appearing too ‘campaigny’) but that doesn’t really matter. People talking about Obama on a personal level resonates with many people – it’ll stick and it’ll get people thinking. Most of the other videos don’t make you think – they don’t try very hard to engage you – they just talk about what they think you want to hear.  Whether you are promoting a new cleaning solvent or your presidential candidacy the message has to resonate – it has to appeal emotionally or you’re wasting your time.

 

Bonus Video:

Congressman Paul Ryan’s Pathway to Prosperity {Grade A-}

Ryan won’t be running in 2012 but this is still a great video that shows how to effectively promote an idea. (Isn’t that what the elections should be about…) I’m not going to comment on the oversimplification of some very complicated issues being shown in this video but I do believe the style and approach are very effective. Probably the best of the lot. It’s well produced, interesting to watch and more importantly, it communicates something of lasting value. It gives you a clear (at least in Ryan’s mind) view of where he sees the specific problems and discusses how these problems should be addresses. The biggest issue with most political videos is that they are usually forgettable, have little lasting value and most importantly, they never make a convincing point. Ryan has taken a stand and also taken the time to clearly and effectively communicate his position on a very specific issue.  Any company would benefit from taking this type of approach: Clearly identifying a specific pain, addressing the specific solution(s) to stop that pain, and most important - clearly demonstrating the benefits of fixing that pain. Marketing 101. Kudos to Ryan for this. See you in 2016.

{Follow-up note: Time magazine just named Ryan as a runner-up for their ‘Time, Man of the Year“.  And while Ryan claims in this article he doesn’t have the fire in his belly to be President, I’d be willing to bet that  will change in the near future.}

Even more bonus videos

Go to Ron Paul’s site and watch some of his older videos – they’re the most fun to watch.  He’s the only guy who you believe isn’t just saying whatever is needed to get elected. You actually feel that he believes what he says and probably won’t change his mind once elected. (He doesn’t stand a chance.)

 

Filed Under: General, Marketing with Video, The Effect of Video on Your Brand, Video and Government Tagged With: , , ,

51 ways to use web video to help your business grow

January 3, 2011 By 34 Comments

video wall


As bandwidth increases and video production costs continue to decrease businesses are beginning to adopt video as a primary method of communicating with their customers and prospects. In-house or outsourced, video is quickly becoming a marketer’s media tool of choice for two reasons: video is engaging and, more importantly, video is persuasive. Here are some of the ways that businesses are using video to help improve their bottom line:

Customer Reference Videos

1.  Customer Testimonials (Popularity: Moderate  | Growth Potential: High)
Nothing is more compelling than seeing and hearing your customer (ideally in their own environment) extol the virtues of your products and services or explaining how your company helped them to achieve their business goals. These videos usually run from fifteen second snippets to a minute and are typically combined with or used to support other marketing material.

2. Success Stories (Popularity: Moderate  | Growth Potential: High)
Similar to a customer testimonial these videos run between one and two minutes and follow an interview format where the person on screen answers questions posed by an interviewer just off-camera. These videos are usually delivered as stand-alone marketing support materials and are often grouped with other customer success stories.

3. Video Case Study (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
A video case study combines customer testimonials with more a more in-depth explanation of how your company’s products and services helped your customer be successful. These case studies usually incorporate two voices – a narrator and the voice of your customer and can run anywhere from two to five minutes. The video structure follows the same “Problem, Solution, Benefit” format found in a printed case study and usually include b-roll or other supporting text and video.

4. Man-in-the-street Interviews (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
These videos are typically done to promote events and to build buzz around coming events but can also be employed to capture ‘spontaneous’ responses to targeted questions that help promote your product or service or to help differentiate the benefits of your brand compared to the real or imagined problems associated with your competitors. Consumer focused companies such as soft drink manufacturers, phone companies and fast food companies often use this video format in advertising but you are starting to see this type of video appear as a stand-alone promotion on business websites or YouTube business channels.  Sometimes these videos are genuine. Sometimes they are completely staged. ‘Authenticity’ is, in some sense, becoming a style…

5. Customer Presentations. (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Low)
If one of your customers is presenting at a conference, trade show or event or even in your offices and is talking about your products or services either directly with you or indirectly as part of a larger discussion this may be a perfect opportunity to capture the presentation of video (with permission, of course) to re-purpose on your website and intranet.

Product and Service Promotion

6. Product Presentations (Popularity: Moderate  | Growth Potential: High)
Product (or service) presentation videos are typically employed early in the buying cycle. Product or service presentations focus on benefits and talk from your customer’s perspective. They should speak clearly to how your product solves a specific business, personal or economic problem that your prospect is experiencing. They are used to help your customers and prospects differentiate between the benefits of your products and services to those of your competitors.

7. Product Demonstrations (Popularity: Moderate  | Growth Potential: High)
Product demos show how your product works and highlight the features that differentiate it from that of your competitors. Software screen captures, a 3D cut-away, or a high impact demo by a presenter are all excellent ways of showing how your product or service works. These videos are typically used to influence a prospect who is relatively far along in the sales cycle. In technology marketing these videos would be targeted at the technical approvers who need to understand how something works. In consumer marketing these would be targeted at the economic buyers of larger ticket items who may be further along the sales process.

8. Product Reviews (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
The best product reviews are trusted third party reviews. Video reviews can be found anywhere from YouTube to various business portals. To the extent they are positive and promote your brand, they should be referenced. You can also partner with trusted third parties to create product reviews for your own products.

9. Visual Stories (Popularity: Moderate  | Growth Potential: High)
Quickly rising in popularity, visual stories employ illustrations, animations and motion graphics with a voice-over to explain complex products or services in a simple and compelling manner. These are sometime referred to as ‘explainers’ and are usually between one and three minutes in length. A new version of this tool, used primarily for entertainment, are websites that offer predefined characters and backgrounds that you can both animate and add an automated voice to (sort of like building your own Second Life commercials). You will begin to see many new hosted services offering customizable cloud-based animation modeling options – some good and some quite awful.

Corporate Video

10. Corporate Overview (Popularity: High  | Growth Potential: moderate)
These videos are the video equivalent of the ‘company brochure’ for small companies – intended to give new visitors to a website a better idea of the company. Corporate overview videos typically company history, key products, executives/owners and other top level business info. As the cost of video production continues to decrease and the popularity of video increases you will start to see these videos being replaced by multiple, more targeted video.

11. Executive Presentations (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
Whether you are preparing for a quarterly update, responding to a major event in your industry or making a regularly scheduled presentation there is great value in presenting the “face” and “voice” of your leadership team to all of your constituents.

12. Staff Presentations (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
Social media and other Web 2.0 trends have caused companies to reconsider how they communicate with external audiences. Your senior leadership team should not be the first and only consideration to represent your company. It is becoming more imperative to consider showcasing the people that drive the day-to-day operations of your company. Customer service representatives, technical experts and legacy workers are all valuable considerations for this new category of corporate video. Surveys show that there is more trust associated with these employees than with senior management. When you are selling to influencers in organizations (versus economic buyers or decision makers) it is especially important you represent your company with people that your customers and prospects can relate to.

13. Corporate facilities or equipment tour (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Low)
Ten years ago corporate facility videos and equipment tours were popular. Down-sizing, off-shoring, outsourcing, a couple of recessions and a hollowing out of North America’s manufacturing base has change the priorities placed on these videos. Uniqueness is key to success here. That said, it’s really not about you and your stuff any more – it’s about how you can solve your customers problems.

14. Annual Report / Review (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Low)
Public companies are legally obliged to create annual and quarterly reviews. As well, larger privately held companies also create their own quarterly and annual reviews. As print continues to fall out of favor video will either supplement or replace these materials.

15. Video Signature and Video Introduction (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
Social media sites like LinkedIn and Facebook are just starting to enter into the corporate culture even though they have been part of the social culture for years. Other social sites like web-based dating services are now commonplace. Video is becoming a key component in how you ‘sell’ yourself, in your private life… and in business. A video signature is a video (either embedded or direct link to video) that is in the signature portion of your email. Introductory videos serve the same purpose – to give people who don’t know you a better idea about who your are.

Training

16. Training (Popularity: Moderate  | Growth Potential: High)
Corporate video first gained prominence with training (service, support, sales, personal development etc.) and continues to be one of the best uses of video. Online Video is a cost effective substitute for in-class training. You can also easily integrate video into online training management tools.

17. Overnight expert videos (Sales Support)  (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
If you serve a large geographic area or sell through channels then it is well worth the effort to put together short ‘overnight expert’ sales support videos that highlight the key selling points, features, benefits, objection handling and follow-up issues to consider by your direct or channel sales force.

18. Just-in-time learning (‘How-to’ Videos)  (Popularity:Moderate  | Growth Potential: High)
Contextual training videos are becoming very popular on the web. ‘How-to’ videos, video manuals, on-site video reference, quick assembly demos, and other types of video are being used to supplement or replace traditional training. Mobile video will increase the popularity of this type of video.

Customer Support

19. Post sale support and maintenance videos (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
No one reads manuals. You can save thousands of dollars of post sale support by creating informative assembly, installation and maintenance videos for your products and services.

20. Website FAQ Video (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
In certain formats video can be a suitable replacement for text where an authoritative voice, support materials or other visual references are required. A list of FAQ’s answered by a company expert is an example.

21. Live, two-way video (i.e. Apple’s FaceTime or Skype)
I believe an interesting application for mobile computing and video is going to evolve around the ability to incorporate live and recorded video into the customer support process. Imagine being able to show someone the problem you are having with their product rather than trying to describe it or send them a photo. Showing someone the problem is just the beginning. Getting a step-by-step video response with someone talking you through the solution – live… that’s the holy grail of customer support. Most companies will dismiss this as too expensive. Other companies, like Apple, will integrate these types of services into their entire brand experience.

Internal Communications

22. Internal Communications (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
In larger companies few people have the time or interest to understand what other groups or functions within the company do or even why they exist. Internal videos that highlight business plans, new business activities and achievements can improve knowledge transfer and lead to more effective communications. They are also a great way to show off your local heroes. These videos can be either live or recorded and are typically used in larger more geographically dispersed companies. As employees continue to work from home these videos will become more important.

23. Event/Conference and Trade Show Communications. (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Low)
Most companies spend a disproportionate amount of their marketing budget on attending and participating in a variety of industry events and yet only a very small percentage of employees ever benefit from these activities. Share the knowledge gained at these events by capturing the presentations, demos, interviews, commentaries etc. on video.

24. Employee orientation (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
Once your new recruits are on board employee orientation videos are a great way to get new staff up to speed. Company history, structure, procedures, policies and codes of behavior can all be communicated effectively with video.

25. Health, Legal & Safety (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
The cost of dealing with health and safety related issues within organizations continues to grow. Video is one of the most effective means of minimizing these costs.

Advertising , Marketing  and Promotion

26. Commercials (Popularity: High  | Growth Potential: High)
While advertisers are becoming more selective in how they chose to spend their promotional dollars with broadcast television, other venues for commercials such as online video pre-roll, online sponsorships, in-game advertising, event sponsorships and in-theatre advertising are starting to take the place of broadcast / cable commercials. A proliferation of video screens cropping up on every building, device and structure will create an even more diverse set of advertising opportunities. The challenge will be to create specialized content targeted to ever- shrinking niche audiences.

27. Viral Video (Popularity: High  | Growth Potential: High)
A video is viral if it is so compelling that people want to share it. (Calling a video ‘Viral’ doesn’t make it so). Viral videos have to be extremely engaging, entertaining, shocking or meaningful to be successful. Unfortunately some of the most successful viral videos have little connection (and therefore value) to any brand. Everyone references ‘Will it Blend’ but very few viral videos are remotely this successful in actually driving sales. Viral video is very difficult to do well.

28. Email Video (Popularity: Moderate  | Growth Potential: High)
Testing has shown that open rates can double if you include video in your email marketing activities. To be effective the video should be purpose-built to elicit a specific conversion activity such as requesting a demo, more info, etc. E-mail is seeing a resurgence with marketers and embedded video in emails (like gmail supports) or links to video in email is becoming very popular.

29. Infomercials (Popularity: High  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
Infomercials have been around forever. While they continue to be the primary focus of web-based parody videos they have remained remarkably resilient over time. The shopping channel is, in effect, a 24 hour infomercial. If done well, Infomercials can be very effective at selling certain consumer products.

30.  Content Marketing (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Huge)
This is a broad category that will become very important over the next months and years. Much of the content (video or otherwise) being created today by companies is focused on selling and focused on the brand. Focusing on solving your customers problems first and then associating your brand with those solutions will be increasingly more important and effective. (i.e. Home Depot has developed branded ‘how-to’ series that sits on their website and shows their customers how-to fix various things around the house. ) What knowledge do you have that can help your customers and prospects. People don’t go to your website to see your sales pitch. They go to see if you can solve their problem.

31. Landing pages and micro sites (Popularity: Moderate  | Growth Potential: High)
Video is beginning to replace or supplement text and graphics as a content element on many corporate websites. Landing pages can offer a more compelling call to action with video. Some micro sites on larger web properties are self contained, purpose-built conversion machines that have the singular purpose of generating a conversion activity (sign-up for more info, attend event, order something etc.). Video is becoming an important part of the conversion process.

32. Interactive Video (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: High)
The promise of interactive video has been around for years but we’re just starting to see companies build in interactivity into their videos. You can build in calls to action, form fields, multiple scenarios and any number of engaging content that get people to not just passively watch your video but actually gets them to start to interact with your video. Technology will play a huge role in interactive video over the next few years. You can already see the foundations of this with YouTube allowing you to add annotations and links to videos.

33. Branded Entertainment and Sponsored Video (Popularity:Moderate  | Growth Potential:Moderate)
Viral Video in many ways is just branded entertainment. There are many ways companies can benefit from having their names attached to content. In the ’50 the ‘soaps’ were a great way for P&G and other consumer companies to promote their brand. Everyday there is a new format for sponsored video being created for delivery on the web. Many will fail but some will become hugely popular. Associating your brand with the right entertainment and informational content on the web is a very interesting opportunity.

PR Support and Community Relations

34. Video Press Releases (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: High)
The standard four paragraph press release is now being supplemented with video and rich media to tell a more engaging story. Video is now being purpose-built to directly support the important company announcements. The new challenge for press releases is to change the focus from the company to the customer.

35.  PR Support Materials (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)

Make it easy for networks, bloggers, news gathers and others to promote your business and also to talk about your industry. Smart companies are developing video support catalogs of company and industry related materials (b-roll, industry footage, sound bites etc) and offering them to news and business portals. The demand for video is everywhere. If a news agency (online or broadcast) is looking for stock footage to use in a story it might as well be yours. (assuming the story is positive, of course)

36. Community Relations Video (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
If your company is out working in the community, being good corporate citizens, helping the environment or contributing to important causes you should be capturing those efforts on video. Show the world what you are doing, don’t just talk about it.

37. Corporate Talk Show / Interviews (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
Weekly newsletters require a lot of effort and the ‘open’ rate on most of these is quite low. Companies of all sizes are now starting to develop talk-show format video where a host interviews various people (either internal or external to their company) to discuss things that are important to your audience. Think of it as the long tail of interviews where very specific interviews are being delivered to very specific audiences.

38. EPK (electronic press kit)  (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
While EPK’s are still being delivered on DVD, web based video and text are quickly replacing this electronic version of the press kit which became popular in the mid 90′s.

Event Video

39. Event Presentation video (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
Events represent a unique confluence of expertise and opportunity – often under-leveraged. Trade Shows, meeting and conferences are usually attended by your top sales people, your corporate executives, industry experts and other influential business people. If you are speaking at an event or someone is referencing your company you should be capturing this valuable content on video.

40. Round table Sessions (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
Take the opportunity at an event to corral four to six of your best customers and other industry experts, put them in room and video tape them talking about industry trends, business issues and the future of your industry. This content will be the most valuable content you could ever capture.

41. Q&A Expert sessions. (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
There are many opportunities to take specific event participants to the side and take them through informal Q&A sessions on various topics that matter to your customers. This content is valuable lead generation content.

Other Uses of Video

42. Recruitment Videos (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
Finding the best employees is the single most important function of any company and yet comparatively small amounts of time and money are allocated to this critical task. Recruitment videos that feature company employees, highlight corporate culture and promote the direction of the company can be very influential.

43. VLOG (Popularity: Moderate  | Growth Potential:Moderate)
There are many levels and types of Vloggers today but for the sake of brevity I will identify two: 1. Pro Vloggers who have engaging styles, rich content and a growing list of followers who promote their vlog on their site and through various syndicated channels and 2. Regular Vloggers who have chosen, for whatever reason, to speak into a camera instead of typing on a keyboard. The problem today is that, unlike onscreen text, you can’t scan a vlog – you have to watch the whole thing to see whether it is worth your time. The other problem is that most people just aren’t that compelling on camera so there is little, to no value of a talking head – and often it’s a distraction. Of course everyone references Gary Vaynerchuck (from Wine Library TV) as the rule (rather than the exception) for video blogging in the same way that everyone references the success of Will It Blend as being what to expect when you launch your first viral video project. For individuals looking to gain notoriety from their passions vlogging can be a good option if you have a good on-camera presence and great content.

44. In Store Video (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: High)
Wal-Mart has its own profitable in-store TV network that makes shoppers aware of new promotions. LCD screens are ubiquitous. In store LCD’s will be networked and customizable offering you the ability to promote your own goods and services or make money by promoting other complimentary services.

45. Company Lobby / Waiting Room Video (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
HD video screens are popping up everywhere – why not in your lobby or reception where you can get a jump start on first impressions and also take advantage of a captive audience.

46. Mobile Video (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Huge)
Yep, ‘there’s an Ap for that’. Mobile video will soon be the largest video category outside of broadcast. In the short-run, mobile video will consist of hastily re-purposed video made to fit on a mobile device. It will quickly evolve into a much more specific format – i.e.  five to fifteen second hyper targeted messages that are part of geo-located (‘location aware’) and micro-niched promotions. Adding mobility (true context) to video will generate many new uses and formats for video.

47. Market research, focus groups and polling (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Moderate)
Market research firms are now capturing the anecdotal feedback along with the raw statistics of their research. If a picture is worth a thousand words then a video of your customer describing her likes and dislikes of your new product is priceless. Go to YouTube to see how people are describing your products and services.

48. Video White paper (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Low)
Video white papers have evolved over the last years from basically a person reading a white paper on camera (what’s the point) to a professional delivery that is accompanied by charts, graphs and other visual references to make the presentation more valuable.

49. Video Magazine (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Low)
Some video production companies specialize in helping companies deliver serialized video content to their customers. Like the name implies video content is created on a regular basis (usually monthly) that customers and prospects can view through a subscription service. While it makes sense to apply tradition formats to new technology and ideas, not all ideas transfer as elegantly as others.

50. Customer UCG Campaigns (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential:Moderate)
User Generated Content Campaigns- where customers are encouraged to upload videos showing how they use your products are becoming quite popular. Contests are usually the driver but sometimes just giving customers a forum to express themselves is enough.

51. Behind the Scenes Video (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential:Low)
Personalize your brand. Open up the cultural veil and let customers and products understand who you are – a group of humans rather than a ‘brand’. Authenticity is important.

Have I left any out? Let me know.

 

Bonus Applications:

52. Projection Mapping. Like everything else related to video, the costs of projecting video is dropping quickly. As a result you are starting to see innovative applications of projected video. Here are some great examples: http://econsultancy.com/us/blog/7676-16-mind-blowing-examples-of-big-brand-projection-mapping?utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter

Filed Under: Content Marketing, General, Marketing with Video, Resources, The Effect of Video on Your Brand, The Future of Corporate Video, Video Marketing, video production Tagged With: , , ,

The implications of Yogi Bear’s shocking death

December 15, 2010 By Leave a Comment

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Warner Brothers has to be impressed, very angry and a little nervous, most likely in that order.

Edmund Earle, a recent animation graduate from the Rhode Island School of Design, developed his own ‘alternate ending’ to the current Yogi Bear movie based on the ending of the movie ‘The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.’ Earle’s video is impressive (especially considering he did it himself) and will no doubt help to launch a successful animation career.  Earle refers to the video as a parody hoping to fall into ‘fair use‘ protection and avoid litigation. YouTube, like Hollywood is rife with ‘Parody’, ‘Inspiration’ ,’Homage’ , and people otherwise copying the style, themes or ideas of others.

This issue isn’t new but because the video is so well done, I believe it could start a much larger debate over ‘fair use.’ The simple claim would be that Earle is not directly making money off of a copyrighted brand, it was intended as a ‘parody,’ so – no harm no foul. WB on the other hand could claim harm and they might have a point. This video might also generate a huge amount of buzz for a movie that is still in theaters. (Wouldn’t it be brilliant if WB was actually behind this as a publicity stunt…)

Regardless of the legal issues or what side of the ‘fair use’ argument you happen to fall on, the implications of this video are significant to your company:

1. How much control do you have over your brand?
Is it okay for anyone to do anything they want with your brand, your copyrighted material and your intellectual property as long as they call it a parody? Most industry observers concede that social media is causing companies to lose control of their brands.

2. How should you react when this happens?
The easy and correct answer is – it depends. How much harm was caused? What are the short and long term implications? Will reacting or not reacting cause greater harm in the future? What are the PR implications to how you react? Do you scream like a petulant child or do you embrace (and therefore co-opt) the transgressor?

3. How does this ‘new reality’ affect your business and your brand in the future?
I believe this is the important consideration in this matter – the question all companies should be considering right now.  A few years ago the technology didn’t exist to allow one talented individual to develop and share something like this. Today it does. All bets are off. This is going to happen again and again, in many different ways with many different consequences.  Companies may or may not be protected by the law (just ask the recording industry), so what should you do to anticipate and embrace this change? Do you build this new reality into your future brand and business planning or do you fight kicking and screaming? Should WB start hiring more lawyers or should they be encouraging animators to develop alternate endings to some of their movies – like this one, while they are still in theaters?

Should you be steadfastly protecting your brand or sharing it with the masses?

Filed Under: General, Marketing with Video, The Effect of Video on Your Brand, YouTube Video Tagged With: , ,

T-Mobile’s next installment in the “Life’s for sharing” viral video series.

October 31, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Back in early 2009, T-Mobile developed their hugely successful ‘T-Mobile Dance video in Liverpool station‘ (23 million views on YouTube). Then, three months later they delivered the T-Mobile Sing-a-long at Trafaulgar Square video. (4 millions views). A year and a half  later T-mobile has introduced their most recent video developed to support their ‘Life’s for Sharing’ brand message. With this new entry, T-Mobile has delivered yet another clever video featuring great music in public places that captures both inspired performances by participants as well as great reactions from onlookers.

Creating a hit viral video is like creating a hit record – it’s really tough to do. I’m not sure if T-Mobile will ever be able to repeat the magic of the original T-Mobile Dance video, but any video that captures millions of views, as this one surely will, has to be considered a success. All of these videos are uplifting, fun to watch and very well done. I can’t think of a better way to continue to support the ‘Life’s for Sharing’ brand positioning.

Filed Under: Marketing with Video, The Effect of Video on Your Brand, Video Marketing, Viral Video, YouTube Video Tagged With: ,

Inspired Viral Video shows performance is still a big part of the song.

October 17, 2010 By Leave a Comment

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So what did this one cost to make?

Like any popular song, an inspired video needs a hook. In this case the ‘hook’ is the band substituting their instruments with iPhone aps to play one of their recent songs ‘spontaneously’ on a New York subway. It feels real so it probably is, and if it’s not, it probably won’t matter. Did they do it in one take? Did they overdub some music in the studio? Was any of this really spontaneous? Perception is reality.

The band Atomic Tom delivered on a very simple idea – play your song using iphone aps instead of real instruments… in a public place. The video is certainly helped by good shot planning and structure: Start slow to limit expectations and build engagment as you go; Include crowd reaction shots to build interest and show that you should take notice of what’s going on; Include close-ups of the instruments to demonstrate how impressive (or ‘improbable’ for skeptics) the feat of playing a 4 inch sheet of glass can be.  And it certainly helps that the song they are promoting is a good one.

Like the experience of  Sons of Maxwell, this video will lift the band from obscurity and guarantee them their 15 minutes. The question remains, are they now on the same viral treadmill as OK Go where their future success is tied as much to the quality of their videos as it is to their music?

It’s a great video, and will no doubt inspire a thousand different (and lesser) variations on this theme.

… and yes, Steve Jobs has to be really happy with this video.

Filed Under: General, The Effect of Video on Your Brand, Video Marketing, Video PR, Viral Video, YouTube Video Tagged With: , , ,

How web video powers global innovation

September 21, 2010 By Leave a Comment

video powers global innovation

“I’m convinced that the latest iteration of crowd-accelerated innovation, fueled by Web video, is about to ignite the biggest learning cycle in human history.”

Big statement… with even bigger consequences. Imagine the impact on productivity if it’s correct.  Chris Anderson, founder of Future Publishing and curator of the TED Conference  says the rise of web video is driving a worldwide phenomenon he calls Crowd Accelerated Innovation — a self-fueling cycle of learning that could be ‘as significant as the invention of print.’

True to the vision of TED (“Riveting talks by remarkable people, free to the world”) Anderson suggests that video sharing sites like YouTube are driving innovation in thousands of disciplines ranging from the ultra-niche to the sharing of truly world-changing ideas.

Today individuals are driving this radical innovation. Organizations on the other hand, still  have to contend with inertia and institutionalized bad habits. They also need to embrace radical openness in order to tap into the power of this growing phenomenon. That’s a big challenge.

The video is thought provoking and certainly worth a look:

http://www.cnn.com/2010/OPINION/09/18/anderson.youtube.innovation/

Filed Under: General, Online Video Industry, The Effect of Video on Your Brand, The Future of Corporate Video, Video and Education, YouTube Video Tagged With: , , , ,

5 Reasons You Should Post Your Marketing Video on YouTube

February 16, 2010 By 1 Comment

Happy Birthday YouTube.

The LA times just posted a recent article that highlights YouTube’s meteoric rise over the last five years.  Google’s $ 1.6 billion purchase of the site in 2006 is still being debated but few people are betting against Google eventually turning YouTube into yet another money making machine.

All hype and controversy aside, YouTube’s numbers are impressive:

85% online video market share in the US
#4 site globally in terms of overall traffic
#2 site globally for search
20 hours of video uploaded every minute
5 Billion video streams a month
#2 time suck behind network television
…etc.

The folks at ReelSEO posted a great article in the fall that compared the options of ‘Hosting’ your video versus ‘Posting’ (placing it on a free hosting site like YouTube) and considered nineteen variables that should influence your decision. Their conclusion: “Unless your business is dependent on monetization of content (you are Hulu), chances are that the odds will be in favour of posting video.”

The biggest complaint about YouTube is that it is a big messy sandbox where you can’t control how your video is being presented. That’s true, but it’s important to remember that YouTube is more than just a place to post your video for free – it’s also a marketing platform. Here are five reasons why you should place your marketing video on YouTube (regardless of whether you also host them on your own site):

1. Sharing
Yes, you do lose some control over how your video is presented on YouTube, that’s the down-side of social media – the single biggest issue for companies deciding if and how to engage the great social media experiment. The upside however is huge. YouTube was built for the express purpose of sharing. The reality is that your website isn’t as important as it used to be – it’s no longer the exclusive or final ‘destination’ for all things about your products and your brand. More than ever people are discovering content wherever they happen to be (physically or virtually). You need to create content that is intended to be shared and consumed in many different ways and YouTube is the world’s biggest content bizarre – open 24/7.

2. SEO
Google is prioritizing video in it’s universal search algorithm. Every SEO article I read tells me that Google is explicitly looking for video content. Does Google have a bias toward video on it’s own website? It’s hard to say but you know that Google is certainly aware of it’s own video and is reading the meta data that you have tagged on your YouTube channel. Ideally, if you have a video sitemap on your website with proper mRSS feed Google should be able to find and promote your video as well. Why not do both? As well, you benefit from metatagging your video content on YouTube and linking back to your own website to help improve your site’s pagerank.

3. Content marketing and getting noticed
Content marketing will have the greatest potential to influence your brand in the future. Traditional marketers will argue that it’s a waste of time to place their videos on YouTube because no one is looking for them and no one is going to find them. That’s true. No one is looking for your traditional marketing video because it talks about you and your products and no one cares much about you or your products. If instead, you post a really informative video that solves a specific problem that your customers are facing your video will not only get found, it will get shared. ‘Yes, but we can’t just give stuff away,” you might respond. If you don’t someone else is going to.

4. Reach.
The long tail gets longer every day. YouTube has the greatest reach in the world (thanks to Google). Your audience may be huge or it may be very, very small. It doesn’t matter. There is no more cost effective way to reach your potential audience than on YouTube. Sure, the person typing in “Lolcats” into YouTube is not your customer, but the person typing in “North East Bolivian Pitted Kumquat Ripple Delight” just may be. Your customer may not frequent YouTube but I would bet that someone who knows and is trusted by your customer does.

5. It’s free.
Chris Anderson explains in his new book ‘Free – The Future of a Radical Price’ (a great read btw) that free is the inevitable price for many things online – you just have to figure out something else to charge for. Free doesn’t necessarily mean cheap either. YouTube continues to upgrade it’s service every month with things like better support for HD video, interactivity, metrics, mobile integration (i.e. the only easy way to get video on an iPhone at the moment) etc.

Filed Under: Content Marketing, General, how-to video, The Effect of Video on Your Brand, The Future of Corporate Video, Video Marketing, video production, YouTube Video Tagged With: , ,

5 Video Lessons from the World’s Best Marketer.,

January 25, 2010 By 1 Comment

Coca-Cola is the arguably the best corporate marketer of all time. They have been in business for well over a century and are one of the most recognized brands and products (Coke) in the world. {/End of argument.}

Sure they’ve had some notable missteps along the way such as the introduction of ‘New Coke” in 1985 (or was that a brilliant marketing ploy to reintroduce their flagship product as Coca-Cola ‘Classic’) and they have not necessarily fared well with every new product or business line that they have introduced, but to remain in a leadership position in a commodity business (sugar water) for well over a hundred years – that is absolutely remarkable.

I’ve highlighted below a number of video promotions that the company has developed over the past forty years  to illustrate what I believe makes Coca-Cola the preeminent marketing company on the planet.

Lesson #1. Be Current.

Coke Happiness Machine. Coke’s new promotion, recently developed by Definition 6,  is a very well conceived viral video campaign. Coca-Cola has been a pioneer in social media but it has not ventured far into the world of viral video. (Millions of their past TV ads are shared each year but these ads were not developed with the specific goal of being shared virally – that’s just a side benefit to developing consistently great ads.)  At over a million views and counting this video is certainly a viral hit but numbers alone don’t account for it’s effectiveness. As usual, Coke does many things right in developing this viral promotion. It features the brand prominently in the video without ever appearing to salesy. (Underplaying or not featuring your brand at all begs the question – why did you bother in the first place?) The video has a simple, engaging style without feeling over produced – again an important consideration in the development of viral video. The video is engaging and a little surprising – two key elements to the success of any viral video. And finally, this video has a structure/story that can easily be repeated – new stuff coming out of a machine at a new location (“Where Will Happiness Strike Next?”). A ‘one hit viral wonder’ is great but you will have much more success if you can develop a series of videos that keep a viral video campaign going over period of time. Reach without frequency will not move the needle very far.

Lesson #2. Be Unique

Beautiful. It’s hard to categorize this video although the title certainly does this video justice. I imagine even James Cameron would be impressed with the fanciful world that Coke created to represent what really goes on inside a Coke machine. This ad aired in both 30 and 60 second formats although I think this extended version (90 seconds) serves this video best. Allusions to Willy Wonka and other children’s stories have been made but this video is like no other. The risk in stepping out this far into an imaginary world is that because there is no frame of reference it is far easier to fail than it is to succeed. Because there is no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ it is more likely that the viewer will respond “what the $@!# was that?” rather than “that was incredible”. Like the recent Evian Babies viral – if you have amazing work representing your brand, you reap great rewards. But if you step out, take a big risk and fail, you fail big.

Lesson # 3. Be Consistent.

Northern Lights. This original Polar Bear ad ran in 1993 and was developed to support the “Always Coca-Cola” campaign. Coca-Cola is one of the most consistent brands on the planet. They consistently create great adverting and they are also consistent in the  promotional themes and styles that they develop. Coke recognized the appeal of this first polar bear ad and  developed an ongoing series of polar bear ads that have run over the last 15 years – usually coinciding with the Christmas season.

Companies have to continually examine their markets and refresh their brand and associate new attributes and meaning to their products to stay current over time.  Coke continues to do this but there is still something to be said for consistency – the fact that they continue to use the comfortable and familiar polar bears to promote the brand. This series of polar bear videos consistently, and ironically, delivers the most engaging human attributes -  innocence and playfulness.

Lesson #4. Be Relevant


I‘d like to teach the world to sing. In 2007, Campaign Magazine called this video “one of the best-loved and most influential ads in TV history.” Created by McCann Erickson in 1971 this video neatly captured a newly emerging global consciousness. The peace generation of the sixties introduced North America to a world beyond war and trade. This video, accompanied by a great song written for the commercial (which later made it all the way to #1 in Britain and #6 on the music charts in the US),  tapped into the zeitgeist of the nation in a way that very few commercials have. Even older generations who otherwise hated the ‘hippy freaks’ found something to like in this love song to the world.

Being relevant is the hardest thing for a company to do. ‘Relevance’ extends beyond the specific attributes of your brand.  Great brands know how to be relevant because they have leadership who are attuned to the fashion, styles, trends and business priorities of the day. Unfortunately there is no rule, or law, or guidance for how to be relevant. Smart media agencies can help show you the way but ultimately it’s the company that makes the decision on how it promotes itself. Your company either has this awareness built into it’s DNA (i.e. Coke, Apple, Nike) or it doesn’t.

Lesson #5 Be Memorable.

Mean Joe Green Being ‘memorable’ is different than being ‘unique’. Unique (different) is good – that means you stand out, but being memorable is more important. Memorable usually (but not always) means simple. One simple but powerful idea that sticks with you for months and years. In this iconic Superbowl ad ‘Mean’ Joe Green shares a moment with a young fan. The point of highlighting this video is to show that videos don’t need to be overly complex to be effective. The simplest idea can be the most powerful if it is delivered in an engaging way. Good story telling is about finding an emotional link that will resonate with an audience. This ad has a universal appeal and is arguably one of the most memorable ads ever developed.

Interestingly, Coke tried a remake of this commercial with Troy Polamalo last year but it just didn’t have the same magic as the original. Yes, even the best marketers don’t always hit home runs. The difference between Coke and most other marketers is that even Coke’s ‘failures’ are pretty good.

Filed Under: Corporate Video Examples, General, The Effect of Video on Your Brand, Video Marketing Tagged With: , , , ,
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