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Microsoft reinvents lame

January 16, 2009 By Jimm Fox Leave a Comment

Microsoft’s newest video promotion makes the “I’m a PC” guy look cool.

 

 
Microsoft has introduced a new application called Songsmith. It may well be a great application but the “High School Musical” style video promotion for the new software has to make you wonder what they were thinking. 

Perhaps they are smarter than everyone. Maybe they figured that if they made it just bad enough, if they appealed to virtually no one,  and took campy to new levels of lame that the blogosphere would light up talking about this new promotional video. If that was the plan - mission accomplished.

Maybe this was the plan too when they spent a cazillion dollars on those confusing and spectacularly unfunny Bill Gates and Jerry Seinfeld  promotions.

Microsoft’s official line is that it was a low budget marketing viral video created by two of the guys who coded the product (and who also starred in the video – good for them) . Of course ‘Low budget’ is a relative term. You have to know that they still spent more time and money on this ‘low budget’ diddy than most companies could afford.

The takeaway -  calling it a viral video doesn’t excuse it and certainly doesn’t mean the affect on your brand will be negligable.

Other notes:
1. Interesting APPLE references:  The little girl – who’s name is ‘LISA’ is using a Macbook Pro!
2. I think the most astute label I have read in reference to this video is “Craptastic.”
3. They should attempt a ‘Death Metal” version next.

Filed Under: Corporate Video Examples Tagged With:

26 ways for your company to use online video

January 7, 2009 By Jimm Fox 4 Comments

TVs panel

“Online video”, “web video” and “Internet video” are terms that will soon fade from our lexicon. They will simply be shortened to “Video”. While the portable bandwidth of DVD’s and now Blu-ray will continue to be used for some time, faster broadband and wireless speeds will result in all media moving “online”. Broadcast television will become just one piece of the Internet. Video will be the dominant marketing media format for business. Throw rich media and social media into the mix and the result is a profound transformation to the way that companies promote themselves.

Your company website will soon house a variety of different video and rich media assets that will be used to differentiate your offering, educate your customers and influence your influencers. Here are 26 examples of how video is being used by companies today to help move their businesses forward:

1. Customer Testimonials
Nothing is more compelling than seeing and hearing your customer (in their own environment) extol the virtues of your products and services and explaining how you helped them achieve their business goals.

2. Video Success Story
It is often challenging to get customers to agree (especially larger customers) to go on camera to talk about your company. You can still present the customer success with your own presenters speaking specifically about the customer win or talking more generically about a company win in that industry.

3. Video Case Study
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. These usually follow the “Problem, Solution, Benefit” format – very similar to their print equivalent.

4. Product Demonstrations
Show how your product works – highlight the features that differentiate it from your competitors. A software walk-through, a 3D cut-away, a high impact demo by a presenter are all excellent ways of showing how your product or service works.

5. Product Presentations
Product demos shows the details of how your products work. These are best used in helping your customers and prospects differentiate between your products and services and those of your competitors. Early on in the sales cycle you need to talk more about benefits – from the customer”s perspective. Product presentations explain how your product can help your customers solve their business problems. Determining where your customers are in their buying cycle is just as important as segmenting your audiences.

6. Corporate Overview
Corporate overviews are often the starting point for companies using video to promote their services. Corporate overviews are usually brief (2-3 minutes) and can include a short history, some location/facilities shots and introductions from your senior mangement team.

7. Executive Presentations
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.

8. Staff Presentations
Social media and other Web 2.0 trends have caused companies to reconsider how they communicate with their external audiences. Your senior leadership team should not be the first and only consideration for representing your company. It is becoming more important 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 the decsion makers it is especially important you represent your company with people that your customers and prospects can relate to.

9. VLOG
Video blogging has been gaining popularity on personal and expert blog sites and is now carrying over to corporate blogging as well.

10. Corporate facilities or equipment tour
While corporate overviews serve many purposes a corporate facilities or equipment tour can be used to highlight the unique characteristics of your building, and infrastructure, to show the breadth of your operations and reach or to highlight special equipment that sets you apart from your competitors. (Uniqueness is certainly a key to success here)

11. Post sale support and maintenance videos
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.

12. Overnight expert videos
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.

13. Training
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 to in-class training. You can also integrate video into online training management tools.

14. Health & Safety
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.

15. Internal Communications
In larger companies no one has the time or interest to understand what other groups or functions within the company do or why they exist. Internal videos that highlight activities, procedures and best practices can save money and lead to more effective communications. They are also a great way to show off your local hero’s.

16. Recruitment Videos
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.

17. Employee orientation
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 behaviour can all be communicated effectively with video.

18. Marketing
Outbound programs like email marketing and direct mail are taking advantage of video and rich media as a more engaging way to capture and keep the attention of customers and prospects.

19. Landing pages and other web pages
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.

20. Event Video
There are many ways to leverage the considerable amount of time and money spent on events and trade shows with video: Capture demos on camera while you have your experts assembled in one location. Capture speaking opportunities from your execs and re-purpose them on your website. Use the opportunity to video short testimonials from your customers while they are at your booth. Capture the event or trade show activities and share with the employees back at the office.

21. Video Press Releases
The standard four paragraph press release is now being supplemented with video and rich media to tell a more engaging story.

22. Viral Video
Many companies are testing viral video as a means of promoting their brand. Striking the balance between maximizing entertainment (pass along) value and minimizing blatant brand promotion is the challenge.

23. Commercials
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 entertainment, online sponsorships, games, event sponsorships and in-theatre are starting to take the place of broadcast and cable commercials. Expect more and more video screens to crop up on every building, device and structure offering an even more diverse set of advertising opportunities.

24. Company Lobby Video
HD video screens are popping up everywhere – why not in your lobby or reception where you can get a jump start on first impressions.

25. Market research, focus groups and polling
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.

26. Community relations
If your company is out working in the community, being good corporate citizens, helping the environment, contributing to valuable causes – you should be capturing those efforts on video.

Filed Under: Marketing with Video Tagged With: ,

What does an online corporate video cost?

December 3, 2008 By Jimm Fox Leave a Comment

The cost of producing an online corporate video depends on many factors:

  1. Format – are you shooting and editing in full 1080P HD or using a less expensive middle or lower-end format?
  2. Length – Is your corporate video a one minute talking head or are you shooting an eight minute documentary on your company’s philanthropic activities?
  3. Crew – Do you need a single videographer or a crew (Videographer, Second Camera, Lighting Technician, Audio Technician, Director, etc)?
  4. Script – Are you developing a purpose-built script and storyboard or are you shooting unscripted footage of a company spokesperson?
  5. B-Roll – Are you shooting or purchasing extra footage that will be edited in with your main footage to add context and improve the pace and style of the video?
  6. Editing – Are any special effects, complicated edits, animation or other media assets required or is it just a straight edit of an unscripted presentation?
  7. Actors – Do you need to hire professional presenters, actors or models to improve the quality of your presentation?
  8. Location – Are you shooting in one spot or many? In town or all over the country? Are there contingent factors that have to be considered like the weather, availability of key executives or rental / studio facilities?
  9. Audio – Do you require narration for the video, an audio music bed for the presentation? Are there multilingual/translation and localization considerations?
  10. Licensing – Are you using any media assets or talent that could be subject to ongoing licensing,  usage or union fees.
  11. Quality – How important is quality to you? As always, there is a strong positive correlation between price and quality.
  12. Direct or Third party – Are you dealing directly with the video production company or are you going through an agency or other middleman?
  13. Delivery/Distribution – What is the final output? How many formats? Who is distributing it and how is it being distributed on the web? How is the video being managed for re-use?

Taking all of the above into consideration there are reasonable ballpark figures that you can use as a guidepost for budget purposes. A three to five minute web-based corporate video presentation might cost between $2500 and $7500 depending on the variables mentioned above. If you use the time honoured “$1,000 a minute” for a professionally produced online corporate video as a starting point, that will give you a reasonable idea of where to begin in the budgeting process. The best way to get a quick estimate is to have a reference video to compare to.

Like in any other business category, there are a broad range of service providers that fall into the online web video production category. From online do-it-yourself tools that ostensibly fall into the web video category to the multi-award winning agencies that shoot only on film and only look at budgets in the six figure range… you do tend to get what you pay for.

The good news is that the cost of video production has come down considerably over the past few years and will continue to drop as increase in demand drives new competition and the cost of production (mostly on the technology side) continues to drop.

Filed Under: Managing Video Projects Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

4 Reasons to shoot corporate video in Full HD.

December 2, 2008 By Jimm Fox 2 Comments

There are many different cameras and many video formats at the disposal of video production companies: DV, Digital Betacam, DVCAM, DVCPRO, HD, P2, XDCAM, Red and even film (16 or 35mm if the budget allows).

Full HD (1920x1080p) is becoming the new high-end standard for corporate video production. Cameras like Panasonic’s P2 series or Sony’s EX1 series are capable of shooting at the highest resolutions and outputting directly to disc – which allows for much more efficient workflow. These cameras rival or surpass the quality of broadcast ENG cameras. Fully tricked-out with proper mikes and lens you’re probably looking at an outlay of $12,000 or more. But if you are looking for high quality input (and output) and want to make sure your video will still be usable tomorrow, using a camera that shoots full HD is your best option.

I shoot almost exclusively with the Sony EX1 for many reasons:
1. Quality. Attaining high quality footage is the best and most obvious reason to shoot in full HD. Whether you are shooting for a 480×270 web video or for a large HD plasma display at an event, there is no substitute for the quality that a high-end camera produces. In IT circles the expression ‘garbage in, garbage out” relates to the quality of output being determined by the quality of the input. The same holds true for video. Even if you are compressing your full HD footage down to a small web video format the final quality is still determined by the starting quality. Keying out backgrounds, colour correction, zooming in edit mode and many other post production activities are directly affected by the quality of the original video.
2. Flexibility. HD is ‘future proof’ (today). You can repurpose and re-use your full HD footage for a variety of uses such as trade shows, broadcast, and the web and still plan on incorporating it into future productions and formats. Video formats change quickly so having the highest quality footage allows you the most flexibility and re-use options in the future.
3. Standards. Full HD is becoming the standard (16×9 aspect ratio full 1920x1080p) for Corporate Video. Large companies are starting to specifically ask for this format and mid-sized and smaller companies will follow suit. Ericsson even claims that its mobile phone cameras will shoot in HD video in 2012!
4. Ecosystems – A corollary of the quality and standard argument is that ecosystems evolve to support the standards and the higher quality formats because of the larger scale associated with the standard and the higher profits associated with the higher quality. Camera equipment, editing software, storage devices and a host of other support products and services will evolve around the high end HD standards like Sony’s EX1 and the Panasonic P2.

Filed Under: Managing Video Projects Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Should you use a presenter in your corporate video?

December 1, 2008 By Jimm Fox 2 Comments

 

If you are blessed with articulate, charismatic executives then consider yourself lucky. If you are like most companies (large or small) however, you may want to consider hiring professional presenters to represent your company in your corporate videos.

This subject often triggers vigorous debate amongst the ‘authenticity’ purists. I tend to take a more pragmatic approach when considering whether or not to use a presenter. The answer to whether or not a professional presenter is necessary or appropriate depends on the context. Some examples:

Commercials. Most companies (large and small) use presenters/actors for commercials, for good reason. Stephen Jobs is arguably one of the best presenters on the planet but Apple doesn’t use him in their ads. Justin Long ( the “I’m a Mac” guy ) is a much better embodiment of the Apple attitude, style and demographic than Jobs. Sure, Dave Thomas was a great spokesman for Wendy’s, Sir Richard Branson is Virgin and Harland David Sanders was KFC – but these are the exceptions. Linking your brand to the CEO is not always a good strategy (especially if he/she leaves the company). Lee Iacocca and his outsized ego almost crushed Chrysler back in the day. Unless you have a compelling, articulate leader – one that your target audience identifies positively with, you are better off to use a surrogate.

Product Demonstrations. This category is much more complicated because there are many types of product demonstrations and many different audiences. As an example, if you are selling into a technical B2B market then a product demo is better delivered by the product manager – regardless of his/her on- screen abilities. Technical audiences trust technical people and rather enjoy ridiculing actors who “probably don’t have a clue about they are talking about”. If, on the other hand you are selling a non-technical product to a B2C market then a presenter that represents your target demographic would be more appropriate. If you are showing how something works – i.e. a real-world example (either in the field with a customer or in reinacting in a studio)  then actors / presenters may be much better suited to the task. “Show me, don’t tell me” is one of the sweet spots of online corporate video and product and service demos in particular.

Corporate Overviews. This is one of the broadest and most common Online Corporate Video Categories – usually the first point of entry for companies using online video to market themselves. This category also overlaps product demonstrations for companies where one product is the company. Corporate Overviews are the best place to show off the executives or employees because the business purpose of the corporate overview is to highlight the company (not necessarily the benefits of the products or services that you produce). In this case authenticity is very important. The challenge however comes when your owner/CEO/ executive is just not that compelling. Some video production companies will claim they can make anyone look good on camera, but the truth is that not everyone does well on camera. Awkward, confused, inarticulate, nervous, distracted, uninspiring… none of these characteristics help your company’s image. You may want to consider reaching down into the ranks to find someone who might have a stronger emotional appeal with your target audience and who is more comfortable on camera.

The desired format and structure of the video should determine the need for a teleprompter. If you are looking for a personal, unscripted style then it might make sense to give the executive some talking points, roll film and cross your fingers. If however, you have a very specific, detailed or structured message you should consider using a teleprompter with either a company spokesperson or an external presenter.

One of the challenges is that you often don’t know how you will do until in front of a camera until you are in front of a camera. It is the job of the video production company to make professional recommendations as to the use of a presenter versus an in-house spokesperson. It can be very difficult for the business to be objective about its own internal capabilities and it also can be politically challenging for internal staff to tell executives that they are not doing well during a shoot.

 

Filed Under: Managing Video Projects Tagged With: , , , ,
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