Getting Video Right

Getting Video Right

For the last four weeks of my video challenge each Sunday I have produced a video book review. I like to review books which have had an impact on my life. One of the most important has been the one I wrote: “How to Get Video Right”. The reason why I wrote this book was seeing a pattern where businesses focused on the production of the video and then not use it to its full potential when delivered.

“How to Get Video Right” speaks directly to the tens of thousands of companies around the world who recognise video’s potential, but are lost on how to cash in. Covering everything from discovering the “story” and finding the correct production partner to setting budgets, ensuring the video is actually watched and leaving the audience chomping at the bit for more, Banks’ new guide guarantees the maximum ROI on any video marketing project.

Synopsis:
If you are serious about growing your business, engaging your employees, and selling to your customers, you need to embrace video. If you don’t, you risk your organisation being left behind in this rapidly changing digital age.

In this book you will learn:
• The knack of achieving maximum return on investment
• How to save thousands of pounds on your next production
• Why Identifying your audience is critical
• The importance of getting your story right
• The types and style of videos for your business
• How to find the right video partner
• The secrets to ensuring your video is watched
• How to measure engagement to get the best value

I want to show people how to take video seriously – in terms of paying for quality production, not rushing the story-making strategy process and ensuring that the finished product is distributed in a way that makes for a huge ROI. You’d be surprised at how many organisations have world-class videos just sitting there, without being seen by the intended audience The bottom line is if companies don’t jump on the video bandwagon soon, they’re going to be left behind.”

“Every day when you’re not using video is potentially costing you and your business customers and money. Reading a book like this is important so you get an understanding of video and how it can help your business grow.”Chris Cardell, Marketing expert, Cardell Media

You can buy the book on Amazon or directly from the book’s website.  f If you watch the video there is a discount code which is valid until the end of July 2019.

 

Review of your video

Review of your video

It’s the penultimate day of my 30-day video challenge. Posting a video a day has not been easy, and I will be sharing my insights on what worked, what didn’t work, the engagement, social media platform quirks, and short cuts to speed up the process in the coming weeks. In today’s video, I talk about the importance of feedback

Now, I’ve been doing lots of content, and I do want to know whether this is content you’ve enjoyed. Has it been useful? Or what kind of topics do you want to know about? The idea of doing this whole campaign is to raise my profile, but also to start some conversations.

As I thank you for watching my videos I would like to review your video you have made, this could be a recent video, or it could be something you made a while ago and you’d just like to know, does it work?

I’m happy to review it and give some feedback on the quality of the video in terms of production. I’ll look at some of the messaging, how you’ve used the video, tips on how to improve for the next one. If you are interested in taking me up on this offer, please send me a message or email , please email me.. Look forward to seeing your work, and I promise I will be gentle.

What to do with it

What to do with it

So you’ve made a video, congratulations 👏. I hope it is worthy of an Oscar, maybe you’re not going to enter it into the Academy Awards 🏆, but the question is, what are you going to do with it now to get it seen?

Most businesses I see when they make a video plonk it on the front page of their website, create a few social media posts with it and think this is video marketing and all done.

Companies need to understand that your campaign doesn’t end with a great video. What happens next is just as important. You must have a sound content distribution plan in place before even beginning production. By doing so, you avoid being one of the companies that waste thousands each month on video and are left wondering why the results are so poor. Do it properly, and you will see results that will be reflected on the bottom line.

In order to optimise ROI on video assets, one approach is the ‘Owned’, ‘Earned’ and ‘Paid’ model when it comes to content distribution. Here’s how it works:

Owned – This first element relates to how the content is distributed using the firm’s own media outlets first, ranging from the company website to email lists, salespeople and exhibitions, as well as social media and YouTube channels.

Earn – Refers to distribution through partners, professional memberships and associations, industry news outlets, blogs, influencers, etc.

Paid – The final stage of the process relates to the derived benefits for the company. Which is why every distribution plan is tracked and evaluated on success and efficiency against goals, such as conversions, dwell time, sales, etc. Paid distribution is perfect when the limits of owned and earned sources have been reached, and there is a need to push the video out to a new audience. When it comes to attracting new audiences with video content, there’s no better avenue for reaching the right demographic than going through paid advertising. By doing so can achieve even better results on follow-up campaigns.

Success in video is not all about the production. Putting a plan in place for content distribution makes a massive difference to the results you see. Using this strategy, companies will notice a quantifiable ROI that far outweighs the initial investment.

* Book offer shown in the video only valid until 31st July 2019

https://youtu.be/wM3Rm1ydNWU

Can I make a video?

Can I make a video?

A question I often get asked is, “if I’m not tech savvy, how can I make videos myself which are good enough for my own business?”
Day 27 of my video challenge, and in this video, I explain, while the technology and cost have become accessible to all. There is a caveat.

Let me explain. So yes, you know, you can shoot your videos for your business easily. The gadgets, the software that we have now is quite amazing. It’s affordable, easy to use, and high quality. When I am out and about, and I’m just filming on my iPhone. I have a simple set up with a shotgun microphone, to improve the sound. A clip-on wide angle lens, so when I am filming myself, it’s not to close. I also use a little tripod to help me hold the phone a bit steadier. When at my home office, I use a DSLR, it doesn’t have to be a costly camera. A lens on it and a tripod, and you can create some excellent looking videos.

The biggest tip I give if you want to create a video which looks good, is getting some training. There’s plenty of online tutorials on Youtube. You can invest in paid courses. Or I can come and help you. I have supported many companies where I come in and run workshops, which maximises the skill of an in-house team.

When you’ve shot your video, the next part is to edit it, and this is a potential bottleneck. It’s not hard to learn how to do editing, to do simple edits and maybe some simple graphics, but it is, to make your film look polished and professional, you need to know the software – it’s a steep learning curve for many. I include myself in this. I can edit, but I would probably only use 10% of the power of the editing software program I use, which happens to be Final Cut X. It takes me longer to edit the videos than it does to shoot them. The question I have for you as an entrepreneur or business owner is what value do you put on your time? Yes, you know you need videos for your business, but how much time do you have to shoot and edit them. My 2nd big tip is to outsource the editing. You could start and look what someone on your team, can you up-skill them with a bit of training to be able to do some shoots and edits? If cost is a consideration, look to outsource the editing overseas.

If you don’t have an in-house team, consider hiring a local videographer who can come in and shoot and edit some basic videos for you. Or bring in a video production company who can sit down with you and you can talk about your needs and goals for the video.

If you have watched any of my other videos, you will know video needs to have a plan, and it needs to have a strategy. That’s one of the reasons why I wrote my book “How to Get Video Right”. If you’re serious about growing your business, you need to have video as part of your strategy. It’s great that if you want to do your own video content, my advice would be decided on the outcomes you want to achieve with the videos, and get some training on the production.

What is a video strategist?

What is a video strategist?

As video becomes more important, increasingly important to your business in terms of engaging with your staff, stakeholders, leads and clients, you certainly need to have a strategy around any video you make, and it’s not all about production.

I see clients want to jump in straight into the making of a video, but to make video work, you need to do so much more around it. At Tallboy, we do have a five-step process of which the producing of a video, the making of a video, is only one of five steps. I’ll go into more of what those five steps are in other videos, the making of a video is not the most essential part, it’s one of the critical components, but it’s not the end-all and be-all. Unless you have a strategy around your video, then it’s potentially not going to work. That is the role of a video strategist, is to make sure that your video works, and it achieves the aims and goals you want to achieve.