Inovedia Marketing provides the following services, how can we help you?
Social Media Marketing
We provide training, monitoring, blogging & copy writing services which means we can just get you started or manage and build your social networking efforts!
Multimedia Production
Let us create your web videos! We have Emmy award winning talent and the know how to create high quality videos & podcasts on a budget. For bigger projects, our access and established relationships with full service facilities means the sky is the limit!
Web Design & New Media Development
Put the web to work for you! From tweaks to complete redesigns, we’ll transform your website into an engaging resource your ideal customers will frequent! Ask how we can deliver highly target-able audiences to your door through new media product development! We can extend your brand, drive traffic and multiply your reach!
General Creative Services
Copy-writing, design services, online and traditional marketing campaign development, contest creation & management. Ad creation including banner ads, print, radio, television, newspaper and direct mail.
Whether you’re a home builder or not, I highly recommend Three Proven YouTube Strategies for Homebuilderson The Armory Blog by Brendan Miller. He asks the question “Can YouTube be used as a marketing and lead generation tool instead of just a sales tool for builders?” and you should be asking the same for your business, blog, brand, etc.
On his list of suggestions (see article for details):
1) Create a contest
2) Do Something Outrageous With Your Product
3) Be A Thought Leader
Fortunately his advice doesn’t just apply to Youtube and it doesn’t just apply to home builders either. No matter where you’re posting videos whether you’re a real estate agent, restaurant owner or if you’ve started a new business using a Bedazzler you should do more than take notes, take action!
As a side note, it’s worth mentioning that while he searched for “Home Builder” on Youtube to see what surfaced, but you should put serious thought into how you’re customers and potential customers would search for your product and the best way to figure that out is to ask them directly! This is a good use for email lists, LinkedIn contacts, Facebook friends lists, etc. If you need to start building list of your own for networking you may want to start here: Blogs to Facebook, Where Your Biz Should Be and How to Start and for other ideas on creating videos as well as more creative inspiration to market your product or company here’s a more extensive list for your reading list:
Every website can benefit from a “How to” demonstration whether its created with video, photographs, an article, a power point presentation or an animation, simple or elaborate. Even the most basic demonstration can make a big difference.
Where should you start? What “how to” should you do?
Ultimately these questions should be answered by your customers, so ask them! Start with a list of your services and related topics your customers may be interested in and be sure to included other random ideas – anything goes! The idea here is to educate, entertain or somehow engage visitors with useful content. You don’t need to go all out with an elaborate video, a couple of photos accompanied by short explanations can work extremely well just ask Ikea!
Keep it "Ikea Simple" click to enlarge
Here’s an example using a simple list and photo layout and they’ve even included a video at the bottom of the page. “How to Make Cous Cous”
Simple descriptions & photos work! click to visit site
If you want to create a video, for your first one, narrow it down to only topics you’re extremely knowledgeable of that can be performed in a quiet, well lit area. Here’s a link to a great example of a video shot very close up, in one take. “How to Tie a Tie”
*Please note, these videos and photos are well lit and shot very close to subject of the video. Instructions should be clear and to the point. Keep in mind that with web video your audience is watching a pretty small screen, they’ll want to see what you’re showing them!
I’m not suggesting you do anything that will cause you to lose business or give away your family secrets, but the chances are that even if you did give away your award winning recipe noone could replicate it anyway! That being said, try to showcase your expertise and give useful information.
As a final suggestion, look for opportunities to link to existing demonstrations. For example: to enhance InovediaMarketing.com as a small business resource we use “Delicious” to bookmark useful “New Marketing” articles. You can learn about using delicious from this very creative video:
Here are some other sites you can peruse for “how to” examples:
Creating videos for your website does not have to be a big expensive production in order to make a big impact on your visitors. From “How to” to “Viral Videos” here are examples that can be created “on the cheap” with little gear, no professional help and still manage to effectively get the point across.
HOW TO (Demonstration):
This video is a great example of what to do and what not to do! While the quality of this video is underwhelming, to say the least, the content is solid. The big take away for you: make sure there’s enough light! Before you watch this, keep in mind that this video has been seen almost 400,000 times in about 2 years. That’s right, four hundred thousand times. Just imagine if you were a piano reseller or teacher and your name was prominent throughout!
Have you ever watched someone make a paper airplane? You don’t get much more basic than this! What’s great about this video is that you can clearly see everything that’s happening and, anyone who wanted to, could easily follow along using the pause/play buttons to create create their own paper airplane. Is there something you do that can be showcased like this? This video has been seen over 1.5 million times!
A Unique Glimpse at What You Do:
Here is a fun way you may be able to highlight services you provide on your website, it may take some minor editing but the results are well worth it!
THE PERSONAL APPROACH:
This video is from Girl Arsonist, an “independent novelist,” who is trying to connect with her fans, build her audience and sell some books.
VIRAL VIDEOS:
These are videos intended to create buzz and drive views to your site. They are often very subtle and sometimes don’t even mention the products / services / company that created them, which I generally do not recommend. Here is a viral video example I created, using basic editing software, as an Olympic tie-in.
This is pretty amazing and kind of mesmerizing.
The final video is an amazingly successful viral video project by Blendtec. It is clever, hugely popular and “on brand.” The Will it Blend video is obviously of high quality and production but could certainly be done “on the cheap.”
For tips and advice on purchasing & using consumer video equipment I highly recommend Scott Bourne’s http://www.ConsumerVideoTips.com. Scott provides straight forward advice on a wide range of products.
Whether you are going to pick up a camera yourself or put the camera in someone else’s hands, professional or amateur, here are some tips to help you keep your message front and center.
Narrow your focus. Don’t talk about all of your services in one video; create many videos that each demonstrates one service. More choices = more inviting.
Have a plan! Try your best to script and map out everything. To get a more natural performance in a longer video, I suggest using discussion points instead of cue cards that have the whole script written out word for word. Shorter projects should be memorized whenever possible because it’s both obvious and distracting when someone is reading directly off cue cards.
Schedule extra time! You’ll be surprised at how quickly time flies, if you have plenty you won’t have to worry about how many takes… it takes. You may even be able to accommodate new ideas that strike you in the moment. The less rushed, the more natural the performance and the more you have to repeat lines, the more comfortable they’ll be read.
Do a trial run! Television shows often shoot pilot episodes, you should too. This will reveal obstacles and give you a good idea of how much time and resources your project will actually take. You may find yourself scaling back or gearing up to ensure success!
Keep it simple! Keep the area that will be on camera clutter free, well lit and reasonably quiet if possible. Be sure that everything shown on camera actually needs to be there. Conditions will vary greatly from project to project but think about this… Lighting can take a project from good to great, clutter can kill your message and background sounds can be added later, where adding dialog later may be much more difficult.
Shoot tight. Make sure everything you’re showing and demonstrating is clearly visible. If you’re showing me how to roll sushi, tighten in on the working area… in this scenario, if your face is on camera the shot is probably too wide for me to really see the demonstration. Web videos are often small when viewed and because the quality is fairly low you need to make sure viewers can see what you’re showing.
Virtually every video camera has an input for headphones. Get an inexpensive pair of “over the ear” headphones. Make sure the videographer is wearing the headphones during the shoot. This is the best way to identify audio problems allowing you to reshoot if need be.
Keep segments short! Break up videos into multiple parts making sure individual segments can “stand alone” then also upload the entire video as a single clip (if possible), this will give the user the choice that works best for them. Clearly mark each video with details such as “Large file” or “Part 1, length 3 minutes” so viewers know exactly what to expect.
If there is editing involved, keep transitions and other effects to a minimum. A good transition is one you don’t notice.
If someone else shoots the video for you, professional or amateur, make sure you will receive all of the footage. Be sure to include this requirement in your upfront negotiations. There may come a time when you need that footage, you could be in a bind if videographer is unavailable.
Remember, video projects can be as complicated as you make them. If you focus on keeping your message clear and concise, you should have a winner every time. This is in no way meant to be a comprehensive list, just general tips on producing better “how to” videos for the web for folks who have little or no experience putting together projects like these. Please share this article by clicking the + button below my name.
Richard Bouchez is a certified Inbound Marketing professional specializing in Social Media Marketing & New Media content development. Richard’s web, audio & video work has been honored with Emmy, Promax & CBA awards.
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