Website video: what kind should your business make?
Posted by Catie Foertsch on Fri, Aug 21, 2009 @ 09:16 AM
A few years ago, video on websites was a new phenomenon. Most companies preferred to wait and see rather than investing in video, in case it was a passing fad. The few companies that were placing video on their websites were proceeding slowly, creating one single video, posting it on their home page or elsewhere on their site, and that was it. Because video was a novelty.
Things have changed. Video has become a mainstream component of an effective Internet marketing plan. The question for companies now isn't ‘Will you use video on your website?' but rather, ‘What kind of video content will you make?'
To find the answer, start with more questions:
- What do you need to show people? A product? A process? A physical space? A person being an expert? Satisfied customers who bought your product?
- What questions do you need to answer? What do people ask you, over and over and over? What message do you need to communicate? Trustworthiness? Authority? Credibility? Effectiveness? Great customer service? Friendly people?
- What feelings do you need to generate?
Now, prioritize your answers. Figure out which are the most important. Once you have that list, assign a video to each item. Then look at how you can cost-effectively create video content for as many items on your list as possible. A good idea is to break your list into phases: what content you'll create now, what content you'll create six months from now, etc.
Here's one example:
An accounting firm decides that it needs to show people expertise, trustworthiness, great customer service, friendly and helpful staff. It decides to make the following videos:
- Expertise: a videotaped seminar presented by three of the firm's partners. The raw seminar video will be broken into six to eight small two-to-three-minute videos.
- Trustworthiness: a video of the firm's partners talking about what trustworthiness means and how the firm exemplifies trustworthiness. Also, a video of a customer testimonial/case study that specifically addresses trustworthiness.
- Customer service: two customer testimonials/case studies that address the firm's excellent customer service from the customer's perspective
- Friendly and helpful staff: six short videos for the ‘About Us' page with six staff members. Each video features a staff member talking about the kind of person he or she is, how they look at the world, what they do for fun, what causes they contribute money and time to, etc. While not directly addressing accounting, the videos will help potential customers make connections to staff members as people.
The firm decides to phase production. Phase one will include the seminar and the customer testimonials. Six months from now, they'll move to phase two, and create the staff videos.
If you're ready to create video content for your website, starting with questions about what you want your video content to do will help you understand what kind of video to make. Then, phasing production will help you create your video content in a planned, orderly, and affordable way.