Seeking a compelling reason to bite the bullet and create a company video already? We’ll give you two:
- “People are hungry for stories. It’s part of our very being.” – Studs Terkel
- “Stories give color to black and white information.” – Todd Stocker
Plenty of people have said it first: stories are important. As Frog’s, we spend day after day crafting unique stories for each of our clients, but recently, we found that one story wasn’t properly being told – our own. We had all the words down, from who we are and what we do to how we do it; what we were missing however, was a visual story. Which brings us to today’s topic of discussion: company videos. Producing a video that encapsulates the essence of your business may seem daunting at first, especially if you don’t have the resources to create it yourself. So where do you begin? Start with these 3 steps.
Step 1: Determine your objectives and video type
Your first step is to answer a few important questions: Who are you? What message are you trying to convey? Whether you’re producing the video internally or hiring an agency, it’s important to begin by defining the objectives of the final piece. Consider which of these categories your video falls into:
- Educational: Introducing, or further informing your audience about your company and its offering
- Promotional: Showcasing your services and/or products to a targeted audience or market segment
- Entertaining: Having a little fun and adding some personality to your brand and industry
Our video opted for an educational format to give potential clients and employees an idea of what our agency is all about. Upon making this decision, the real work begins…
Step 2: Consider the components your video will include
With your objectives and corporate identity in mind, consider how the following components could fit into your video and how well their inclusion would portray your company’s brand. Depending on the desired length of your company video, your production could include all or some of these key features:
- Company history
- Team members
- Culture and personality
- Client work and results
- Services and products
To reference an example, let’s take a look at our recent “educational” video which focused its components exclusively on team, services and client work…
Team and services:
The video opens with visual representations of our branding including our logo and Doylestown, PA headquarters. Much like the way we build relationships with our clients, we wanted our audience to feel like a new neighbor on the block. Our goal was to introduce ourselves and invite them in; what better way to do so than through the front door?
First we showed where we are; next we wanted to showcase who we are. Pictured first is Co-Founder and Managing Partner, Mark Schmukler, and his specialty: strategy. Next, Sagefrog introduces his counterpart, Co-Founder and Managing Partner, Suzanne Morris, and her focus: creative.
The remainder of the video conveys our core identifiers: collaboration, talent, teamwork, results and success. Ultimately, the people who collaborate on their talents and practice teamwork to provide results and accelerated success to our clients are pictured throughout: account managers, digital experts, designers and copywriters.
Client work:
The final scenes showcase our marketing work spanning website development, video marketing, marketing collateral and of course everything that makes it possible – from copywriting and design to coding and production. In line with our objectives to provide an educational overview to prospective clients and employees, we chose to showcase work from clients that reside in our specialty industries of B2B healthcare, technology and business services.
Step 3: Polish your production with these tips
Now that the big questions are answered, there is one key tip that will be pertinent in enabling the success of your video: length.
Our video is exactly one minute long. You may be thinking: all that work for 60 seconds? It’s true. A longer clip could have showcased more information, from our history and individual team members to our expansive portfolio of results – but our concise video length was deliberate and strategic.
In fact1, 5% of viewers will stop watching a video after one minute and 60% by the two minute mark. So, when it comes to video marketing – time is absolutely of the essence. Today, one-third of all online activity is being spent watching videos, so it’s important that your video is amongst them. Lastly, embedding a video on a landing page can increase conversions by 80%. This is an important tip, especially if your video objective was to be educational or promotional.
Lastly, timing is everything.
We decided to release our video after a series of 2016 lists and awards were released to the Philadelphia and New Jersey region that recognized Sagefrog! Our goal was to kick off the fourth quarter with a comprehensive marketing blitz that included the video, being recognized as the fastest growing B2B marketing agency in the Philadelphia region by Philadelphia Business Journal’s ’50 on Fire in Philly’ List and by Philadelphia 100.
Did you find these tips helpful? Here are other resources you might enjoy!
Are you interested in video marketing or other B2B marketing services? Contact Sagefrog Marketing Group, today.
Sources:
1 Hubspot, 31 Video Marketing Statistics to Inform Your Strategy [Infographic]
