This article gives an interesting insight into why it is sometimes better to NOT use professional actors or presenters, particularly for small to medium-sized businesses.
In the modern age of electronic gimmickry and the "copy-cat school" of thought, the understanding of forwarding a message as the fundamental reason for communicating in the first place has been all but lost. Yet "message" is what marketing and promotion is all about.
Ever get the feeling the cameraman or editor is calling attention to him or herself so as to impress you with technique? True professional cameramen (and editors and every other member of the production team) know that their role is to immerse the audience in the message or story so that the point is gotten across as intended and with emotional impact. True innovation in terms of technique still follows the basic principle of forwarding the intended message, not forwarding the self gratification of the producer of the piece.
If you want a biography or tribute done on a remarkable person, as soon as you hear someone telling you about "packages" based on number of hours of video interview, tell them "thank you very much" and move onto your next videographer prospect...
Old Predictions and New Trends
A couple years ago Bruce Clay, one of the top SEO experts in the world, predicted (to paraphrase) “in a couple of years, if you don’t have video content, you won’t rank (on the search engines).”
Well, it’s been a couple of years and it seems he wasn’t far off.
Now we’re hearing that in short order (I’ll skip the year prediction), 90% of the web will be video-based. Just search “video seo” and you’ll see what I mean.
Frankly, I don’t know what that means exactly. But it certainly implies the necessity for video content for starters.
Around the same time, all on my own, I started telling clients that the slick, expensive video ads they’re so accustomed to from TV are not the way to promote new business. In fact, the cost of such productions is what made the whole idea of video prohibitive to small and medium-sized businesses. My point, covered in more detail on other articles in this blog, was that it works fine for the Big Guys because we’re already familiar with their products and services and don’t really need to be sold on them particularly. Those flashy videos are just there to remind us that those Big Guys still exist and are still offering great stuff for you to buy.
But for the smaller guys, the guys that most of us never heard of (and the guys that want to be discovered), that same approach could be a distinct disadvantage. Why? Because it’s just “marketing hype”. “It’s just an actor reading a script”.
So my approach was more of a documentary approach using the real people who are themselves human and slightly imperfect; not slick and polished like a pro actor with perfect hair, posture, hand gestures and clever script.
Seems this too has panned out as an accurate prediction. Now I’ve been seeing blog posts about “humanizing” business videos and “the documentary approach”.
The one thing I did learn from these blogs was something I must have known a couple of years ago but hadn’t put my finger on….YouTube changed everything.
Need I say more?
Business Web Video Pricing
Business Web Video Pricing
From £450
This page is offered to businesses as a guide to price categories for most business web videos using actual business videos produced by the Video Whisperer.
The Video Whisperer specializes in videos for small to medium-sized businesses with prices ranging from £450-£5500.
Let's cut to the chase with some sample business videos and their prices.
Standard Business Web Promotional Video--£850-£1200
This is the standard video format for most medium-larger sized businesses. It's basic formula is based on a narrative derived interviews from one or two key executives and supported by video footage and graphics with a fitting but stock (not original) music track. Ideally client testimonials are woven into the content of this type of video.
Model Business Video for Small Business £450-£750
The first of these two samples is toward the higher cost of £750. It's ideal because, a) it is 2 minutes or less, b) the presenter (or could be the owner/spokesperson) summarizes quickly the company/offer, c) the client testimonials re-enforse what the presenter (or owner) said, d) the company logo and contact detail are visible throughout, e) fitting music and graphics forward the mood and message nicely...and, again, all in two minutes or less.
The second sample (more toward the lower cost of £450) is an example using the actual owner of the shop (not a professional presenter), and though the longer length of the video is dictated by how much he wants to cover to achieve a personalized tour of the newly expanded shop, it is yet kept interesting by a combination of the driving music and diverse visuals. Some of his regular clients learned things they didn't know about the shop by watching this video!
The third sample falls mid-range and was specifically designed without narration so that it could be played continuously in reception.
Corporate Branding Video--£2000-£3000
This is a typical "Corporate Video, a video which can be used on the company's website and/or be shown to prospective clients in the offices, at trade shows, etc. It's length is in the 4-5 minute range. It is usually constructed from interviews of corporate executives* and driven visually by lots of dynamic footage and graphics that support the narrative and compay image. It includes an original music score written for and unique to the business; music which can be used freely by the company for other promotion and site-related video.
*Note: The typical approach to corporate videos is adherence to a meticulously planned out script resulting often in a video that, though it has "all the right marketing bits", comes off stilted, hollow, or just plain "hypey" sounding. The Video Whisperer uses a different approach (which is manifest in all the sample videos and which you can read about HERE.)
Full-Blown Business Promotional Videos--£4000-£5500
This project was essentially a mini-documentary which addressed a highly charged subject in its regional area (logging in Montana, USA), and so served to both expose a balance between truth and lies forwarded by media and vested interests, and to promote the company's environmentally responsible services. It was released in 4 parts totalling about 28 minutes. Regardless of this video's particular content, this is to give an example of the type of content (narrative driven by multiple interviews, related footage that supports the narrative and tells the story, title sequence, original music score) for a longer project (20-30 minute) in the £4000-£5000 range.
The above costings are provided as guidelines. In most cases the costs shown were the actual costs of the sample video production shown. In any case, video pricing is very simple and based on a day-rate of production plus any extras such as professional talent, certain travel expenses, etc. Prices are determined before production begins and are held to. You won't see "overtime charges" or any other hidden charges.
Call the Video Whisperer to discuss your project (01476 879071) or send an enquiry.
Comment on Business videos
Back in the early days of TV advertising and print media in the last century, it was enough to say,
"Acme is the best". And people would buy because you said so.
Then, when enough people were saying "we're the best" Madison Avenue (New York) stepped in with the new age of "hype"...
And apparently, in the 21st Century, "hype" is still alive and well.
But wasn't it decades ago that the general public started ignoring it knowing well they were just listening to "well scripted" advertising dialogue?
Perhaps that's when advertising humor entered into the arena --and that worked well (and is still working well) with well known and established businesses whose products and services are already known. This then, was a matter of keeping the brand in the public's mind. And there's nothing wrong with that.
But what about small businesses or corporations that aren't well known or are brand new?
What will make the public listen to you?
Passion.
Sincerity.
For the last year I've been advising clients to not bother writing scripts or hiring professional actors or presenters.
I have a different approach.
I learned after doing about 1000 interviews with people all over the world in from all walks of life from the very bottom to the very top that all people are passionate about something. If you get them talking about what they want to talk about, they light up inevitably and invariably. And even with a video camera in their face, suddenly all their inhibitions and introversions disappear.
Conversely, if you try to get them to say some pre-conceived idea you've got--or try to coax them to say certain things--or try to get them to read a script, they get all wobbly and introverted and you wind up with hash. And some marketing or video companies will pass that off to you and expect you to applaud it as a professional marketing piece.
I'm sure you've seen this sort of result in various business videos you've seen. It's either slick hype, or amateur school play time, and neither are very effective.
My approach in the production of a 3 minute business web video is to interview the person or persons involved. The interview is an informal chat, a conversation about the topic or topics we are meant to be promoting. It doesn't matter what is said. "Ums" and "ahhs" don't matter. Dead-end questions are dropped. Questions that raise the interest and emotional tone of the interviewee are expanded upon. I keep mental notes as to what material obtained will be useful in the eventual video and I generally know when I have enough such material. The interviews might be a cumulative 20 minutes or more for each person (if more than one). There might be as much as an hour's material to distill down to 2 to 4 minutes.
After the interviews, I now know what other footage needs to be shot to cover what the person or persons were talking about and I shoot it.
I then go through all the material and isolate all the "usable bits".
Next I put it into a logical order (which may not be the order it was obtained in) to give a suitable beginning, middle and end of the video.
Finally I edit it down to the desired length and that gives me the "narrative" for the video...in other words, the SCRIPT.
Part of that process is removing all the "umms" and "ahhs" (as much as possible) and any irrelevant parts. It's not that saying "umm" or "ahh" is bad. It's human. But as an example, in one recent 3 minute video I seamlessly cut out 38 "ums". That wasn't all of them, but enough to make the person come off very well indeed while still being human.
So finally, when this narrative is all together in a cohesive string, if you were to look at it on the editing timeline, it would look like the person has been "sliced and diced".
So all those slices and dices are then covered up with the relevant shots of what it is that the person is talking about--which of course forwards the message of what he's talking about.
The editing job is to keep it on point to forward the marketing message you wanted in the first place.
And you wind up with a piece that is sincere, even passionate, and with no trace of hype.
You wind up with a piece that's believable.
Like this one:
Or this one:
For an idea of business video costing, Click Here.
Wedding Video Critique
Recently a colleague at the IOV (Institute of Videographers) requested a critique of some wedding videos. My reply could be of interest to those seeking wedding videographers
I thought I'd reply privately as "constructive criticism" can sometimes draw in a gang-bang of irrelevant comments on forums.
I watched the video you linked to and then watched half of the one on the home page of your site.
It looks like you've done quite a few wedding videos! So don't think you have it all wrong.
I've never been influenced by other wedding videos I've seen particularly. My background and training is in cinematography and the disciplines of good story telling along with about 6 years of video documentary work and the need there to move in and out quick while thinking on your feet.
But my approach still goes back to the basics of cinematography. "Videography" is not really different, as it's just a different medium, but I believe it has largely been influenced by the "MTV" age and also by a plethora of would-be movie-makers who, owing to the relative low cost of video equipment and editing programs, launch themselves into the field with no schooling except what they've seen on MTV or YouTube, etc. Their approach, therefore, can be a jumble of "gimmicky" shots edited with no sense and covered up with pointless electronic effects offered up by their editing programs.
I wrote a couple of related articles on my blog some time ago I'd like you to read:
Anyway I have only two observations that might be helpful, beyond what you may agree with or not in the two articles I wrote inasmuch as they may also be helpful to you.
First is that I see a tendency to record on video what is normally in the purview of wedding photographers.
Wedding photographers normally do all the "conventions"--photographing details and doing all the usual posed shots of the couple and entourage, etc. I wouldn't mix that up with doing video of the same or similar material.
Video is not really a glorified still photograph.
Now don't get me wrong. It's not that you shouldn't shoot these various set-ups as they are happening. I shoot everything--or as much as I can. It's more because of the documentary aspect--meaning, one shoots as much as one can during a live event just to have the material to cover the edit. It doesn't mean that you necessarily have to use these things, but your purpose for using them is different than the purpose of the still photographer.
Now let's hold that thought for a minute…
My view of the end product of a wedding video is that it should distill down the essences of the event and meld together memorable images (memories) in an artistic fashion such that anyone watching it (even just Joe Blow off the street) would enjoy and be moved by it. But more importantly, the couple and their friends will want to watch it over and over and over again and experience the emotion again and again.
How long should it be? Well, that depends on the wedding and any particular requests of the couple. But I'd say even the grandest events in all aspects can be edited down to 30 minutes, more or less. Ironically it takes much longer to do that than to just put it all in there, but will they want to watch a 60 minute or 90 minute pure record of the event with a few cutesy shots over and over again? I doubt it. Twice maybe. Friends and family, once.
It should have emotional impact and should present what they want to see or remember, not what the cameraman thinks is cool.
Along those lines, you know that many more moments than they will ever know which are recorded on your tape, are not really what they want to see or remember.
Sometimes it's fleeting expressions, nervous gestures, or awkward stumbles and other things--right on down to the obvious (scratching an itch or whatever).
For example, in one of the two I watched, the groom really stumbled badly on part of the vows. While they might socially laugh about that, you must know that it's really something that makes the groom cringe and which could make the bride "wonder". Those kind of things, wherever possible, I would cut out.
But it goes back to creating a moving montage of wonderful and poignant memories.
Part of that is "who was there". So going back to shooting photographer set-ups, I tend to use them to get close shots of the people, or two-shots or three-shots where they are interacting, for the purpose of including faces in the video I may have not gotten otherwise. And I usually do all that kind of stuff in slow motion to their chosen song. That's just my approach--the ceremony (or the essential parts of it) real time and most of the rest in slow motion montages interspersed with any necessary real-time footage such as speeches, or highlights from speeches.
But the reason I do it that way is to create a piece that they will want to watch over and over because it's got so many memories compacted into a short space.
Which brings me to a second point. I feel that your shots go by too quickly. You're editing nicely to the tempo of the songs, but, for the most part, you don't need to cut on every beat. What happens there is that it's all going by too quickly in terms of those memories they'd want to savor. It's a subtle point, but just a bit too fast to allow the various bits to be soaked in.
I personally never stage anything. I prefer to try to capture as many good candid moments as possible while being as invisible as possible. That way they're seeing themselves as they've never seen themselves before. If they've posed something, they're not seeing anything they don't already know.
However, you have some beautiful shots there--walking in the woods, etc. So your eye is good--and I'm not saying to never do that. I'm just saying, consider using that eye more to capture moments without them ever knowing they were captured--and those moments will have a lot more emotional impact for them.
Again, it's all about presenting an emotional memory package to those who want to share or re-experience the memories. And when you accomplish that well, it will always exceed their expectations and they will always tell you so and you will know that they really mean it. And that, I feel, is the end product one should go for.
Video Whisperer Sample Wedding Videos
An excerpt from the 67 minute full version, that length owing
mainly to the desired inclusion of all the post wedding speeches (which were all quite good!)
The full 22 minute version of this wedding, closer to the ideal length
of about 30 minutes)
Excerpted from the full 35 minute version
Pro Actor vs. Local Talent
Most of the business/corporate videos on this site were done with local talent--specifically, the actual people who work at the business, including owners, directors and regular staff.
Heavyweight Air Express was a medium-sized, but global company venturing into the video realm. They immediately thought to hire a professional actor to do their video. I advised against it, and whilst my opinion, when I told them why, they decided to go with their own talent.
In the case of Heavyweight Air Express, it wasn't that they could afford to hire a pro for the job. In the case of smaller businesses, the additional cost may indeed be an important factor, and could even be the reason for not even considering having a video done due to perceived high cost.
The good news is that a high quality impactful business video is quite affordable, notwithstanding the fact that it should rapidly pay for itself.
As to pro actor versus local talent, here is my opinion and essentially what I told Heavyweight.
Firstly, think about those big companies who use professional talent on TV commercials. We know they're actors and we know they're paid and we know they're reading script. The only reason that doesn't bother us is that we ALREADY KNOW the company, its products and services, precisely because they're already big.
Now let's consider we were watching a commercial for a company we never heard of and that a professional actor was presenting. Well, we can tell at once that he or she is a professional actor, and we know that they're being paid and reading script. Suddenly those factors that didn't bother us with the company we already know come into play in a different way with the company we never heard of. To a certain degree we suspect that is it just "hype". Afterall, it's a professional actor reading a script with perfect hair and all the right hand gestures.
Now let's take that same company and use it's actual president, CEO or owner. First off, we can tell it's not a polished pro. We can tell this is the real guy and that he's putting his reputation on the line. So what he has to say--if it's a subject we're interested in--has a little more credibility. And we tend to give him a chance. We listen. We don't just toss him off as a bit of marketing hype.
Secondly, people who work for the company and believe in it and its products and services are emotionally attached. They know what they're talking about. They've dealt with the products, services and the customers who use them. And we can tell that too.
So the question becomes, how does one get a "regular guy" to come off well in front of the camera.
That's pretty simple and is something a director is trained to do. But in terms of content (how we get them to say what we want them to say), here is where the Video Whisperer differs from most other video production companies. We don't try to script it. "Remembering script" or "remembering what to say" is the downfall of any attempt to produce a marketing piece for a business, because people who are not trained actors have trouble with that sort of thing--and you can tell.
Instead we do it on an interview basis. We have an informal chat--interview if you like-- with the camera rolling. Sure there are plenty of bobbles and mis-starts and all else that is part of normal human conversation. But as soon as we start talking about a subject that they KNOW SOMETHING ABOUT or have a particular EMOTIONAL CONTACT with, they suddenly start sounding quite natural and start coming off quite professionally--having completely forgotten about the camera.
Such interview may last 20-40 minutes or more. And from that, the job of the editor is to distill from all the footage the essence of what we want to impart to the potential customer or client. That means there are a lot of "cuts" and that means often things are put together in a sequence differing from how it actually came off in the interview. That doesn't matter. What matters is that, in the end, they provided the material necessary to being able to put together a marketing piece for the company just as if it had been scripted to begin with. And the best part is: Some of the things that come up in an interview one would never have thought to script!
Here's the Heavyweight Air Express video with their own talent:
Here's the R&R Conner, Inc. video with their own talent:
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