Video is a very powerful communication tool – it weaves images, sound, music, and graphics into an engaging, informative (and often emotional) experience that helps you connect deeply with your target audience. Audiences come away from the experience with a “feeling” about your people, your company, and your brand. Our goal as strategic communicators is to turn that feeling about your company into action.
Video is also a passive medium – complementary to, but distinctly different from mediums like print and web. Unlike a poster at a bus shelter, a video will not allow your audience to linger longer, re-read a headline, or consider content while they wait for their bus. For that reason, data-rich messages like names, dates, bullet lists, facts and figures are rarely recalled (or even absorbed) by your video audience.
Captive audiences, such as a group of people gathered for a meeting or event, have significantly longer attention spans than prospects that are casually surfing the Internet. In fact, viewer engagement by even the most committed Internet prospects drops dramatically after the first 20 or 30 seconds. Unless there is a compelling reason to stay and watch your video, most of your audience will simply move on to risk-free surfing activities they can control.
Web visitors also want to be in full control of their Internet experience – their time is precious. They dislike being held hostage by a slow loading splash page, a fancy banner ad that takes over their browser, or a video that takes too long to get to the point.
The most successful online environments are ones that provide a variety of mediums (text, still photos, videos, graphics) and endless of ways to absorb the content. Audiences can linger longer on the text and photos, explore interactive graphics, peruse customer quotes, and watch videos that engage and interest them - in any order they choose.
With that short primer to the world of video, we offer the following practices:
• Leverage the unique strengths of video …
• … And avoid its weaknesses.
• Resist the temptation to communicate too much.
• Break up your messages into small packets.
• Make each packet relevant to your audience.
• Allow your audience to chose the packets that interest them.
• Engage, surprise, and delight your audiences - reward them for watching.
• Focus most on “igniting a conversation” - not just delivering information.
Sometimes organizations feel pressured to develop a video (or series of videos) that “cover all bases”. They’ve secured the budget so now they want to pour all of the content into one project. In effect, however, they end up doing the exact opposite of the practices we’ve described above.
Storymasters works collaboratively with you and your team to map out an effective long-term video production strategy. And we ensure that the videos we produce dovetail nicely with parallel communications initiatives in print, web or live event.
Facts...
... versus Feelings.
So let’s recap.
Video is a powerful tool.
If you harness its strengths, your video will create impressions that last for years.
If you indulge in its weaknesses – your audience will tune out and click out.
Video’s immediate takeaway isn’t just information, it’s a feeling.
And much more than data and facts, feelings and impressions linger and last.
