Tag Archives: video production

There are plenty of independent videographers out there helping businesses produce their videos. There are also lots of companies choosing to produce their own. One of the reasons each of them fail to create compelling marketing videos that will connect with audiences is they aren’t good at interviewing people.

Not all marketing videos involve interviews, but a large number of them do. It doesn’t sound like it’s anything difficult. You write down some questions and ask them, right? Wrong.

How companies go wrong

Think about the situation you’re putting your interview subject in when they sit down for an interview. They have a camera in their face, the interviewer sitting next to the camera, if you’re shooting with a pro videographer there’s probably some lights and microphones in place. Throw in the interviewer firing off these scripted questions one after the other and you have created a situation that is completely unnatural… and that’s being diplomatic. In other words… it really sucks.

That environment will make most people very uncomfortable, so what kind of sound bites do you expect them to deliver? Unless they’re a seasoned professional, they’re going to provide answers that sound just like the questions they’re being asked… canned… scripted… unnatural. Not exactly the type of sound bites that are going to captivate viewers.

How to inspire great sound bites

Interviewing people is a true skill. One that’s honed through years in the field shooting videos. It’s not about having tons of questions prepared and working your way down a list. It’s having questions prepared, but using them to help create a conversation.

Conversation is what generates great sound bites. The person in-front of the camera relaxes because they don’t feel like they’re on a firing line. They start to forget there’s a camera in their face. Those lights fade away and it simply becomes two people talking.

You know you’ve done a good job interviewing someone when it’s all finished and they’re surprised. They say something like, “Wow… that was easy.”

It’s actually pretty tough

The thing is putting people at ease like that isn’t easy. I’ve been on corporate shoots where someone from the company wants to be the person asking the questions. That’s a terrible idea, especially when it’s a boss. Talk about putting an interviewee on edge. How do you expect them to relax when you have a corporate authority figure grilling them?

I’ve also seen independent videographers struggle with interviewing people. In many cases, videographers are fabulous interviewers. They’ve been around enough great interviewers, they know how it works. But in some cases, it’s just not their thing. They might have unbelievable visual skills to shoot and edit great video, but they don’t have the people skills to put interviewees at ease.

That’s why it’s important to hire the right storyteller for your project. They’ll have the skill to help people relax and deliver great sound bites.

–Tony Gnau

Tony Gnau is a three-time Emmy-winning journalist. He is also the founder and chief storytelling officer at T60 Productions. T60 has won 11 Telly Awards for its work over the last eight years.

Just a couple takeaways from yesterday’s ChicagoAMA Executive Sunrise Series event (VIDEO BELOW). Cars.com CMO Linda Bartman talked a lot about the company’s challenge of satisfying its audience (car buyers) and its clients (dealers/advertisers). She mentioned a couple of things I though tied nicely into businesses producing marketing videos.

Cars.com leaders are consistently doing their best to educate clients about the benefits of digital marketing. Many car dealers are apparently pretty resistant to change. Unfortunately for them, the days of customers showing up at a dealership unclear on what they want are over. Digital media has changed everything. Now, customers have researched what they want for hours online before they ever get to a dealership, so those dealers need to do a better job of selling themselves… not just their cars.

You might see where this is going. One of the things Linda mentioned yesterday morning is that they advocate for dealers to produce some sort of video to introduce themselves to customers.

About Us Videos

That’s a good idea no matter what business you’re in. Think about it. Virtually everyone researches online before making purchases. Knowing we like to buy from people we like, video is a great way to get in front of customers before they ever meet you. Video gives you the ability to create a good first impression while they’re surfing online.

As part of the discussion, Bartman also talked a bit about the tough conversations they have with dealers/advertisers who aren’t happy with the cars.com consumer-centric business model. The balance between providing quality information as well as advertising that generates leads. I couldn’t believe her take.

Bartman’s Mind-Blowing statement

“Conflict isn’t a bad thing if it allows you to tell your story.”

Storytelling. It’s such a powerful tool. Business leaders should be looking for every opportunity to share their story, and video is a great way to do it.

Video… storytelling… I like what I hear from cars.com.

 –Tony Gnau

Tony Gnau is a three-time Emmy-winning journalist. He is also the founder and chief storytelling officer at T60 Productions. T60 has won 11 Telly Awards for its work over the last eight years.

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Courtesy: uplifinglives.org

Non-profits are typically great video production clients. Mainly because they understand how effective storytelling can be in marketing an organization. One of our clients also understands it can play a big roll during a crisis like the Oklahoma tornado aftermath.

UpLifting Lives is an charity focused on housing. It helps with debt relief plans for homeowners upside down on their mortgages, and they step-in after disasters to help get people back into their neighborhoods. The video we produced for them touches on each of those missions, but yesterday I got a call from them asking for an emergency edit session.

Tailoring a message

They wanted me to cut down the video so it only mentions the disaster relief part (VIDEO BELOW). See… they’re already on the ground in Oklahoma and they’re ready to help rebuild. They also have all sorts of people curious about how that works, so they want a video in place that speaks only to those situations.

Instead of wasting people’s time on a component of their mission that doesn’t apply here… debt relief… they’ll have a video that speaks to the thousands of people impacted by the Oklahoma tornadoes.

We were happy to make the edits yesterday and hope the video serves them well in the coming days. They have a big task in front of them.

–Tony Gnau

Tony Gnau is a three-time Emmy-winning journalist. He is also the founder and chief storytelling officer at T60 Productions. T60 has won 11 Telly Awards for its work over the last eight years.

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This is a HUGE pet peeve of mine, but it also serves as a valuable lesson for business leaders. Actually, it’s a good tip for anyone shooting video on their cell phone… which is pretty much everyone. Please shoot your cell phone video in the proper aspect ratio.

Virtually all video cameras these days shoot in widescreen 16:9, right? That’s what your flat screen TV is at home. That’s what your computer monitor is at work… your laptop… YouTube screen… et cetera. The problem is when most people shoot video on their phone, they hold it vertically… which makes your aspect ratio 9:16.

This makes for TERRIBLE video

Instead of a beautiful picture covering the entire screen, you get a narrow image in the center with all sorts of black space on the sides.

AAARRRRGGGG! It drives me insane. Nothing screams AMATEUR as much as video that looks like this.

Corporate video mistake

I see it all the time in DIY corporate videos. Heck, sometimes I see it in professionally produced corporate videos… usually when someone at the company shoots something that “must” be in the finished video. Please don’t do this. I have successfully talked a few T60 clients out of including similar video. The only, and I mean, only circumstance this is acceptable in my book is if it’s a one-time-only event. The company tested a product, someone caught it on camera and it’s awesome. Something along those line.

Anyway, consider this my public service for the day. Please, do not shoot video vertically on your cell phone. Simply turn it sideways and you’ll do yourself a world of good.

–Tony Gnau

Tony Gnau is a three-time Emmy-winning journalist. He is also the founder and chief storytelling officer at T60 Productions. T60 has won 11 Telly Awards for its work over the last eight years.

I got a question last week from a business owner, “What do you do if you want a video for your business but you’re camera-shy?” It’s not an unfamiliar question and my standard answers is, “Suck it up.” After a moment of shock, I smile and say, “Do testimonial videos.”

testimonials accomplish a few things

Testimonials are the camera-shy business leader’s best friend because it’s a win-win-win. Hearing from people who use a product or service makes a big impact on viewers… the clients who provide their story get some publicity as well… and the camera-shy business leader doesn’t have to be seen or heard on camera!

Testimonials work… bigtime

I’ve blogged a lot in the past (here, here, here… just to name a few) about how effective testimonials can be, but I think this is the first time I have come at it from this angle.

It’s certainly something to keep in mind if you’re looking for ways to promote your business, but don’t necessarily feel comfortable being the face of the company.

–Tony Gnau

Tony Gnau is a three-time Emmy-winning journalist. He is also the founder and chief storytelling officer at T60 Productions. T60 has won 11 Telly Awards for its work over the last eight years.

Courtesy: Goose Island Beer Co.

A quarter century in business is something to celebrate. The ups, the downs, the people who made it everything possible… all of it makes for good video content. Give it to a loyal following and they’ll eat it up… or drink it down in this case.

Goose Island Beer Company is celebrating its 25th Anniversary this week. For those of you outside Chicago, it’s quite simply the city’s beer. Starting as a brew pub, growing into a craft brewery, and succeeding to the point where Anheuser-Busch stepped in and purchased the company. It’s the American Dream come to life, and now you can learn all about it in a newly produced video (WATCH IT BELOW).

Goose Island Helped Grow T60

I’m really proud of this video even though T60 didn’t have any part in it. As you may or may not know, Goose Island played a BIG role in growing this business. Just a couple years after launching, Goose Island leaders hired T60 to produce about a dozen videos on their beers. It was without question the biggest single project we had worked. The videos turned out great, and we were called back for a few other projects over the next couple of years.

Goose Island as a client gave T60 instant credibility here in Chicago. When prospects would ask me about some of our clients, all I had to do was mention the Goose and I had their attention. Great company, great product, our storytelling… I couldn’t ask for much more.

Inspiring More Storytelling

We haven’t done anything for them since the crew from St. Louis made the purchase. You’d think I’d be bummed, but the truth is it warms my heart. See… Goose Island’s leaders understand the power of video and storytelling. They wanted to do more… a lot more… so they went out and hired someone to produce videos in-house.

In a way, I hope their experience with T60 inspired them. They were so happy with the response they got from our videos that they wanted more, and from a cost standpoint it made more sense to hire someone full-time.

What Goose Island Can Teach you

I’d love to still be doing work for them, but when you see the video you’ll understand they’re in good hands. It’s on the long-side, but in this case I think that’s just fine. This video is for everyone at the company and anyone who’s a die-hard fan. You want to do a 15-minute video on the company’s history for those audiences? Go for it.

It’s actually a great lesson for anyone struggling with finding content ideas. Your company’s history is a potential treasure trove. You don’t have to do a 15-minute epic. A series of short history stories on various aspects of the company is a great way to go.

Anyway, I couldn’t be happier for everyone at Goose Island and I’m eternally grateful to have worked with them. They are passionate about what they do, and it comes through in all their videos.

Happy Anniversary Goose.

–Tony Gnau

Tony Gnau is a three-time Emmy-winning journalist. He is also the founder and chief storytelling officer at T60 Productions. T60 has won 11 Telly Awards for its work over the last eight years.

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Courtesy: cars.com

One of the things I love about being a ChicagoAMA sponsor is getting to meet the amazing professionals who share their time and knowledge with the members. T60 produces preview videos for many of the organization’s events. That means I get to meet the keynote speakers weeks before their presentations, and that one-on-one time has been priceless to learn about their video strategy.

Basically, I get to pick their brains. A lot it centers on the topic they’ll be covering, but no surprise I also ask them questions about how they’re using video. You can imagine how excited I was when I met with the cars.com Chief Marketing Officer,Linda Bartman, and saw a sheet hanging above her desk entitled, The Video Factor.

It was an infographic the company produced in 2011 to highlight how many people are watching online videos. You don’t need me to tell you… it’s like a gazillion. Here’s what I love though… it’s terrific justification for producing video content.

What’s coming at the event

Which leads me into the upcoming event (SEE VIDEO BELOW | REGISTER). Linda will be speaking about some of the challenges they face that might sound familiar to many marketers. One of them is having to explain some of their content decisions. In the case of cars.com, they have to explain it to their clients… the companies and dealerships that advertise with them.

The case for video

The info-graphic does a great job of explaining the reason for producing video content. 178-million Americans watching online video… 30% watching on mobile devices… and then the nitty-gritty for them.

• 68% of people watching online automotive videos found them important
• 55% of car buyers watch an online video before making their purchase
• Shoppers who watch dealer videos on cars.com spend nearly twice as much time on the site as people who don’t watch videos

Good stuff. That’s coming from a company that crunches the numbers and understands the power of video.

–Tony Gnau

Tony Gnau is a three-time Emmy-winning journalist. He is also the founder and chief storytelling officer at T60 Productions. T60 has won 11 Telly Awards for its work over the last eight years.

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Courtesy: imdb.com

I watched a pretty cool movie over the weekend, and it illustrated something important for anyone producing corporate videos. Keeping an open mind is crucial to storytelling.

The movie I saw was Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead. It’s all about nutrition and changing the way we eat. The material is interesting, the story is well-told and it’s worthwhile watching. The trailer and full movie are below.

Alright, spoiler alert… I’m going to give away a surprise in the movie, so if you’re genuinely interested in seeing it… bookmark this post and come back to read it later.

About the movie

Okay, the movie is billed as the story of Joe Cross… an Australian man who’s 100-pounds overweight, suffering from an autoimmune disease and ready to make a big life-change. That is indeed what the movie is about, but there’s a story that overtakes it. Along the way on Joe’s journey, he runs into a truck driver in worse shape than him. Joe offers his help, and low and behold the trucker calls him out of the blue one day asking to take him up on it.

What’s remarkable about this is that the phone call appears to come at the end of Joe’s adventure. I can just imagine the production meeting after that phone call. Here they are at the end of the production and what could be an even better story has been gift-wrapped for them.

Joe’s story is good and he’s a likeable guy, but the transformation that follows with the truck driver is nothing short of extraordinary. It clearly added several months to the production and I’m sure more expense as well.

Takeaway

Joe and the production team deserve a lot of credit. It would have been easy for them to ignore the truck driver’s story and make the movie they set-out to make… all focused on Joe and his journey. What they seemingly did was make a tough call and it paid-off BIGTIME!

This isn’t a unique situation. The same thing happens during all sorts of corporate video productions. The hard thing is standing up and telling either your client or boss… there’s a better story here. I know we made plans to do one thing, but we’ve found something better. You might get some push-back and ultimately they’re the ones making the call, but you owe it to them to give your professional opinion.

You should want to tell the best story possible, even if that wasn’t the story you set-out to tell.

–Tony Gnau

Tony Gnau is a three-time Emmy-winning journalist. He is also the founder and chief storytelling officer at T60 Productions. T60 has won 11 Telly Awards for its work over the last eight years.

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Courtesy– Pete the Cat: I like my white shoes.

I’m your classic half-full versus half-empty kind of guy. Always have been. That’s a good quality to have when producing corporate videos.

Here’s how my morning went last Thursday…

• 6:20 a.m.: woke up 20-minutes late
• 7:00 a.m.: realized I forgot my phone at home
• 8:30 a.m.: returned to get my phone, made me late for chiropractor appointment
• 11:10 a.m.: after an hour in the office, jumped on the L to meet a friend/colleague in the Loop for lunch
• 11:15 a.m.: CTA shut down north side L service because of a train derailment
• 11:45 a.m.: make the 30-minute walk home only to arrive to a big pile of cat puke in the front hall

That was all before Noon. It would have been easy to get down after a morning like that or feel sorry for myself, but as Pete the Cat would say… “It’s all good.” (VIDEO BELOW)

That’s an attitude that will help you be successful producing corporate videos. Productions are always changing. Sometimes for the good, but more often than not the changes present… we’ll call them… challenges.

Griping about it isn’t going to help anything. Rolling with it and being a problem-solver will not only make you feel better, it will likely lead to a good video. There have been plenty of situations where I’ve been handed a lemon during a shoot, and those lemonade videos frequently turn out to be some of my favorites.

Keep your head up and press on.

–Tony Gnau

Tony Gnau is a three-time Emmy-winning journalist. He is also the founder and chief storytelling officer at T60 Productions. T60 has won 11 Telly Awards for its work over the last eight years.

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Courtesy: thestartbook.com

Here we go again. I had another pros and cons conversation recently with someone about do-it-yourself video content. Thankfully, I had a new argument to bolster my opinion courtesy Jon Acuff.

Acuff is a successful author. He started with a blog and his latest book, START (VIDEO BELOW), debuted on The New York Times best sellers list. I’m a big fan of his last book, Quitter, and I’m looking forward to reading this next one. He’s an entertaining writer, but even better he’s pretty inspiring.

I was listening to him talk about START during an EntreLeadership podcast and something really hit home for me. I run into a lot of leaders at success companies who think they can produce their own videos. “Tim in accounting has his own camera and his home movies are pretty good.” That’s an actual quote.

You can’t skip ahead to awesome

Acuff talks about these stages everyone goes through on the road to awesome… learning, editing, mastering, harvesting and guiding. If you’re going to be awesome at something, you have to go through each step. One leads to the other and nobody gets to jump ahead. You figure out what you’re passionate about, practice, hone your craft, see the benefits of your hard work, then help others who are starting out.

As someone who’s dedicated their professional life to becoming a great storyteller, that clicked with me. It’s also why most DIY corporate videos suck. Ted in accounting hasn’t gone through the steps. His boss wants him to be a professional storyteller, but he hasn’t spent enough time learning, editing and mastering.

When to DIY, When not to DIY

I’ve said it time and time again, if you’re a small business owner without any budget and believe in the power of video… have at it. Produce your own stuff. It’s better than nothing and nobody is expecting professional videos from you.

On the other hand, if you’re a leader at an established company, find yourself a video pro. They’ll do it smarter, more efficiently and better than you.

Why would you trust the image and reputation of your business to Ted in accounting?

–Tony Gnau

Tony Gnau is a three-time Emmy-winning journalist. He is also the founder and chief storytelling officer at T60 Productions. T60 has won 11 Telly Awards for its work over the last eight years.

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