Videos for business have a range of styles, depending on their purpose and audience. Below are the top five types of videos that Picture This Video gets asked to make. In addition, I’m providing some information about how long each video takes to produce, from pre-production to delivery. I’ll also help you know what to look for to see the video’s success.
Testimonials / Case Studies
When people are considering buying something, they like to hear from other people. That’s why unboxing videos on YouTube are so popular! You see someone experiencing a product for the first time, and hear what they think about it! Testimonial videos can be really powerful to build trust and get new customers.
For your company, if you don’t have something to unbox, you can have your best clients do an interview. This can also be turned into a case study, where the problem is presented by your client, you speak about how you approached solving the problem, as well as any challenges you overcame, and then the client speaks about the end result, and how it helped them.
Production time
For this kind of video, there would be a pre-production meeting to discuss any footage needs outside of the interview, and scheduling the shoot. The shoot could be done in a half day, in most cases. From the interview, a script would be written, and when approved by the client, the editing would be done. Case study videos generally fall within the 5-10 minute window, and testimonial videos are generally 3-5 minutes.
Metrics
For these kinds of videos, you want to look at play rate and your conversion metrics. Adding a call to action at the end that takes them to a landing page on your website can help you know how that video is converting customers.
Promotional Videos
Promotional videos, when used for an event (whether online or in-person) are like video invitations. You pitch your event using your branding, and invite your audience to come to the event through your call-to-action. These promotional videos can be embedded into electronic newsletters. They are usually 1-3 minutes long.
Using a call-to-action that goes to a specific landing page will help you track how many folks saw your video, and then went to learn more or register. You’ll want to give a brief detailed overview of what you’re promoting, and you want to encourage viewers to take action. Promotional videos can be graphics-driven, or for a more personal touch, see if the host can shoot a quick personal invite.
Production time
For this kind of video, if you’re just using graphics, the production time might just be a couple of hours of editing. If you’re shooting a host with teleprompter, on location, you’d add a half day to the time.
Metrics
As mentioned previously, your call-to-action will help you know if your video is working. Make your video specific for tracking with a promo code, or specific landing page.
Teaser Videos for Social Media
These types of promotional videos are best for podcasts, livestreams, and YouTube content. Outside of video, you can promote blog posts, e-books, and live events. With so much content available to your audience, how can you find and connect with the viewers you’re looking for? Make a teaser video that links to the longer version and build up awareness that way.
For social media, you want to make sure that the video can be carried with visuals, since many people don’t turn the volume up on videos. If you have narration, make sure you have captions.
You may need to make different versions, depending on the platform, since different platforms have different time requirements and size requirements. Sprout Social always has the latest information for all of the platform requirements.
Production time
For teaser videos, you may just want to use existing footage from whatever you are trying to promote. Depending on your editing skills, your video might take a few minutes, or a few hours to create. Of course, if you need editing help, that’s where Picture This Video can come in!
Metrics
By their nature, social media videos are designed to NOT encourage viewers to go off the platform. So think of them more as being used in the top level of the sales funnel- the awareness stage. Pay attention to the view count and completion rate metrics within each platform to see how your content performs.
Livestreams
Are you already doing conferences, conducting in-person seminars, or sharing big product announcements? Need to reach a wider audience, or the remote employees that won’t be onsite? Livestreams are the answer.
Livestreams are key to businesses in software and e-commerce, who tend to have global audiences, so using a livesteam to forge meaningful and deeper business relationships.
Where can you stream? YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter all have livestream capabilities. And you can set up a page on your own website for us to stream your event. Picture This Video can stream to multiple destinations concurrently, and can also accommodate questions from the audience, roll-in videos, powerpoint slides, and on-screen graphics.
Production time
Production time ranges. If we’re producing your event from the office, and you and your guest are using webcams, we will want a dry run scheduled, and we’ll work with you in the pre-production stage to understand the components we need to build or obtain for your event. If your event is on-location, we’ll also need to understand how we will interface with the rest of the a/v crew, and what/who we will need to bring in addition to our switching and encoding equipment. On-location events are full day events. Neither style of event has any planned post-production component, though we do record the events for archival purposes
Metrics
Livestreams are measured by engagement- whether it’s watched live, or later. How many people took action, such as liking, sharing, or commenting? How many watched all the way through and how many watched for 10 seconds or longer?
Video Series
Are you ready to form a real relationship with your audience through your video content? A video series allows you to take deep dives into a content area, and you can also get creative! Just like the popularity of binge-worthy episodic content in the entertainment arena, there’s no reason why you can’t create binge-worthy content. If you run a nursery (of plants), it would be appropriate to have a gardening show that features planting advice for different times of the year. Just keep in mind, this is not a series of sales videos! It is a series of videos that help your audience in the industry you’re business is based. Hosting the videos directly on your website ensures they will be more apt to explore your website than cat videos on YouTube!
In addition, a video series can be a content marketing gold mine. You can repurpose the content into social media posts, blog articles, and more.
Due to the complexity of this larger video production initiative, this is probably not the time to DIY. You need to have consistency from show to show, and working with the same team and gear every time is a good step in that direction.
You may want to experiment with the show length for a bit. Figure out your messaging first, and then worry about optimizing it to ensure your show is tight, rather than worrying about meeting a specific duration.
Production time
A video series is pretty time-consuming, and it’s advisable to do a lot of time in the pre-production stage to iron out the concept (and how it fits into your brand marketing strategy), figuring out what kind of budget you have for this initiative, and choosing a location for shooting.
You’ll then need to work on a production schedule to ensure that the production team (and anyone who will be appearing on camera) will know what phase of production is happening when, and what they may be responsible for at any given point. Typically, you’ll need at least 4 weeks budgeted, per episode, as a range of time for the different elements of production.
This video will certainly need editing, and the rule of thumb for figuring out how long a video might take to edit is one hour of editing for every minute of finished content. We bill editing by the hour.
Metrics
A series is a long-term investment. It’s built for long-term results. For short-term success, you can use brand awareness metrics (such as views) to prove your concept …and engagement metrics (such as comments and shares) to see if you’re “in the right room” as your audience.
Wrap-up
Hopefully, this helps you best understand the variety of ways you might be able to use video in your business’s communication and marketing strategy. If any of these video types interest you, we’d be happy to talk with you about how to proceed. Just contact us to set up a free consultation.
