Online Video Production

Could online video become the new way to feature your products on your website? I think so. I have recently seen two different ecommerce sites use online video to showcase products. Although done in completely different styles I think they both go to show how online video and internet video marketing are changing the landscape of the internet.

enveme.com has implemented short video clips of their products on each individual products page. By showing models with the product actually on, you can see how the material flows and looks when worn. I know that some product pages allow you to rotate the product and even zoom in on it, but does this really tell you what you want?

The second company that I have seen using online video for their produtcs is WilliamRast.com and should be of no surprise since it is co-owned by Justin Timberlake and features him in the videos. The key to this example is that it's not models walking around or spinning with the product on. The videos are shot in a short film format and feature the companies clothing within each video. This approach is completely outside the box of product showcase but the ability to share the videos gives William Rast a free and quick way for their consumers to share their brand with others.

Check out this Cantaloupe.tv client showcasing their products with online video.

With the price of online video production and distribution continually dropping I look forward to seeing more and more products being presentd to the consumer in this fashion. The creativeness is endless!

If you have ever experienced dowtime at a hosting provider whether you're hosting something as trivial as a personal webiste that only your mom has ever vistited, or something as critical as a enterprise SaaS application that 1 million clients rely on every day, you know how frustrating it can be. No one can deliver 100% uptime, but they get so close that we come to expect it and take it for granted.

What is often the most frustrating is not knowing when the service will come back up or what exactly caused it in the first place. After the fact, these hosting providers are left to figure out how to best make amends with their customers and to restore faith in their hosting abilities.

This is where online video production and internet video marketing can help.

Take for instance Rackspace. Rackspace recently had two outages, one on June 29th and one on July 7th. They responded the best way they could have. They not only fixed the problem and made efforts to ensure that it never happens - they actually took the time to put the CEO on camera to explain this to us.

You can see the video below and also check out this blog post by Lifeline Data Centers.

I have been recently introduced to a website that is taking the college campus tour to a whole new level. YOUniversityTV has brought the college campus tour to online video. With campus tours in all 50 states, universities and colleges are being given the chance to engage with more potential student prospects than ever.

This is the beauty of online video production and online video content management systems, like Cantaloupe's Backlight, becoming easier to use and more affordable.

With the economy in a slump, traveling to tour a college that is 6 states aways is probably out of the question for many soon-to-be college students. With the use of a little internet video marketing and a video content management system YOUniveristyTV is taking the travel out of the equation and bringing the campus tour into the comfort of your home. They have even taken it one step further and are now letting user generated videos to be uploaded to the website, meaning that they are getting free and relevant content that they are then able to distribute.

If you are wondering how your company or organization can utilize online video to help you engage a broader audience contact Cantaloupe or sign up for our Eloupe webinar - Engaging Your Audience the Cantaloupe Way.

Guerrilla filmmaking refers to a form of independent filmmaking characterized by low budgets, skeleton crews, and simple props using whatever is available.

Robert Rodriguez (Desperado, Sin City) made this term notorious by making the film El Mariachi for $7,000, before digital editing made filmmaking cheaper.

These techniques, chronicled in the journal Rebel Without a Crew, have been very useful in the world of web video production.

The 4 steps to Guerrilla Video Production

1. Plan ahead - know what you want and how to get it before you go in
2. Be flexible - anything can and will happen, but you got to keep moving
3. Bring only what you need - equipment is heavy and expensive, do you really need a second light?
4. Get what you need and get out - be efficient, time is money

An average shoot, for me, is about 1-2 hours.  I go in knowing exactly what video and sound I need.  I bring bare bones equipment and staff, usually just one other guy. When we leave a shoot, I have everything we need to put a story together, most of the time.

By doing this, the cost of online video production is decreased dramatically. 

The look, feel and cost of web video is different than standard video production.  Don't get left behind and get stuck paying for it.


Justin Gutwein

Tip #1: Don’t Shoot into Windows
Tip #2: Organic Storytelling
Tip #3: Don't Pick up the Sticks

There's a great post about why advertising will fail over at Techcrunch (of all places). At Cantaloupe.tv, we've often given three reasons ourselves why unscripted, serendipitous, non-commercial like online video production makes sense for the web.

1. It's what viewers want. People don't want to watch commercials on the internet
2. People use the internet to seek the truth. Being unscripted and sincere, authentic web video helps people get at the truth.
3. The internet is about long-term conversations. Interview-style shooting is more practical and cost effective and allows for producing multiple videos.

Compare ours to what business professor Eric Clemons from Wharton has to say about advertising (which very obviously includes online video advertising)

There are three problems with advertising in any form, whether broadcast or online:

• Consumers do not trust advertising. Dan Ariely has demonstrated that messages attributed to a commercial source have much lower credibility and much lower impact on the perception of product quality than the same message attributed to a rating service. Forrester Research has completed studies that show that advertising and company sponsored blogs are the least-trusted source of information on products and services, while recommendations from friends and online reviews from customers are the highest.
  
• Consumers do not want to view advertising. Think of watching network TV news and remember that the commercials on all the major networks are as closely synchronized as possible.  Why?  If network executives believed we all wanted to see the ads they would be staggered, so that users could channel surf to view the ads; ads are synchronized so that users cannot channel surf to avoid the ads.
  
• And mostly consumers do not need advertising. My own research suggests that consumers behave as if they get much of their information about product offerings from the internet, through independent professional rating sites like dpreview.com or community content rating services like Ratebeer.com or TripAdvisor

It's great to see that our indianapolis-based online marketing firm has gotten this message right from day one. We've always been about storytelling and authentic web video, and now we have an online video management software piece to make it that much easier to execute your video strategies.

Tell a story! I just spent some time watching an online video put together by Honda and from a distance it has all the makings of a corporate video...yet I eagerly watched all 5+minutes of it.

I didn't even realize I was sucked in until more than halfway through it.

I asked myself, what's different about this video than most other online video production that comes out of big businesses? It's the running storyline of "kicking out the ladder." It's also the fact that they put real people on camera talking off the cuff. If these employees of Honda are scripted, then they should quit their day jobs and become actors. They're that sincere and convincing.

Yes, Honda probably did pay more to have this one video produced than most of us spend on our entire video marketing strategy but that mainly shows up in some flashy camera effects that most of us don't notice anyway (one of my video producers pointed out that they're using some slow motion equipment that we don't have). They also have the advantage of showing some cool crash testing.

Other than that, it's mostly just people talking on camera telling a cool story.

People at your company can do that right? Before you say no, just listen next time they're talking about the latest episode of Lost, American Idol, or The Office. Everyone is a storyteller, even if they're retelling someone else's story.

Here's the video:



(By the way, there's also a shout out to Greensburg, Indiana at about the 2 minutes to go mark.)

It was a monumental week in our household.  Thanksgiving was great and we survived the 10 hour drive to Washington, D.C. with 3 young children in the car.  But, when I use the word 'monumental,' it is because, after many months of waiting, my oldest daughter Ellen finally lost her first tooth.  The event unfolded on the night before Thanksgiving.  We spent most of the day in the car with Ellen wiggling that tooth.   My husband and I had been nervous because we were fearful that this blessed FIRST tooth would come out in her sleep or it would fall out at school and it would get lost. (I shutter to think of what might happen if this prize were to get lost.)  As it happened, 15 minutes after we arrived at our location, Ellen was showing the entire family the tooth.  And, as sure as anything, with a captive audience, out it popped and in to the safe hands of my husband. Everyone hugged her and it was an exciting moment.  This was great because we shared this 'event' with the family and managed to save this treasure.

This whole event highlights the importance of timing.  In business (and life) timing is everything.  Being at the right place at the right time or simply knowing how to use your time is critical.  My view of web video is that it needs to capture real actions and real events.  That is why online video production is different than more traditional "corporate" video production.  Capturing the essence of a moment versus staging something makes it more believable. And, when you looking at internet video marketing this mantra of believability is even more critical.  I don't look on-line for voice overs and scripts.  I look for entertaining content.  I want to experience the tooth falling out or hear the CEO talk about how his mother inspired him/her for greatness.  That is what web video is for- communicating real emotions and events. You can experiment more with your messaging and approach because it is affordable and interesting.  Web video stories should be an important tool for any business or organization communicating with a relevant constituency.  That is what real versus staged video offers.

In case you were wondering, the Tooth Fairy did find Ellen and her face, when she realized it the next morning, was priceless. 

As anyone from Indiana can tell you, we're teeming with great universities in the Hoosier state. I won't begin to mention them for fear of leaving one out, but you'd be hard pressed to find another state with so many notable public and private institutions for higher education, each of them being known for their strength in a particular field.
One such school, Ball State University, has a communications program that's achieved much notoriety (and not just because late night tv show host David Letterman graduated from there).

At Cantaloupe.tv we're particularly interested in what they're doing with web video, a category within their emerging media studies. The latest is a series of student produced "webisodes" called "Evenly Odd."

"Webisode" refers to a type of online streaming video or if you prefer, online tv media, and as you probably guessed, it derives from combining "web" and "episode." (a naming technique I just found out that's referred to as a "portmanteau". Yes, despite my video ties I'm a geek for words)

Webisodes are essentially what we're creating when we create videos for online video magazines. The difference in the naming is that we liken our web video production to magazines, while "webisode" users prefer the tv metaphor.

It's great to see Ball State empower their students with skills for web video production, which will undoubtedly prove valuable in what is truly an emerging media. I wouldn't doubt that by the time these students have a foothold in their careers, online video production and online video will be the norm, and cable tv will be a relic of the past.

A lot of our clients ask me how they can improve their Video Magazines email open rates and click-thru rates and my first question back to them is always "What does your email database look like?"

When we start taking a closer look, we usually find out that the database has never been cleansed, a large portion of the subscribers are not truly opted in, and that none of them are segmented for relevance.

When I tell them that the best way to improve their numbers is deleting many of the unengaged subscribers, they cower in complete fear. Which is odd, because I think they should be jumping for joy that it's that easy.

I get their concern but their logic is flawed. It is NOT better to keep an unengaged subscriber in your database "just in case" they see one of your emails and become reengaged and here's why DOING SO ONLY MAKES IT MORE DIFFICULT TO REACH PEOPLE WHO ARE ACTUALLY ENGAGED.

I put it in all caps because it is so important to get that point. You damage your email reputation every time you take that small chance, which means you're more likely to end up in the SPAM folders of your true subscribers.

You may look at me and say "his expertise is in online video production, what does he know about email?" Well, our primary mode of distributing our clients' web video is through email, but still, don't take my word for it. Check out this article from BtoB on "How do I prevent my emails from being labeled as SPAM?

The most important is of course number one:

Maintain a clean list by handling bounces properly and scrubbing your list regularly. Scrubbing includes removing duplicates, suppressing distribution accounts (e.g., info@ or sales@) and removing inactive addresses with no opens or clicks in the last 12 months.

A report put together by Convio, Sea Change Strategies and Edge Research tells fundraising professionals that they need to pay special attention to online video marketing. The report titled "The Wired Wealthy: Using the Internet to Connect to your Middle and Major Donors says:

5. Pay Special Attention to Video
Maybe this is the single exception to recommendation four. Relationship Seekers are heavy users of online video and express significant interest in seeing more. Hire a professional producer, and ask a test group of donors what they think before launching to a wider audience. No single video is going to change everything; a series of modestly produced short videos will get more mileage than one blockbuster. Most “viral videos” never go “viral.” Don’t measure success merely by looking at how many times a video has been viewed. The real measure is whether the right people – your wired wealthy Relationship Seekers – have seen it, and whether it has inspired them.

For those who prefer bullet points, the key takeaways are:

• Even with online video production, you should hire a professional
• It's better to do multiple, shorter, "modestly produced" stories than to do one expensive, flashy video. You'll use them more.
• As far as video tracking and video analytics, you need to look beyond number of views. It's about WHO saw the video, not just HOW MANY
• Finally, viral marketing does not mean getting millions of hits. It means making something contagious in the true sense of one to one marketing.

To Cantaloupe, this isn't news. It's exactly how our Video Magazines were designed to be utilized. Multiple videos, modestly produced for long term conversations directed at the right permission-based audience.

Those familiar with traditional video production might be surprised to know that we don't use scripts or storyboards here at Cantaloupe. These former staples are painfully time consuming and costly, not to mention they tend to reek "staged commercial."

So are scripts and storyboards still necessary? No. And this is part of the innovation the internet has brought to digital video production.

Traditionalists might wonder how then, do you plan a story with any predictable result? The answer is not in scripting and editing it's in the interview-style of shooting. We rely on the expertise and knowledge of your people, partners, and clients (indisputably the best people for telling your authentic story). They don't need to read a script to know what needs to be said. They have the script in their head, and they've rehearsed it a thousand times - that is every time they have talked to a prospect, explained to a friend what they do, helped a customer, or justified their reason for buying from you.

There is still planning involved, but it focuses on the indispensable components of the story rather than the details. It focuses on the core message, the key characters, the high-level talking points, the locations, the big take-away, and the vision. This is the essence of our story development process.

Scripting and storyboarding still has its place with tv shows, movies, and commercials, but when it comes to web video production where authenticity is expected and highly valued, scripting and storyboarding is just overkill.

It’s not hard to find information on the internet about shooting video and posting it to the web. Here is one site I find particularly comprehensive and informative:
University of Texas Web Video Guidelines

As you read the intro to the document you realize this document exists because of the discontent with the quality of “do-it-yourselfers.” Most people just aren't happy with the quality of web video.

While Cantaloupe is against (as a general rule) super-produced, expensive, flashy video, we believe the video needs to look professional, and it needs to be of higher quality than what an amateur videographer can produce. The integration of video on websites also needs to look professional - this is especially true for organizations and businesses.

Do you really have the time or the experience to do this yourself? Wouldn’t you rather hand off this work to a trusted party and focus more time on your business strategy?

The point is, it often seems cheaper to do online video production yourself, but it’s difficult to see the dollars you pay in loss productivity, added stress, and diminished result.

By selling only one product, video magazines, Cantaloupe has developed efficiencies and expertise around internet video marketing that allow us to deliver a higher quality product at a cheaper cost.  Look around, you'll find few website video firms (although you'll find plenty that offer either video production or web video technology) and even less that  offer  authentic storytelling.

Okay, the original quote is, “ Filmmaking is a chance to live many lifetimes,” from the director Robert Altman. I read it in a book and jotted it down years ago.

In the last 7 months since starting with Cantaloupe I have found my memorable quote  very true. Everyday I man a camera, and with my oversized headphones I listen to stories. I hear about salesmen’s successes, cancer survivors’ courage , community workers’ passions,  and politicians’ agendas. The list goes on and on. Granted these stories aren’t autobiographies but they are glimpses into people’s lives. Salesmen teach me how to market my company, cancer survivors remind me how important family is, community workers motivate me to volunteer and politicians motivate me to vote.  The stories allow me to relate to people and experience the world from their position.

Granted the theater is a powerful medium and a 3 minute story may not reflect a lifetime however don’t underestimate online video. Cantaloupe's videos are powerful. They delivers a glimpse of someone’s life and influences me and anyone willing to click play.

Hi everyone, welcome to my first blog EVER.  I've never blogged before so I'm going to take this opportunity to talk all about myself.  Everything from Indonesia, web video production and my epiphany when I started working at Cantaloupe.TV  I'll get the boring stuff out of the way first.

I have been working in digital video production since my junior year in IUPUI's New Media program.  While there, I focused on all different types of digital media production. I worked in web design, 3D animation, video production, streaming video etc.  At the end of my college career I had to come up with a project that told a story.  We could use any of the skills we had honed while in college in any combination we wanted.

Some of our crazy ideas:

An online interactive roller coaster experience
3D animation about a kid trying to create every digital image possible
An Interactive Marketing Kiosk for a restaurant

All of these ideas sounded exciting but the possibility for STORY in each project sounded less appealing than what we ended up doing.  I decided to travel to Indonesia (with 2 video classes under my belt) and interview survivors of the 2005 Tsunami that killed over 250,000 people.  While I was in Indonesia my project partner started working on the website that would house the video stories I collected.  

This project, called notseennotheard.com, ended up being used as an internet video marketing tool for the not-for-profit we were working with. (island-aid.org)  They were able to use it to show their donors the types of people they were helping.  We had to use streaming video because Island-Aid's donors were all over the world and hard copies such as DVD or simple text emails just wouldn't work to get the message across.  We wanted a way to capture the real emotion and strife of those affected by the tsunami and effectively have people view these stories. Viral web video was the only way to do it.  

Our greatest accomplishment was using the website as an avenue for people to donate money so two little girls in a remote mountain village could get surgery.  Without telling the stories of these two little girls, Erinawati and Soteria, they may still be living with debilitating burn scars that covered half of their bodies.

Here are a few things I learned after completing the project:

EVERYONE has a story
Video on Websites works

These were important lessons starting out in my journey towards finding my first post college job but my real lesson was yet to come.

By chance, I met Jon DiGregory (founder of Cantaloupe.TV), and my esteemed boss) and he explained his concept of a Video Magazine.  We talked about the world of online video advertising, online marketing, viral marketing etc. and my eyes were opened.  Just when I thought throwing a little video on websites was good enough I realized I had a lot to learn.  Thus begins my journey in online video production and working for Cantaloupe.TV

You can look forward to my future blogs probably being about myself just like this one.  I'll try to entertain you, tell truthful stories, maybe throw in some useful information and I hope you'll keep reading on an ongoing basis.  

DISCLAIMER:
If you want to be entertained by riveting stories about things you are interested in this blog is only a mediocre resource.  Do yourself a favor and go find a video blog if you want compelling emotional content.  

THANKS!!! and keep reading!

Zachary Nischan Shields

My oldest daughter, Ellen, LOVES stories.  She has quite an imagination and I always seem to find myself making up stories for her.  Most of them include princesses and flying horses.

It makes me feel like a bad mom, but sometimes I get annoyed trying to think up stories to satisfy her hunger for a fantastic tale.  The frustration comes from having to "make up" a story versus telling one that really happened.  Fantasy makes sense in many venues.  But, in the world of online video production where web videos are becoming commonplace, fantasy stories don't always make sense. 

The internet is a forum in which normal folks, like me, can go to get good, seemingly objective, information.  Commercials are for TV.  The "truth" is found on the internet.  So, when I talk to people about online video production I steer them toward telling real stories with real people.  No scripts...no actors...just life.

My daughter is looking for fantasy.  So, I try, with all my weird story lines, to deliver.  But most folks don't want the tale of the princess who was trapped by a ogre and rescued by her sister who flew in on a unicorn.  They go on-line looking for the truth.  I find that much easier to deliver and luckily my job is helping people to find and tell those real stories.

As a person heavily involved in the marketing at Cantaloupe, I'm here to tell you that producing video magazines can actually be an easier (and in case I need to say it better) alternative to writing a bunch of text for your website.

Don't believe me? Well have you ever tried to write text for your website? Unless you're one of the fortunate few trained in writing copy, I'm sure you agree it's hard. It's hard to be both concise and precise with your online marketing message - not to mention, trying to be engaging.

What tone should I use? Does this accurately reflect what we do? Is this too long for anyone to even bother reading? Will this make sense to other people? Am I being too technical? Not technical enough? Does this stay true to our brand?

Now, if you're still thinking of traditional video production, then you're right, traditional video production is much more difficult than writing text. You essentially have to write the text (scripts)  AND find competent people to deliver the message exactly as you've written it.

However, when you talk about online video production, that is, the type of unscripted, serendipitous storytelling that Cantaloupe does, conveying what you do, what your people are like, and what your brand is suddenly becomes much easier. That's because you let the people around you - your colleagues, customers, partners, etc. - deliver your message in their own words. In essence, they shoulder some of the work.

Sound scary? It shouldn't be. These people are experts in your business, and their collective expression of your story and message will always be more accurate than your one, not to mention more authentic and believable.

The other thing that makes video easier than text is that you can call on Cantaloupe to provide the normally difficult aspects of video production (like story development, shooting, and editing).

I'll be the first to admit that video doesn't ALWAYS beat text, but next time you try to become the Hemingway of website copy, ask yourself if video might not be a better medium. It's easier and more cost effective than you might think.