John Cecil – Author – Online Video Revolution – Available on Amazon 

Hi! This is John Cecil and this is video 2 in my eight part series “8 Golden Rules For Online Video Success.”

Rule #2: Quality is Key.

You need video content on your website. It’s important that your video looks good and portrays a professional image for your company.

We are suggesting you have a high quality, highly produced video for your online video marketing efforts. Look, if you use a camcorder in your mom’s basement and have a low quality video, your website, your brand and your company will all look amateur.

Your company needs professional footage. You want to distinguish your brand from the quick and free content uploaded daily via YouTube. Hiring a professional multimedia expert makes good sense. You will get content, guidance, industry experience and be led step-by-step through best practices to put your dollars to the best possible work for you.

On the other hand, you may decide it’s important to your organization to shoot footage on-site. If you choose to do this, make sure you’ve got top-grade equipment. It will be a worthwhile investment with good pay off – when you do it. Good equipment will enhance the professionalism of your content and provide your company’s brand to viewers in the best manner possible. Content is for the exclusive use of your viewers because you will create it to help them get educated about your product or service and receive information necessary to make their buying decisions. It doesn’t have to break the bank, sink the budget or put your CFO in shock.

And remember, online content is for online viewers, offline content is for offline viewers. Do your organization a favor and keep them separate. The two are not generally intermingled successfully.

So why not go for a high end video? I believe you’ll see the results with higher conversions. Put in as much time and effort as you do in your graphics, the design, and the communication that you have on your website.

Remember, quality is key for good conversions using online video.

Read more about online video and the 8 Golden Rules For Online Video Success in Online Video Revolution: How to Reinvent and Market Your Business Using Video by John Cecil, available  on Amazon.

John Cecil – Author – Online Video Revolution – Available on Amazon 

Eight Golden Rules For Online Video Success

Rule #1: Keep It Simple!

Your online video content allows viewers to educate themselves about your product or service.  Your intent is to increase your sales conversions by turning prospects into buyers.

Don’t go overboard with your video. People are always trying to go way too long, way too broad. You’re not looking to win an Academy Award. You’re simply looking to communicate you’re company’s message with your online video.

This means don’t:

-produce confusing content for your viewers to watch

-have longer than necessary video length

-include multiple messages, unneeded information or other content that can distract them from your primary purpose.

When your content is short and specific you’ll find that customers will be moved to the next step in your sales cycle.  Video that is 60-seconds or shorter has the best success rate for informing, educating and engaging web viewers.

Not enough time to get your message across, right?  Ask viewers to take one step per video. If you have 5 minutes of video and you need to explain to your customer what your product is, create 5 videos.

Look at your sales process:  Does that first step need to be filling out a lead form, clicking or picking up the phone for a freebie, signing up for a newsletter?  Your viewers are online viewing your message, and at the same time, they are conducting other activities.  Multi-tasking is the norm as attention spans have decreased with online messages of many sorts.

I encourage clients to create engaging, relevant content specifically for highly distracted viewers that gives them the highlights of a particular product or service.  Those that are receptive to this guidance see an incline in sales conversions when monitoring their statistics.  Those that resist tips for best practices, well, they are not so happy with the sales conversions created by the too-much-at-one-time content they serve their customers.

Bottom line: Don’t go too long; keep the script short and concise. Get to the point and keep your video simple.

Read more about online video and the 8 Golden Rules For Online Video Success in Online Video Revolution: How to Reinvent and Market Your Business Using Video by John Cecil, available  on Amazon.

John Cecil – Author – Online Video Revolution – Available on Amazon

TV Spots and pre-roll advertising: What is the connection?

What kind of videos should you create for your pre-roll advertising?

A lot of companies come to us and ask us for advice on how they should use video in their ads. And as you know, pre-roll is actually the predominant form of online video advertising happening on the web today.

What’s happening is that most customers are polarizing by using their television spots as their pre-roll advertising. And this is a broken model. We’re saying, “Don’t use your TV spots as pre-roll, but use original, created content for your pre-roll advertising. So this goes back to the abandonment issue that we’ve talked about and people watching on a smaller screen are different than someone watching on TV.

Why are people using TV spots as their pre-roll? Part of it is laziness. And what we’re saying is what you need to do, if you’re actually producing a television spot, schedule an extra day or maybe two extra days to focus on solely on pre-roll. You can connect pre-roll to that ad and run sort of extensions of the ad or create ads specifically for your pre-roll efforts. So for example, an advertiser could be running their pre-roll on a site that has to do with environmentally sensitive content. And you obviously wouldn’t want to run a certain kind of content on that page.

So think about pre-roll. You can now target by subject and genre, just like you can with television ads. So don’t think about just placing your television spot in that place. Create content specifically, not only for your company and for the medium of pre-roll, but think about the environment, the webpage, the subject that that pre-roll will be running on and get as targeted as possible.

Look, after the Super Bowl I saw at least 10 spots that I saw 2 days before. And I look at those advertisers and I say they’re really missing an opportunity here. Pre-roll is not that great. They call it an interruptive form of advertising, but there’s actually a great video opportunity if you create video content specifically for your pre-roll advertising.

John Cecil – Author – Online Video Revolution – Available on Amazon

Transcription:

Use the power of the play button, the universally recognized play video button, for your online video marketing efforts. Your customers recognize what that play button is. That the universally recognized play button on websites gets higher clicks. More people are clicking on that than just a normal graphic, or text link, or something on your website. We’re seeing great click rates off the play buttons so use the power of the play button all over your website for your online marketing.

Email

If you do a lot of email, use a play button in your HTML graphic. So when someone opens up your email, they see the play button, they click on it, and they actually go to a new page where the video will play on automatically. We’re seeing after the open rate, the click through rate on an email is almost twice as great if you didn’t have a play button.

So as you know, you can’t put video in the body of an email. But if you use a play button in your creative, people will be more likely to click to the page, and hopefully see a video that they are going to watch to the very last frame for an increased conversion.

E-commerce

Are you using video in your e-commerce efforts? If so, don’t forget to put the play button in the check out process. So when a user gets to the check out page, right next to the description of a product, have that play button play video for more information. We’re finding that people want to find out and see a video of that product, and if they do, use the play button to encourage them to click on it and learn more about the product they are thinking of buying. If we get people to watch that video, we’re more likely to get them to make a conversion, or a sale, on that particular checkout page.

Advertisers

Advertisers, don’t forget to use the play button in all your ads as well. Banners, buttons, skyscrapers. Have a play button and you’re more likely o get a click and send that traffic to a page where the video plays automatically.

Don’t forget to use the power of the universally recognized play button for your online video conversion efforts.

Advertising, or “legalized lying” according to H.G Wells, has always attracted a poor reputation because of its dark history of deception. Today, advertising is often venerated as a modern art form, but it seems to me that the truly outstanding adverts, the ones that garner the most attention online tell us something possibly worse than lies, they tell us…nothing.

While this hybridised combination of branded entertainment, or ‘Advertainment‘ has its place in your video marketing strategy, it’s more likely to drive fans than sales. Online video is a gift to a modern business, it’s the window in to your company for the millions of faceless disconnected consumers out there who would like to do business with you, but first, need some reassurance. To do so, video allows businesses to humanise their company, create genuine relationships with customers and accurately promote their product but the latter objective often becomes skewed, shaped by years of exposure to regular advertising.

On the limitless world wide web, videos are not constrained by the traditional 30-second ad spot and so there’s no reason for rhetoric, lofty metaphors, devious elliptical edits or special effects when it comes to promoting your product honestly. Despite the growth of online shopping customers, and especially new customers, need reassurance when buying from you. A simple visual demonstration of your product working as you promise is the ultimate technique to converting those wary purchasers.

However, a simple demonstration video does have the capacity for creativity. By way of example, take a look at the renowned Blendtec marketing strategy, the poster boy for online demonstration videos. Blendtec is the epitome of a consumer product, and when launched by founder Tom Dickson, it boasted that it could “blend anything”. This instantly sounds like the advertising rhetoric we’re used to, and under other circumstances would not convince any mildly sceptical consumer. However, the Blendtec videos embrace one simple concept; demonstrating their USP.

In the resulting campaign, Will it Blend? the USP is tested and demonstrated to the extreme, successfully blending iPhones, DVDs, golf clubs, gaming consoles and more. This approach keeps the content and the brand entertaining, shareable, current but most importantly, authentic. This tactic has built up a brand fan base, video views topping 218 million, and simultaneously elevates its product way above its competitors with these simple, but extreme demonstrations.

It’s a great strategy to follow in order to sell your product or service, and one that as marketers we’ve largely forgotten. Instead, the allure of viral videos, entertaining mass audiences and racking up social statistics has skewed our objectives and we’ve neglected the simple idea that demonstrating the quality of your product is key to converting sales. Furthermore, if you’re creative like Blendtec, why not have it all?

Ryan Stone is an online video producer and marketer for video production company, Lambda Films and founder of online video marketing blog, Retina Burn. If you have any questions then tweet him at @Lambda_Ry.

John Cecil – Author – Online Video Revolution – Available on Amazon

Like a cookie falling on the floor has a five second rule to be eaten, your web site has a ten second rule to be consumed. And let the chips fall where they may (pun badly intended), if your web cookie is not tasty enough to engage your visitor in the first ten seconds, you’ve lost ‘em!

We live in an era of TMI (Too Much Information), too many options, too many distractions, too much to do; too many companies trying to get your attention, too much noise and chatter on the web.

But you, you’ve done your homework, your web site is optimized to get them to your door, it’s laid out so the user can instantly access the information they need, it’s easy to read, has dynamic content and, of course a call to action video. It does right? Because if it doesn’t, you’ve probably lost them already.

According to a study by Visible Measures,
• 20 % of online video viewers click away from a video in the first 10 seconds

• 33% move on at 30 seconds

• 60% are long gone if you hit the 2 minute mark

This statistic is further aggravated by the fact that if the video you do have is hosted on an public server (like YouTube) the chances of them clicking and watching ten seconds of your video, and then that of your competitors video on YouTube is highly likely.

Congratulations, you have spent all that time and money to better the world’s knowledge on your company’s line of expertise, but unfortunately, not converting that information into a sale.

Video is not going away, in fact, in a 2010 report from Cisco, 30% of Internet Traffic was currently video. By 2013, 90% of Internet traffic will be video.

Video is a compelling way to engage your audience, build trust, show products and services, and generate leads, within seconds. But don’t wait for the wave to hit and wash away your cookies and milk, get ahead of the curve, host your video on a site with an intelligent interface, great analytics, and trackable conversion. And I would suggest you do it before the milk spoils.

John Cecil – Author – Online Video Revolution – Available on Amazon

Testing Tips for Online Video!

Most companies test their landing pages against one another to search for better conversions. But no one tests with video. Why not? We’re saying that if you’re doing testing, you should be testing video against video to get and look for better conversions.

In every case we’ve seen where there’s a test, one video outperforms the other. So here’s four basic things you can do to start testing your videos online.

Number One: Talent VS Talent
So a lot of people use either the company CEO or an actor in their video. Test that talent against each other, you’ll always find a winner from a conversion standpoint. Male VS female. Company CEO VS an actress. Test the talent against each other and see how your customers are reacting to their communication with your video.

Number Two: Check Wardrobe
We test colors all the time on landing pages. Red VS blue. We’re seeing the same things happening on online videos when talent is wearing different wardrobe, different colors. You can get as intricate as running different wardrobes against each other and testing out against one another.

Number Three: Script VS Script
We look at long scripts VS short scripts, using different words, and using different things along those lines. Your changing copy on your site to increase your conversions, you should change the copy in your video and test it against each other to see if it works.

Number Four: User Initiated VS Non-User Initiated
This is basically if someone goes to your site does the video start playing automatically or does the user have to click on it to start playing the video? We know best-case scenario you’re going to get about a 15% click through on the video on your site. Meaning that 85% of the people won’t see the content in your video. So you need to test this against each other to see if the video actually works, if more people are watching it VS if they have to click on it.

These are four simple ways you can start testing your online video. There’s hundreds of ways to do it but start with these four for better conversion results.

Creating a playlist with Oculu is simple. To create a playlist, simply insert the following code into your page. Replace the ID numbers with your corresponding company ID and video numbers.

If you have any further questions or concerns, please contact us at support@oculu.com or 1 888-966-2858.

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://www.oculu.com/im4/im_initiate.php?user_id=1234567"></script>
<div id="im_box_ep" style="width: 640px; height: 360px;"></div>

<script type="text/javascript">
function im_is_loaded_ep(options) {
if( typeof im_done != "undefined" ) { im_auto_ep( options ); }
else { setTimeout( "im_is_loaded_ep( { video_id: 111111 } )", 100 ); }
}
im_is_loaded_ep({ video_id:111111 });
</script>
<script type="text/javascript">
function im_process_end_asset( video_id ) {
if( video_id == 1111111 ) im_play_ep({ video_id:22222 });
else if( video_id == 22222 ) im_play_ep({ video_id:33333 });
else if( video_id == 33333 ) im_play_ep({ video_id:44444 });
else if( video_id == 44444 ) im_play_ep({ video_id:55555 });
else if( video_id == 55555 ) im_play_ep({ video_id:66666 });
else if( video_id == 66666 ) return false;
}
</script>

if you want to use the new code replace this part:

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://www.oculu.com/im4/im_initiate.php?user_id=1234567"></script> with this: <script type="text/javascript">
if(location.protocol=="https:"){
document.write('<script src="https://www.oculu.com/im4/im_initiate_v1.php?user_id=12345678&folder_number=xx"><\/script>');
}if(location.protocol=="http:"){
document.write('<script src="http://www.oculu.com/im4/im_initiate_v1.php?user_id=12345678&folder_number=xx"><\/script>');
}
</script>

with this:

<script type="text/javascript">
if(location.protocol=="https:"){
document.write('<script src="https://www.oculu.com/im4/im_initiate_v1.php?user_id=12345678&folder_number=xx"><\/script>');
}if(location.protocol=="http:"){
document.write('<script src="http://www.oculu.com/im4/im_initiate_v1.php?user_id=12345678&folder_number=xx"><\/script>');
}
</script>

this code can be found in dashboard take note that the videos you want to have a playlist must be
place in one folder. if not use this script:

<script type="text/javascript">
if(location.protocol=="https:"){
document.write('<script src="https://www.oculu.com/im4/im_initiate_v1.php?user_id=12345678&folder_number=0"><\/script>');
}if(location.protocol=="http:"){
document.write('<script src="http://www.oculu.com/im4/im_initiate_v1.php?user_id=12345678&folder_number=0"><\/script>');
}
</script>

John Cecil – Author – Online Video Revolution – Available on Amazon

Does your company have a video room?

We’re seeing more and more companies build a small little video production area within an office or somewhere in their building to shoot video. Look, you have rooms with graphic designers and people on Macs creating content for you, why not video?

So an example would be is one of our bigger clients, which is a hospital, actually has created a room in the basement of their facility where the doctors come in and shoot video, the CEO gives messages. It just gives them the ability to create mass video content to communicate to their customers.

Think about creating a video room within your organization just like you have graphic designers and different creatives creating content for your marketing efforts.