Marketing is all about getting noticed, getting remembered, and motivating people to action. Whether it’s a website, display ad, or video, it must first grab people’s attention, it must stop the viewer from going on to the next website, turning the magazine page, or clicking the stop button. In order to accomplish that increasingly difficult task, you must understand the Caricature Effect.

The Caricature Effect

The Caricature Effect simply stated says that what we notice is variation from the norm. Caricature artists exaggerate reality because that is how we visually distinguish one person from another. Human beings are preprogrammed to look for patterns and variations in those patterns, it’s how we recognize who people are, and it is a basic survival mechanism that helps us recognize danger and distinguish friend from foe.

By distorting an individual’s prominent facial features the caricature artist mimics the human brain’s way of remembering who’s who. Our brains are not cameras that take pictures and file them away for future reference. Our memories are malleable, they change and alter over time and experience, and as a result the things we remember best are the things that stand out, things like Bob Hope’s ski-jump nose or Albert Einstein’s wild white hair. The reason caricatures are so effective is because they emphasize the distinguishing differences that we recognize and remember. So how do we use this fundamental, hard-wired human characteristic to further marketing agendas?

What We Notice Is Variation From The Norm

Getting noticed is job-one of any marketing vehicle, so in order to get people to stop, look, and listen we need to use all the available communication elements at our disposal.

When developing a video campaign we use concepts that demand the mental processing of information by shocking, stimulating, puzzling, or tickling the funny bone of the viewer. These techniques force the audience to think, process, and decode the message, and by generating this mental activity we embed our client’s message in the audience’s consciousness. Depending on the brand and/or product, implementation can range from subtle to obvious with the trick being to make people sit-up and take notice by forcing them to think.

Pattern Recognition – The Same But Different

Human beings have evolved to watch for patterns and when an audience recognizes a familiar scenario they leap to a conclusion. It’s a way of making quick decisive decisions that can either help or hurt communication. Properly used pattern recognition can lead your audience where you want to take them, but if the pattern is too obvious or hackneyed, it can lead to viewers dismissing your message.

Let’s face-it, consumers have become increasingly jaded by too many ads that yell at them like a Billy Mays commercial, or promise improbable results like so many diet schemes, or scare the hell out of people with legal disclaimers warning of everything from headaches to heart attacks like most prescription drug ads. These feeble attempts to standout like a pair of John Daley golf slacks only succeed in reminding the audience how completely desperate, or disengaged the advertiser really is.

If you want people to remember your message you have to alter the pattern by varying from the norm so that it forces people to mentally process your information. It’s as simple as a story with a twist like how a comedian sets-up a punch line, or how a magician sets-up an illusion.

In other articles I’ve written extensively about techniques for using video but here let’s discuss something even more universal – photography. It is one of the most economical ways to create the kind of mental stimulation that makes people remember your site and your message.

Photo-Visual Engagement Techniques

Most every website has photography of some sort on it, but like most video implementations, it is rarely used to its full potential. Obviously, do-it-yourself snapshots reek of amateurism but even professional royalty-free images can be as innocuous as DIY snaps are unprofessional, and as we have stated, bland, featureless images are just not going to stimulate anyone’s memory.

Cinegraphs

Cinegraphs are photographs that move. They are created by combining a series of still images into a gif animation. The best cinegraphs use subtle movement like hair or clothing blowing in the wind to cause the audience to take a second look. What appears at first to be a regular photograph creates a ”Did I just see it move?” reaction, and that’s the kind of subtle yet powerful feature that can get people to remember your site, your product, and your brand.

Like any technique you have to know how and when to use it in order to enhance your presentation and reinforce your message. Just parachuting in a technique for technique’s sake is no better than a meaningless royalty free image used as filler.

Sequence Images

A sequence image is a still image that combines a series of images into one photo. Unlike cinegraphs, the image doesn’t move but it does provide a kinetic quality by showing a series of varying poses all combined into one photograph. This kind of image can be very striking and powerful and can cause your viewer to take a moment to decode the story it tells.

Selective Color

Color is another area that often gets forgotten. Different colors have different psychological effects depending on the context in which they are used. In addition to the color choice, using color as a consistent marketing communication element helps enhance and embed your identity and brand image. Many Internet entrepreneurs pay little or no attention to color imaging and it is really unfortunate as it is often an inexpensive but effective way of making a profound impression.

Photographs today are generally full color images but if you’re not controlling the color in your images then you’re missing a great opportunity to make a memorable impression. Of course lack of color (black and white photography) can be just as powerful if used properly. Jack Daniel’s is a brand that uses black and white and selective color extensively in its marketing.

There are several ways to use selective color in your photographic imaging. Jack Daniel’s uses a lot of black backgrounds or B&W photos and copy combined with color product shots of the bottle that has a B&W label but is filled with the golden elixir.

Another effective implementation of selective color is a B&W photograph that has been adjusted so that part of it is in color. For example, a clothing designer might want a black and white photograph of a model but with the dress she is wearing in color so that the garment stands out and not the model.

Illustrated Photos

Combining a photograph with a drawing can be a very effective way to make a unique impression on your website visitors. British film director Alfred Hitchcock used a similar technique for the introduction to his 1950’s television show, where he’d walk on set to lineup with a simple background drawing of his unique and readily recognizable profile. It is a classic example of the Caricature Effect that combines an actual caricature with a photo thereby creating a clever signature style. The image of Hitchcock lining up with his caricature outline is an enduring image of the director that is still recognized more than a half a century later.

It’s The Differences That People Remember

These examples are only a few of the ways Internet entrepreneurs can use the Caricature Effect to enhance their image and embed their brand in the minds of their audience. Whether it’s a display ad, video, a website, or even the design of the product itself, the thing to keep in mind is that it’s the differences that people remember.

Are you ready to engage your web audience?

If so, pick up the phone and call us at +1 905.764.1246. We can help give your business the edge it needs to succeed on the web.

Getting Noticed On The Web is a post from: MRPwebmedia Articles

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The companies that make a real impact in the marketplace are not the ones that produce what people think they want, but rather the ones that produce what people will want but don’t know it.

The ability to know what people will want before they know it exists is not a result of intensive market research, focus groups, or telemarketing surveys. Knowing what people want is based on understanding the human condition: the motivating factors that move people from disinterest to action. Steve Jobs was unrelenting in this philosophy and it resulted in changing the computer, music, movie, and telecommunication industries and more significantly how people live, work, communicate, relax, and in some ways, think.

‘Make A Dent In The Universe’ – Steve Jobs

This is not an approach taught in business schools or self-help marketing courses designed for business neophytes. An entire industry of self-help consultants has exploded on the Internet, all designed to produce mediocrity, all based on rational analysis of what was, rather than what will be. Not many will buy into this alternate approach but that is what makes those who do, so special.

Conventional Wisdom Breeds Mediocrity

Inventing the next big thing in and of itself is not good enough for you to make that dent in the universe. Those who ultimately profit from innovation are not necessarily those who invent it. History is littered with sad stories of entrepreneurs who lacked the ability to implement and communicate their vision to the masses. You have to know how to execute, communicate, convince, and brand your vision in the minds of your audience.

Xerox may have developed the original concept of a graphical user interface and mouse, and they may have had the resources to dominate the future computer market; but they myopically saw themselves as a copier company, and instead chose to turn over the keys to the kingdom to Apple for a relatively small investment stake; much to the chagrin of the Xerox researchers who created the original technology.

The Xerox strategy was textbook business school think – stick to what you do. It’s not so much that the concept is wrong, it’s that the concept must be reinterpreted for a business environment where traditional corporate culture and methodology doesn’t understand, and can’t keep up with the pace of new technologies, and the new forms of competition they breed.

History Repeats But Some Never Learn

When Xerox realized their miscalculation they tried to capitalize on their original research by creating their own computer, but they failed because they lacked the vision needed to implement something that would spark the public’s imagination. Kodak, Polaroid, and the movie and music industries have all succumbed to the same lack of vision.
Where Xerox was run by professional managers who relied on conventional wisdom and traditional methods of operation and decision-making, the Macintosh division of Apple was run by a virtual cult leader who did whatever it took to bring his vision to market.

It’s not that Apple didn’t have the same corporate managers and engineers within the organization, they did, but their efforts resulted in the failed Lisa computer, leaving Jobs to lead his band of Silicon Valley pirates to something truly innovative. But the genius of Macintosh would never have made an impact without Jobs’ steadfast focus on excellence, and his Rasputin-like communicative powers.

The Board of Directors, all experienced corporate executives, even tried to kill the famous 1984 Super Bowl commercial that introduced the Macintosh. The commercial is not only regarded as one of the most influential commercials ever made, but just as importantly, it established the metaphorical language and positioning grammar of a revolutionary brand.

The Grammar of Communication

In order to make an impact and create an identity for your NBT (next big thing) you need to develop a written, oral, and visual language that expresses, explains, and describes the fundamental emotional value proposition your brand delivers.

Every aspect of your business from product, packaging, and logo design, to website layout, iconography, and copy, to photographic and video presentation must all speak with the same voice, the same style, and with the same enthusiastic visionary assurance. You need to develop a brand patois that says: this is who we are, this is what we can do to fulfill your desires, and this is why you need us.

Finding Your Brand Communication Mojo

Tom Derresteijn, partner in Studio Dumbar writes on his website visual-branding dot com about a variety of concepts that help focus marketing attention: inside-out thinking, paradox, and fragmentation.

Inside-out versus Outside-in Thinking

What we have been describing thus far is what Derresteijn refers to as inside-out thinking as opposed to conventional corporate outside-in thinking.

Most business professionals have been educated and trained in the pseudo-science of business management, always looking for rationality in how people behave, when in fact people most frequently respond to emotional triggers of psychological desires. As a result most corporate managers do not understand the impact of imaginative design and creative marketing communication.

Corporate executives worry more about next quarter’s stock market results than they do about the products or services they provide. As a result they play it safe and give people what they say they want by relying on market research.
Ad agencies are quick to adopt the approach because (a) rationalizing decisions on research was an easy sell compared to explaining clever creative, (b) agencies could charge big bucks for the research, and (c) if things went wrong they had a built-in scapegoat, the research.

The underlying problem is simple, people don’t know what they really want until they see it, so you can play it safe and wait for the competition to bury you with something bigger, better, and cheaper, or you can follow your instincts and work to make a dent in the universe. It’s business, there are no guarantees no matter what approach you take, so you can aim for something special, or you can aim for mediocrity.

Paradox

The ‘Think Different’ slogan used by Apple in the 1990s for the Macintosh was brilliant in its duality. Not only did it position Apple against IBM’s “Think” slogan, it conveyed the complex, conceptual conflict found in human nature: the desire to be different and the same simultaneously. The Macintosh was convivial, an easy-to-use machine for the masses, while at the same time it was an alternative to the establishment Big Blue for those who thought of themselves as different or special.

The “Think Different” mantra in its simplicity of presentation, and complexity of meaning, helped create the most loyal customer base of any mass-market company. The Apple world-view is one of alternative solutions available to everyone.

Fragmentation

Websites, social media, print, broadcast, and guerilla marketing efforts must all speak with the same voice and the same point-of-view. They must all present a unified front. Spreading the responsibility for each and every marketing venue destroys the brand message by creating multiple personalities and brand confusion. Entrepreneurial SMEs (small medium enterprises) cannot afford to jump on every fad venue like Facebook and Twitter, without knowing if their brand sensibility is conducive to those venues.

On paper, the sheer volume of users would seem to make these venues perfect for communicating a marketing message, and for some this is in fact the case, however for most SMEs, fragmenting their marketing voice over multiple venues, each with their own character and culture can be a major waste of resources with little to show for it. Smaller companies already have the perfect focused venue for marketing communication, it’s called your website.

The Last Word

Playing it safe may be the right strategy for someone interested in clawing their way up to middle management in a bureaucratic environment, but for those entrepreneurs who truly want to make a dent in the universe, the path is more intuitive. Success in business has always been a risk-reward scenario.

Are you ready to engage your web audience?

If so, pick up the phone and call us at +1 905.764.1246. We can help give your business the edge it needs to succeed on the web.

Marketing By Method Versus Vision is a post from: MRPwebmedia Articles

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Web videos have many purposes: they display, present, inform, educate, enlighten, and entertain; they also persuade, motivate, and sell.

Marketing videos can serve any one of these purposes or they can serve all of them. What is important is the audience remembers the message and the company that delivers it. Without penetrating the audience’s consciousness and making an indelible impression, the resources invested are wasted. Of course the lasting impression you impart must serve your branding and sales objectives.

Creating effective marketing videos entails a lot of creative skills in order to take a self-serving business message and make it not just palatable but memorable. To begin, you need a concept, script, performers, and technical expertise in video, editing, and sound design; as well as the psychological insight to understand, and the creative ability to manipulate, emotional reactions while emphasizing key points.

Knowing how to implement those kinds of subliminal mnemonic memory triggers is essential; after all, if your audience doesn’t remember your message you’ve wasted their time and yours.

Defining The Message

Defining your marketing message seems like a simple task but in reality it’s one of the hardest questions for entrepreneurs to answer in a clear concise manner: the core ingredient needed to build an effective video marketing campaign.

We all take pride in our businesses, that’s only natural; and we all love to tell people we are the best or the cheapest, or that we offer the most features, but as nice as all of that sounds, these are not credible concepts to build a campaign around.

In order to define your core message you must go deeper into the psychological impact your product or service provides. The Maslowian advantage you present is what creates the motivation to purchase; all the other benefits are merely justification for an emotionally based decision.

Developing the Campaign Concept

Once you understand what you’re really selling, it’s time to develop a presentation concept. The best ideas are the ones that can sustain a campaign so that each new variation builds on the preceding ones.

TD Canada Trust for example, uses two old crotchety seniors reminiscent of the two Muppet balcony curmudgeons to deliver the bank’s message. The features presented are mostly irrelevant, as any that turnout to be successful will quickly be copied by the competition. The key to the success and longevity of the campaign is the two pensioners who humanize an otherwise sterile corporate monolith that people have trouble relating to.

Using Multimedia To Communicate

When you meet someone for the first time, you want to make a good impression. You wouldn’t show-up for a meeting with a new client wearing the same clothes you used to wash your car. Of course you’d put on decent clothes and make yourself presentable; it’s natural to want to be viewed favorably. But here comes the problem, just because you want to be viewed favorably and you do what you think is appropriate, doesn’t mean you’ll succeed. It’s the subliminal details and subtleties of a presentation that make a difference between success and failure.

The Web’s natural remoteness makes it even harder to connect with an audience, which in turn, makes it harder to persuade that audience to respond to your message. It doesn’t take much to turn people off. The wrong tie, a bad haircut, a dress that doesn’t fit, or even a distracting ‘tchotchke’ in the background can send your audience to the competition.

On the Web, people are sitting a foot away from the screen staring intently at the images you’re presenting, and they better be communicating the right message both directly and indirectly.

Mnemonic Memory Triggers

When it comes to Web video, every presentation element is magnified, and if you don’t know how to control each and every mnemonic memory trigger, the result will be instantly forgettable at best and disastrous at worst.

1. Colorful Focused Scripts

You need a script! There aren’t too many people who can just ‘wing-it.’ Even the best so-called ad-libs are usually well scripted in advance. Your script is the heart of your message and most business videos fail before they even start because the script lacks character, focus, and style. Even the best actor can’t do much with a lame script and the results can be even worse when you combine a bad script with the company president’s poor delivery.

Even a great script will fail if the performance is subpar. To paraphrase Alfred Hitchcock, ‘A good script is how people speak, with the boring parts taken out.’ In other words, it’s how people would like to speak, but don’t.

The script should focus on the one main point you want your audience to remember because that is all they’re going to remember anyway. Too many ideas all at once only confuse the viewer. If you have to make more points make more videos, once your audience is hooked they’ll want to hear more.

Colorful language, the clever use of metaphor, and convincing performance combine to paint a memorable mental picture for your audience.

2. Fast Pace Editing

Directors tend to get all the credit when it comes to movies, television shows, and commercials, but the person who is intently responsible for delivering what you see and the story it tells is the editor.

Let’s take a seemingly simple talking head format on a white background with an actor delivering a company message. A simple enough scenario, but how many times should the scene be shot? Even if your actor nails the script on the first take, which is unlikely, you should shoot several more backup clips because once you get into the editing suite, all kinds of issues can crop-up.

But that alone isn’t good enough if you want to hold your audience’s attention. We shoot the same scene from three or four different positions or focal lengths so we can cut them together creating a visually interesting presentation. That means the editor has to go through a lot of raw footage to find the best takes.

Quite often you find the best visual take isn’t the same as the best audio take which means the audio from one clip has to be matched to the video of another putting a premium on the ability of the performer to deliver consistent pacing, and the skill of the editor and sound engineer to put it all together. So if you thought Web video was just a case of pointing a camera, you’d be wrong.

3. Multiple Characters

Clients are always worried about an audience’s attention span but the issue isn’t attention span as much as it is creating intrigue and interest. A video has to connect to an audience and peak their curiosity in order to hold their attention. If your video is boring, confusing, and bereft of any meaningful message or hook, you’ll lose them.

Sometimes you’ll notice commercials with an actor walking quickly through a scene talking all the while like he or she is in a hurry to find the closest washroom; it’s an attempt to inject some excitement or action into the scene but in fact it’s a poor substitute for a bad concept and a dull script. And worse still, it’s an expensive technique that generally requires a long dolly shot that can eat-up a lot of budget time and money.

We’ve already talked about using different clips from different angles to maintain pace and interest but another way is to use multiple actors, with each one setting up the pitch for the next, or each one finishing the last one’s sentence. This technique in the hands of a good editor can even make a static or mundane presentation work.

4.Clever Motion Graphics

Motion graphics are another way to help people remember your key points, but like everything else, the devil is in the details. If you turn your video into a glorified PowerPoint presentation you can be sure you’ll lose your audience.

The clever use of motion graphics helps bring your points to life by instilling imagination and creativity into your presentation. In the same way your script uses colorful language and metaphor to be memorable, so too your motion and static graphics must employ visual metaphor to be effective.

5.Multi-Layered Sound Design

Sound design is another area that is often ignored in corporate videos. Poor quality audio like severe room tone is not only a distraction it’s an irritant. On the positive side the right music and sound mnemonics can be as powerful as motion graphics. Music is used to create mood and atmosphere putting the audience in the right frame-of-mind to receive your message, and sound effects help embed the message in the audience’s memory.

Good sound design is one of those features that when done correctly goes unnoticed but nevertheless has a powerful psychological effect on the audience. It’s the sound design that tells the audience what’s importance and what’s not. And it’s the sound design that provides the emotional and psychological subtext that actually pushes the audience to act on your call to action.

6. Color Code

The proper use of color is also very important. Most high profile brands are associated with a color or color palette. Kodak is yellow while their competition Fuji is green. Activia yogurt uses their signature green to great affect in their packaging as well as in their TV commercials and print advertisements.

The consistent use of color is an inexpensive way to help distinguish your brand from all your competitors. In short, when it comes to video, everything matters, from the ambient background music score to the color of the dress or tie your presenter wears.

A Final Word

There is a lot of misunderstanding about what makes a commercial message persuasive and effective. The success of any video campaign must be measured by its ability to deliver the right message in a meaningful memorable manner; it’s not just about hits or even sales, it’s about exciting your audience about what you do. Like the old saying goes, “you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.” Your audience maybe watching, but are they responding?

If your video campaign excites the imagination, and you deliver the promise of your message, you will make the sales; otherwise you’re just blowing smoke and people will head for the hills. If you’d like to see an example of a video campaign that uses all of these elements, click here.

Are you ready to engage your web audience?

If so, pick up the phone and call us at +1 905.764.1246. We can help give your business the edge it needs to succeed on the web.

Video That Sells: Using Memory Triggers is a post from: MRPwebmedia Articles

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You may not remember the 1950s but the so-called “Golden Age” of television was in general pretty bad. Yes, there were some great, groundbreaking programs but there was also a lot of crap, especially the commercials that for the most part were emotionally and psychologically clumsy despite their pseudo-innocence.

We may be nostalgic for Speedy Alka Seltzer but it hardly stacks up to the Evian Baby T-Shirt videos that to my mind were even better than the more famous Roller Babies, a campaign where technical gimmickry overpowered the message. Of course in the 50s, the medium was new and the technology was rudimentary, especially by today’s standards.

With an audience raised on radio, TV producers could get away with almost anything, but today’s audience brought up on television and big budget movies expect and demand a far greater level of presentation sophistication.

If you want to communicate to today’s Web audience, you have to understand the techniques used to make your message understood and memorable. And just as importantly, you have to understand the negative impact of video presentation inadequacies. When we speak of ineffective communication, we are not just talking about technical issues like poor lighting and audio room tone, but more importantly poor messaging and mediocre performance.

Audiences Demand Quality Marketing Presentations

The days of face-to-face meetings are all but gone; even the telephone has become a worthless marketing tool thanks to the auto-call-robots harassing everyone with pitches for duct cleaning and cheap windows and doors. Today people rely on email, text messaging, and social media. These venues have their place for couponing, contests and discounting: promotional tactics that work for nationally advertised brands that have the budgets and built-in demand to take advantage of every marketing platform.

Unfortunately these venues are not conducive to delivering a branded marketing message with the style, sophistication and nuance needed to convince an audience to buy a non nationally advertised product or service. If you’re an entrepreneurial company, you have to think like one, not like Procter and Gamble.

Websites Are Still The Most Valuable Venue

Websites are still the most important marketing resource for prospects trying to find information about a product, service, or brand. Websites are the new phone directory, encyclopedia, catalogue, news magazine and shopping mall all wrapped into one customizable, brandable, multimedia resource. And when it comes to engaging a media savvy audience, video on your website has the potential to deliver the impact, immediacy, and the mind-altering persuasion needed to increase sales – if you know how to use it.

With easy access to relatively inexpensive hardware and software it’s easy to become a “shooter”. Just about everyone owns a video camera and with a little practice, anyone can become proficient in using it; but that is not the same as producing a commercial message. It’s your business, and if you want it to prosper, you better find someone who knows how to tell your story in a way that will make your audience care.

Hiring an outside professional video communication firm to develop your video presentation may seem like an extravagance but you have to ask yourself, how much is your reputation worth?

What Professionals Bring To The Table

No one has more pride in what they do than owner-managers of small and medium size businesses, and one could argue that running a SME is far more difficult than running a major corporation. SME executives are so involved in running the day-to-day operations of their businesses it is not surprising they don’t have the time to develop the cutting-edge skills required to implement a Web video campaign in-house.

In the long-run quality video marketing will bring in more business, expand your market penetration, and enhance your image and reputation. And isn’t that worth investing in an expert who can get it done.

Multi Function Creative and Technical Skills

In order for a video to communicate a marketing message effectively it requires a variety of creative and technical skills including scripting, lighting, audio, videography, photography, editing, special effects, and sound design. Getting by with hackneyed images, stock music, templates, and amateur shooters and presenters will ultimately reflect on your image and cripple your ability to convert visitors into customers.

Conceptual Brand Understanding

There are times when it’s difficult for everyone to see the forests-for-the-trees, and working from dawn to dusk on day-to-day problems leaves little time to think about your business from a conceptual point-of-view, but that’s just what professional marketing companies do.

Every experienced marketer understands that campaigns based on features alone are not the way to move product and grow businesses. Promotional campaigns based on discounting, sales, and contests are nothing more than short-term fixes with little long-term payback and the danger of turning regular clients into discount junkies.

There has to be something more behind a marketing campaign; you need a conceptual basis for audience acceptance. Developing an effective video campaign requires someone who can turn your product, service, or brand into an emotional aspiration. Marketing success requires going beyond the “need” into the realm of “desire.”

Creative Courtship

Marketing is like romance; you have to woo your audience with style and substance. It’s one thing to take a date or your spouse to dinner at some fast-food joint, it’s quite another to take her to a five-star restaurant. Both may fill the need but only the gourmet dinner will light the fire of desire. Marketing is no different. If your video presentations are nothing more than a burger and fries, it’s time to start thinking of filet mignon, but even an expensive meal can cause indigestion if the chef doesn’t really know what he’s doing.

Experience

Professional video marketing firms produce material for a variety of companies in many different industries. That kind of experience can be a valuable asset in developing a campaign approach that works for your business.

An experienced producer will not only know what works and what doesn’t, but he or she will also know how to save you money by not allowing you to waste your budget on costly ineffective concepts, stunts and production techniques.

It’s An Investment Not A Cost

Web video production must be viewed as an investment not a cost. Doing it right means hiring the right company who knows how to develop a presentation that enhances your image and attracts attention. Homemade or semi-pro efforts may seem like a bargain at the time but they will ultimately turn out to be a costly waste of resources that can do more damage than good; then again if you sew your suits, act as your own doctor, and grow your own food, perhaps you don’t need a professional.

Are you ready to engage your web audience?

If so, pick up the phone and call us at +1 905.764.1246. We can help give your business the edge it needs to succeed on the web.

Is Your Brand Worth Professional Treatment? is a post from: MRPwebmedia Articles

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The Web has spawned many great opportunities for people in general and businesses in particular. One of the byproducts of ubiquitous access and use is the ability of anyone with a Web-ready device and Internet connection to participate.

Pardon me for being cynical, but maybe not everyone is capable of participating in a meaningful manner. What I’m saying is the Web has created a whole new venue for amateurism that has both positive and negative consequences.

The High Cost of Amateurism

On the positive side many creative and intelligent people are now able to present their talents and knowledge to a global audience whereas ‘Before The Web Era’ they had to settle for friends and family or at best a local audience. On the downside, just because everyone can do something doesn’t mean they should. I am not even talking about the silly, uninformed comments that appear everywhere, or even the dumb-and-dumber user-generated videos that highlight adolescent stunts and salacious exhibitionism. What I am talking about is how so many legitimate businesses opt for amateur video presentations without the slightest understanding of the damage they are doing to their businesses.

To my mind, your image and message are far too important to leave up to amateurs who don’t understand how to develop and present a marketing message using the Web video medium, a medium that differs from television advertising and corporate presentations as much as it differs from print. For those who think that professional Web video is too expensive, I would advise the real cost of DIY and amateurism is lost sales and reputation.

It’s About Concept and Performance

The truth is you can get away with a lot of technical stuff on the Web but you can never get away with inferior messaging both in concept and performance. The true essence of Web video professionalism is how your business message is turned into a compelling brand story, a mission that should not be taken lightly. I have said it many times but Web Video is an exercise in psychological persuasion not a display of technical wizardry. If you don’t understand how to convert your message into a meaningful brand story, it is best you find someone who does.

8 Brand Video Story Development Concepts

1. Story Form

Business people trained in number-centric management practices often reject, or at least bridle at the notion of storytelling as a legitimate business function, but unless you have a good story to tell no one is going to listen to what you have to say.

Within the movie business it is often said that there are only seven movies: these are the prototypical plots that can be presented in some compelling fashion over two hours. The difference between an award winning movie and a flop is how that story is told, a function of script and performance. Your marketing video must contain the same kind of conceptual reference in order to deliver the message quickly and effectively.

2. Transformation

There are many ways to present your story but every story needs a hero or heroine. He or she is your brand representative who is transformed from one condition or state-of-mind to another. This is the symbolic transformation that your audience vicariously goes through as they watch, a transformation that changes their attitudes, perceptions, and prejudices. It is the process of psychologically moving your viewer from prospect to client. It is the process of conversion.

3. Obstacles

No transformation is complete without overcoming some obstacle in the same way no sale is closed without overcoming some objection. The bigger the obstacle, the more powerful the message becomes.

Everyone instinctively understands their product or service must solve a problem but the problem-solving nature of your solution may not be as apparent as first thought, and a poorly constructed video can actually negate what your trying to accomplish.

4. The Setup

Without a setup your message will fail to make an impact. This is one of the hardest things to get people to recognize. Like any memorable anecdote or magic trick, you cannot skip the setup; without a setup a punch line (your tag line) will have no meaning.

5. Consistent Signature Patterns

Human beings learn through pattern recognition. If the audience can’t recognize the pattern you don’t have a brand. Successful brand development uses consistent language, attitude, and point-of-view, supported by consistent image, color, and style, presented within a consistent contextual framework.

6. Campaigns

One-off presentations don’t result in long-term clients any more than a one-night stand results in a long-term relationship. You must continually support and enhance your identity and image with supportive content and material.

7. Emotional Value Proposition

There are only a handful of hardwired psychological needs that drive human motivation and therefore consumption. The universality of these desires is what makes us tick, it’s what makes us make the decisions we make, and to ultimately buy what we buy. It’s the Emotional Value Proposition you offer your audience that makes them a client. A reliance on fads and features might lead to short-term sales but they’ll rarely lead to long-term customers.

8. Performance

Everyone has a friend who loves to tell jokes but can never quite get it right; either they screw-up the punch line or they butcher the timing, and the story falls flat. Your brand story videos are no different. Unless they are delivered with skill and professionalism they will fail and maybe even do more harm than good. It’s not just a question of hiring someone who can actually spit the words out without getting tongue-tied; it’s about knowing how to use performance techniques within the Web video medium to deliver a memorable marketing message. It’s about performance.

Final Thoughts

Everyone likes to save money, especially when the economy is not the best, but saving money at the cost of your company’s reputation and identity can be a costly mistake. Technology has provided the business executive and company owner with all kinds of benefits, but it would be a mistake to think technology solves psychological concerns; and sales and marketing are most definitely psychological issues.

Are you ready to engage your web audience?

If so, pick up the phone and call us at +1 905.764.1246. We can help give your business the edge it needs to succeed on the web.

8 Brand Video Story Development Concepts is a post from: MRPwebmedia Articles

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Do you have an obligation to be good, and by good, I mean good at your job?

Do you have a responsibility not just to be professional and do what you do on time and on budget but also to be creative, thought provoking, and stimulating in the way that you do it?

Myth-Making As A Branding Strategy

The reason I ask the question is I recently read a comment on a business blog posted by a self-proclaimed advertising expert that justified the notion that schlock advertising works. I don’t know about you but I find the idea disturbing. Sometimes ads work and sometimes they don’t. There are lots of reasons why advertising fails and in many cases it has more to do with implementation rather than conception. And yes we all know that schlock advertising like negative political ad campaigns work in the short-term, but ultimately the tactic leads to audience disillusionment and frustration, which is why we talk to our clients about marketing not advertising.

Marketing Is About Building A Legend

Marketing requires you to take the long-view; it’s an approach that demands a company to stake out a position and build a personality that customers can rely on to be consistent and ethical both in offering and in execution. Marketing is about building a legend, an iconic brand that explains who you are, what you do, and why anyone should care. Marketing is about psychological persuasion in order to improve the wellbeing of your audience. Marketing is about transformation, it communicates a brand story that acts as a metaphor that defines your identity, which in turn helps customers define and express themselves.

Beware Junk Research

A reliance on market research that tells you what people said as oppose to what they think is of little or no value. Even research that tells you what people did, doesn’t tell you what they will do when presented with an unknown option. Even opinion polls on soon to be released products are of little use: without some commitment of value those opinions won’t tell you how people will respond when they have to reach into their wallets to make a decision. Sure there’s good research, mostly available to big corporations produced by the social scientists, psychologists and university professors who study human behavior. Most of the rest of it is hindsight justification for whatever happens to be trendy or in-vogue at the time.

Market Leaders Are Proactive

Research that asks people what they want is useless, how can they know if they want something if it hasn’t been put on the market yet. Marketing is about defining your audience’s need not reacting to what your competitor has already established. By definition that kind of approach will leave you as an also-ran, never a market leader.

Market leaders are proactive not reactive. Asking everyone’s opinion on what and how to sell is weak and ineffectual and is not only reactive, it’s downright regressive. Your customers can’t tell you what they don’t know, that’s why they rely on you.

Brand Stories

Brand Stories are how companies use psychological persuasion to transform viewers into loyal customers (brand evangelists) by changing attitudes, preferences, and preconceptions. Brand stories allow the audience to vicariously transform themselves by providing a look at what could be.
Business is obsessed with technological solutions to psychological problems, one very significant reason why so many tech-based advertising tactics fail. Whether it’s Ad Placement Auctions, Search Engine Optimization techniques, or QR codes, if the final destination is a peace of junk, you lose!
Mainstream media promotes techie-solutions mostly because it’s easy and can be presented in a twenty-second sound bite rather than providing the underlying significance of why something really works, a process that is more complicated and takes more time. Take the Old Spice commercials that were hyped based on the technical wizardry of the creators, when the real genius of these ads was the message. Businesses run out and emulate the technique without a clear understanding of why it worked and more often than not miss the target altogether.

What’s Your Big Idea?

So if technique is merely the how, what’s the why, the why anyone should care? Ask yourself, and be honest, what’s your big idea? Steve Jobs famously asked John Sculley, the head of PepsiCo, whether he wanted to sell sugar water for the rest of his life or change the world? What self-respecting senior executive could resist the challenge and opportunity? Are you selling today’s sugar water laced with Facebook, Twitter, and whatever the next big thing is, while allowing your main online presentation channel, your website, to fall behind?

Sure there’s a place for these IPO-based gimmick sites, but are you following the crowd because that’s what the carpetbaggers are promoting this week, or are you a true entrepreneur with a real idea, a honest point-of-view, a fascinating story to tell, and a real product or service that will set-off the endorphins in your audience’s heads when they hear about it?

What’s Your Emotional Value Proposition?

The key to successful marketing is finding your Emotional Value Proposition. It’s how you humanize the outdated notion of a sales-value proposition that no self-respecting marketing expert gives a hoot about. If you look at what Jobs offered Sculley, it breaks down to an opportunity to achieve ‘self-actualization’ the highest rung on Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. Jobs understood that in order to attract a high-powered, success-oriented executive he had to offer him something big, and from a psychological perspective there is nothing bigger than being all you can be.

In the case of Old Spice the message was more primal, it’s about sex, a basic level ingredient on Maslow’s Hierarchy. The message is clear: buy the product and you attract and satisfy women, what could be more fundamental? Everyone knows sex sells but do you understand why? Sex sells because it’s essential to our survival as a species; we either propagate or we disappear like the Neanderthals. It doesn’t get anymore Maslowian than that.

How To Find Your Big Idea

So if you’re selling the most features, lower prices, better service, and best staff in the business you’re communicating the wrong message. Your audience isn’t stupid; nobody promotes the idea that they have no service and sell cheap crap that doesn’t work. Nobody really cares that you Tweet, Facebook, Google, or text message your day away. What people want to know is what are you going to do to move them up the Maslowian latter. Every successful brand, product, or company is based on a big idea. What’s yours?

Are you ready to engage your web audience?

If so, pick up the phone and call us at +1 905.764.1246. We can help give your business the edge it needs to succeed on the web.

Build An Iconic Web Brand is a post from: MRPwebmedia Articles

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Is your brand cool? Cool is the ultimate compliment your company or product can receive from it’s buying public. To be cool is to be special, superior, and of higher value than the competition, which is why coolness is such a sought-after marketing objective.

And before you reject the idea that your business, product, or brand doesn’t have to be cool, think again. To be cool is to be desired and to be desired is exactly the goal of all marketing communication. Sure you want sales but first you got to be cool.

You Got To Be Cool

To be cool is definitely not the same as being trendy. Trendy is a far too ephemeral goal to invest in. Where trendy is a mere short-lived fad; cool is a statement of character.

The recent American Idol finale and pop culture sideshow illustrates perfectly what I’m talking about. Lady Gaga, the Queen of Trendy, put on a performance that may have wowed her twelve-year old fans but will surely be regarded in the future as merely a bizarre, over-the-top, vulgar circus act; whereas senior citizens Tony Bennett, Tom Jones, and Steven Tyler all delivered remarkable displays of class, cool, and resilience despite their obvious decline in vocal chops. You won’t be seeing fans lineup to see Gaga fall off a staged-cliff in her underwear when she’s cashing her old age pension.

If you run a Internet business, you know you have to be pop culture savvy, not always the easiest thing to do when things change so quickly, another reason why “cool” needs to be the goal, not “trendy.” When businesses make the mistake of confusing coolness with trendiness they are looking for trouble, unfortunately being cool is the antithesis of most business mindsets. But if you’ve got the “cojones” you can make your business cool.

What’s Cool?

To be cool is to be confident in your decision to be different, to ‘zig’ when everyone else ‘zags,’ and to stay the course when everyone tells you you’re nuts. Apple Computer is probably the biggest success story in business today. This is a company that was given-up for dead by the experts more times than Elvis has been sighted wolfing down fried peanut butter and banana sandwiches. This company sells expensive products at higher margins than anybody else, it makes a ton of money, and its stock price has gone through the roof in an economy where every business seems to want to compete with Walmart and be on Facebook. Apple is the company that built a reputation on the idea, “Think Different,” and that’s the essence of cool.

For anyone who knows anything about branding, taking the rebel’s path is the best way to establish your brand personality, and without a unique marketing identity, you have no chance of becoming the next big thing. And if you think Lady Gaga is an example of something new or different, you’re wrong; she’s nothing more than a Madonna shock-pop retread. The opportunities are there for you to take advantage of a business community that is too scared to be different or to unsophisticated to recognize the difference between cool and trendy.

How To Make Your Brand Cool

Every business needs to advertise but ads aren’t cool. Fortunately the Internet provides businesses with an opportunity to deliver ads that aren’t ads, but content in the form of Branded Entertainment.

Branded Entertainment provides the vehicle for businesses to create a personality and establish their cool credentials. Branded Entertainment is the future of Web advertising. It is how you can attract and hold attention while subtly delivering your message in content – it’s a “spoon full of sugar makes the medicine go down” approach.

You Got To Up Your Game

The Web is nothing more than a communication platform that is quickly converging with the 500-channel television environment. Technologies like the iPad combined with Sling Box means people can watch television and the Internet anywhere and anytime. The problem is programming, there isn’t enough of it, and the television stations with their bloated bureaucracies and budgets are limited in what they are able to deliver. The vacuum will be filled by smart Web businesses willing to invest in delivering Internet programming using branded entertainment and product placement as the means to generate the sales.

The caveat is clear: crap won’t fly, not if you want to be cool, and being cool means being desirable. Business has to get off their butts, get their heads out of the sand, and up their game.

Creative programming that informs, enlightens, and entertains is where Web advertising is headed, and the train has already left the station. So business, especially small and medium sized business better get on board or they will be left behind. The Internet’s ability to even the commercial playing field will be lost in a misguided avalanche of Facebook and Twitter advice that if taken will only dilute your website’s ability to communicate your marketing message in a controlled branded environment.

Inform, Enlighten, Entertain

Like it or not your website is your main media channel and if you don’t treat it as such you will never reach your audience in a way that changes attitudes, perceptions, and behavior, particularly the behavior that results in sales.

Since the Internet’s earliest commercial use it’s been dominated by vehicles dedicated to “reach:” from Archie to Google, from MySpace to Facebook, from Gmail to Twitter, each new big deal is all about reaching an audience. Reaching an audience is certainly important, but reaching an audience alone doesn’t deliver the sales business wants or needs.

Dr. Max Sutherland, in his article “When Ads Fail, How To Diagnose Why” explains the concepts of Reach and Recognition as a means of judging advertising effectiveness. The bottom line is simple, if you don’t make an impression on your audience, you will never achieve a brand connection and you will never generate brand recall.

The road to cool brand desirability can take any number of forms but they all have three things in common: you need to inform, enlighten, and entertain in a memorable manner in order to establish the connection and recall that leads to sales.

Are you ready to engage your web audience?

If so, pick up the phone and call us at +1 905.764.1246. We can help give your business the edge it needs to succeed on the web.

Make Your Brand Cool is a post from: MRPwebmedia Articles

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MRPwebmedia is pleased to announce they have been awarded a 2011 Summit Creative Award for Video Microsites, not bad considering there were 4300 entries from 22 countries. The winning site can be seen at http://www.mrpwebmedia.com/ads/CallLimiter.

The great thing about awards is not that we’ve a spiffy statue we can display in the office but rather the work we’ve done was acknowledged by a panel of eighteen industry leaders from nine countries; but more importantly it recognizes that the work successfully and effectively delivered the client’s advertising message and brand identity.

Case Study Video Micro Site For Software Developer

CallLimiter is a small software developer in Australia that has developed some cool little apps that it sells. They came to us to develop a video micro site for their mobile phone product that can be used to control how long you stay on the phone. This is something most everybody can relate to. The phone companies have managed to get many people to abandon their fixed cost landlines and use their cost-per-call mobile phones almost exclusively, thereby increasing almost everyone’s monthly phone bill. It’s a high price to pay for convenience and not everyplace in the world has discount pricing plans, opening up the market for CallLimiter’s product.

Concept Creation

Step one was to find out what the key sale’s points were. The client provided us with three main reasons for buying their product: control personal phone costs, control phone costs for family members, and limit potential mobile health hazards. We quickly realized that mobile phone overuse and abuse was an obvious additional sales point beyond the cost factor that should be made.

Once we knew what rational sales points had to be made we needed to create a scenario that put these sales points into context so the average consumer could relate to them. One of our guiding principles is to try and find the emotional context that drives home the product’s sales proposition and ties it to its brand identity. Just telling people that a product or service will save them money is not good enough; you need to relate what you’re selling to the audience on some human level.

What we came up with was a family dynamic based on the tried and true family sitcom scenario: your harassed father dealing on the phone with his over protective mother, love struck daughter, overly stimulated son, and medically-challenged brother. Four cheeky video scripts were written highlighting each sales point by placing them within a uniform and relatable family context that everyone could understand and find relevant.

Production and Design

The budget was tight so we kept everything simple, and that not only kept the cost down, it also concentrated audience attention on the message. Marketing communication is all about delivering a meaningful, memorable message and you achieve that by using presentation techniques that entertain while delivering the pitch. Complex and expensive production techniques often used in television commercials to grab viewers’ attention are often counterproductive on the Web. For television the sponsor must grab attention during the commercial break when the audience loses focus and wanders off to the kitchen for a drink or starts a conversation with another family member; on the Web your audience is almost always alone, and their focus is directly and intently on the screen. On the Web the problem is one of holding a click-happy audience’s attention, not focus. Many corporate videos don’t work because they are just plain boring and have no personality. The problem is not one of short attention spans or length of presentation but rather one of holding interest, and the best way to hold an audience’s interest is to put the message within a story context and speak directly to the viewer.

Keep it Simple. Make it Entertaining. And Tell a Brand Story.

Three out of the four videos created used two actors on a white background with the father character in the foreground and the family member in the background. The fourth video that was actually the first one shown only used the father character on the phone with his mother which allowed us to eliminate one actor and keep the client’s cost down.

We needed to design a logo for the product, create a website that accommodated all the content, cast, shoot, and edit the videos, compose custom signature music, and create a slide show of images using the actors from the videos. Our design team created the logo and word mark as well as a blue-grey color scheme that visually tied everything together. We even had the actors wearing monotone wardrobes so their clothing didn’t distract attention from the message or conflict with the other visual elements on the website, a detail we often see overlooked.

Another detail that is often overlooked or ignored is signature music and sound design. Because we have our own recording studio and in-house producer and composer we are able to create custom music and signature sound design for each client. The proper use of music and sound design provides an emotional atmosphere that signals the appropriate psychological response from the audience, while the proper use of sound design techniques provides the mnemonics needed to draw attention to the sales points and message being delivered. Finally, we massaged some of the written material and the project was complete.

Conclusion

As simple and clean as the final presentation appears, the work that went into it was detailed, and required the skill-sets of a talented crew of creative professionals. It’s nice to be acknowledged by your peers for a job well done but it’s even more important for the client to have a marketing presentation that works; one that puts the rational sales points into a human context making the brand both memorable as well as relevant.

Are you ready to engage your web audience?

If so, pick up the phone and call us at +1 905.764.1246. We can help give your business the edge it needs to succeed on the web.

MRPwebmedia Awarded the 2011 Summit Creative Award for Video Microsites. is a post from: MRPwebmedia Articles

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We live in the age of communication. We are in constant contact with friends, family, and business colleagues. Each new digital device, software solution, or Internet phenomenon creates an opportunity for entrepreneurs to position themselves as the next-big-thing, and business executives to establish themselves as marketing mavens, business gurus, or technology boffins.

“In the future everyone will be world famous for 15 minutes.” – Andy Warhol

Superstars & Cultural Influence

Andy Warhol was a graphic genius of course, but as importantly, Warhol was a cultural influencer with an eye for image and an ear for sound bites. It was Warhol who popularized the term “Superstar” which if you think about it in today’s terms is fittingly ironic and incredibly perceptive.

Warhol’s “superstar” reference wasn’t to a Marilyn Munroe or Elizabeth Taylor but rather to Edie Sedgwick, a talent-deficient, troubled, anorexic Twiggy look-a-like socialite. If anyone can be famous, it follows that anyone can be a superstar, and the World Wide Web has spawned an entire society of ‘wanna-be’ Web superstars.

But Sedgwick wasn’t about making a viral spectacle of herself in return for her fifteen minutes like so many YouTube superstar pretenders. Sedgwick had real pretensions and surely thought associating with the famous Warhol would help her rise above her own unfortunate upbringing and self-destructive tendencies, but Sedgwick was merely a pawn in Warhol’s world of marketing self promotion.

The real superstar in this tragic opera (Sedgwick died at the age of twenty-eight after years of mental illness and drug abuse) was Warhol himself, for Warhol was the brand, not Sedgwick or any other of the carefully cultivated hangers-on in his entourage. Warhol was the consummate marketing maven who knew how to communicate his vision to a wider public audience better than the more traditional members of the abstruse jargon-filled pretentious art community.

Expertise Doesn’t Make You A Superstar

The Internet is full of very talented and not-so-talented people who have some expertise and who are willing to offer at least a snippet of their knowledge to entice their audience to buy their wares, but knowledge and expertise alone is not going to make you a true Web superstar.

The real marketing superstars, the ones that make a difference, the ones that influence culture and make a lasting and profound impression are the ones that understand the Superstar Guru Effect.

The Superstar Guru Effect

Being an expert is not enough, you have to be able to communicate your expertise effectively, and that means presenting complicated concepts in a way your audience can understand and remember. The art of ‘superstar guru-ism’ lies in your ability to simplify and entertain an audience with the culturally relevant connections between society and commerce.

People like Malcolm Gladwell (‘The Tipping Point’), Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner (‘Freakonomics’) are superstar gurus because they know how to make complicated concepts simple to understand and easy to remember. The ability to articulate clearly and with flair and imagination is what makes the difference between someone who is an expert and very good at their job and someone who captures people’s imaginations and becomes the market leader, the one that sets the agenda for everyone else to follow including the buying public. Bill Gates may be a shrewd business executive but success and wealth don’t make him a superstar. Steve Jobs is the superstar.

Apple Computer arguably always made better products than their competitors but it wasn’t until Apple’s marketing efforts clearly articulated Jobs’ vision of man and machine that the company took off. Where most business owners asked future executives how they would reduce costs and improve ROI, Jobs asked how they were going to change the world? Jobs’ vision was clear from the outset: develop handsome, well-designed, convivial products that make life easier for people, and deliver that message in memorable entertaining advertisements and presentations.

Three Things Every Superstar Website Needs

I see a lot of business websites designed by designers who have technical expertise but who don’t necessarily understand how to communicate, and just as importantly, don’t advise client’s how to develop and construct a marketing vision so it’s simple to understand and easy to remember. Clients with their left-brain bias and short-term ROI perspective are as much to blame as the geek-wunderkinds they hire. It’s a tortoise and hare scenario: business is a marathon not a sprint; successful marketing takes time, patience, and the guts to stick to a simple, memorable conceptual vision.

1. Websites Are About Content

The first thing you need to provide your audience is content; but not all content is created equal. Everybody understands content is a key component of a website, it is why people come to your site in the first place, but so many websites simply throw everything but the kitchen sink at their viewers and that just irritates and frustrates them, and worse, it drives them to their competitors.

The problem with website content is a bit like the problem with intelligence gathering: distinguishing what you need from the vast array of options and information dumped upon the viewer. So many websites are so dense and confusing that finding what you came for is next to impossible.

We all understand that people are in a hurry and that much of the Internet community has a short attention span, but that is really only the tip of the problem. I’ve written over ninety articles most of which are between a thousand and fifteen hundred words and people read them, a lot of people read them, so short attention spans are not really the issue when you’re dealing with a properly qualified audience.

Scott Fenstermaker publishes a great little blog called “People Triggers” and in one of his posts he discusses a Lake Forest leadership presentation and a Jon Stewart video concerning different demographic groups and their relationship to authority (business, government, etc.)

The discussion holds the key to why so many website visitors opt-out of your site before they actually get to the important content. The high-value Web audiences that most businesses target are the Gen-Xers (born 1960-79) and Gen-Yers (Millennials born 1980-2001). The common thread that binds these two groups together and differentiates them from their parents (Boomers born 1946-59), and their grandparents, (Veterans born 1935-45), is that the X and Y Generations are primarily interested only in what business and government can do for them. The main difference between Generation X and Generation Y is the latter only wants to know what you can do for them NOW!

2. Websites Are About Entertainment

The second thing you can do for these visitors is to engage them, and that demands your website be more than a catalogue of products, services, and specifications. These X and Y Generations want to be catered to; they want to feel they matter. Your audience has a definite feeling of entitlement and the only way you are going to break through their cynicism is to engage them with an entertaining presentation that speaks to their psychological demand to be recognized as important.

The Web is more than a giant digital encyclopedia with a Sear’s catalogue attached; it’s an entertainment platform with an audience that demands the right content quickly, and they demand that you make the effort to deliver it in a clever, entertaining package. Your hard-noised no-nonsense approach might have worked for previous generations, but it’s not going to work on today’s self-absorbed consumers.

3. Websites Are About Free

We are all in business to make money, but as much as websites are about content and entertainment, they are also about free. An audience that demands to know what you are going to do for them wants to know what you going to give them for listening to what you have to offer.

That is why the entertainment element is so significant; memorable presentations (things like branded entertainment videos) speak to the notion that you are paying attention to your audience’s desire to be recognized as important. A clever video presentation that demonstrates you understand your audience and are willing to invest in telling them so, carries more weight than a lengthy e-book filled with platitudes and generalities.

The Web has changed the way business is done: music, news, information, and entertainment are all free. Provide your audience with it and they’ll reward you by paying attention to your message. Treat them like you’re doing them a favor and you’ll never get their business.

So You Want To Build A Superstar Website

When you started your website you probably thought it was a exercise in ROI, when it actually turns out to be more like running your own mini broadcast network, complete with news, entertainment, and commercial messaging. Successful websites only need three things to drive business: content, entertainment, and free. Like it or not, you’re in the communication business, and if you want to be a superstar communicator keep it simple and memorable.

Are you ready to engage your web audience?

If so, pick up the phone and call us at +1 905.764.1246. We can help give your business the edge it needs to succeed on the web.

The Making of a Web Superstar Business is a post from: MRPwebmedia Articles

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Consultants are always talking about “deliverables,” a term used to describe the final product provided to their clients. Consultants understand that business people are loath to paying for mere advice even if that advice is critical to their business, but they are open to paying for something tangible like a deliverable. The so called “deliverable” is usually a nice thick report bound in one of those fancy expensive folios that may contain some useful strategies and tactics but quite often is filled with platitudes and generalities accompanied by colorful graphs and charts of equally dubious value. As a consequence, business consultants, have a generalized reputation that lies somewhere between politicians and used car salesman.

Somewhere along the evolutionary development of the Web entrepreneur a lesson was learned, unfortunately it was the wrong one. Deliverables are good; useless unusable stock solutions, even if it’s wrapped in a nice shiny package, are bad.

The How-To Video Strategy

How-to videos have become an essential marketing strategy for featuring product knowledge and market expertise with the goal of creating confidence in a company’s ability to deliver what they promise.

Let’s say you are an expert in something. It really doesn’t matter what it is because there is a market for educational and instructional material for just about anything from guitar playing to poker, from makeup application to origami, from drawing lessons to app development.

Tapping Into The Knowledge Deficit

In today’s fast paced environment tapping into the knowledge deficit is one of the best ways to grow your business. One common business tactic used to exploit how-to opportunities is to provide teaser videos so that people get a taste of what to expect. Anyone interested in learning anything has watched his or her share of teaser videos, but all too often these videos only lead to frustration and a quick click of the mouse onto the next website offering instructions.

I’ve heard many experts fret about giving away too much information without getting paid for it, after all, why would anyone pay if they can get it for free? And here’s where the whole idea of deliverables comes in, but first let’s stop thinking like a consultant and start thinking like a marketing executive. What’s important is not the deliverable but rather the usefulness of the material provided. Let’s call it “the take-away:” the knowledge learned that improves one’s ability to perform and at the same time inspires confidence in your company’s ability to provide worthwhile instruction in the chosen field.

Commercials Aren’t How-to Videos

If you’re an expert in a particular area you should be able to giveaway all kinds of tips and tricks that your potential clients can use without running out of ideas or instructional expertise. Providing interested site visitors with a fancy PDF report, PowerPoint slideshow, or series of less-than-helpful teaser videos all obvious attempts to merely sell the real stuff will only turn people off. Commercials should not masquerade as how-to videos.

Web business is not like brick and mortar business. On the Web you are distanced from your audience by the great digital divide that creates a natural reluctance on the part of your visitors; this remoteness is the biggest obstacle you have to overcome because it creates a natural fear of being cheated. And the best way to solve the problem is to offer something of value that demonstrates your reliability and expertise, and inspires confidence in your ability and desire to deliver what you promise.

The Four How-To Video Elements

Even if you intend to provide useful instruction to your website visitors, you can still get it wrong if you don’t understand the four basic elements of giving instructions.

1. Create Expectations

Tell people what you’re going to teach them. This let’s them know what the video is about and what they can expect to learn. It also implies what they aren’t going to learn so they won’t be frustrated after watching five minutes of something they’re not interested in seeing.

2. Provide Useful Instructions They Can Use

Provide appropriate instructions so that the audience can actually implement what you are teaching them. Don’t leave out or skip over critical steps because of a fear of giving away too much. These teaser videos don’t have to be a complete course in whatever it is you do, but they should be complete as far as the particular tip or trick you are providing.

3. Alert Them To Common Errors

The most common mistake made in providing instruction to people is not alerting them to common mistakes. Make people aware of the usual signs that what they are doing is going wrong. This will inspire confidence in your ability to teach and to deliver something that is truly useful. Nothing is more frustrating to a potential client than to think they have followed your instructions and the result is just not right.

4. Summarize

Remind your audience what you told them in simple memorable terms so that they feel they’ve actually learned something that they can take-away and implement on their own.

The Bottom Line

In the final analysis, if your audience doesn’t leave your website with the feeling that they are actually taking away something useful that they can use, then you’ve failed, and you will never get them to order. The bottom line: you have to give something away, if you expect to get something in return.

Are you ready to engage your web audience?

If so, pick up the phone and call us at +1 905.764.1246. We can help give your business the edge it needs to succeed on the web.

Web Marketing Strategy & Tactics: The Take-Away is a post from: MRPwebmedia Articles

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