010 Small Business Marketing Video Production on a Budget

Web and BeyondCast, the Small Business Digital Marketing and Productivity Technology Show

English - October 02, 2018 12:00 - 47 minutes - 44.1 MB - ★★★★★ - 2 ratings
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Previous Episode: 009 The State of Small Business Technology, September 2018 Edition

Next Episode: 011 GDPR for Small Business

Welcome to Season 1, Episode 010, of Web and BeyondCast. On this cast, we will be discussing marketing video production--what it takes to get the marketing videos you need for your business created. And, to do that, I've brought in my go-to expert on video production, Sharon Sobel of Picture This Video. We are going to learn about what questions you should ask when starting a video project, who you're hiring, and what platforms you should use to get the word out there about your videos once they're made...and much more.

(If you’re reading this in a podcast directory/app, please visit http://webandbeyondcast.com/010 for clickable links and the full show notes and transcript of this cast.)

If you'd like to discuss this episode, please click here to leave a comment down below (this jumps you to the bottom of the post), or feel free to contact me here about any other questions or comments.
In this Cast
Ray Sidney-Smith, Host

Sharon Sobel, of Picture This Video, has been producing video projects for business clients for over 15 years. Having evolved from tape to DVD, to online delivery, her experience and varied skills help you rest assured you are getting someone knowledgeable and experienced in all facets of production, so she’s able to work with you to produce something within your budget, and that meets your marketing video needs.

Show Notes
Resources we mention, including links to them will be provided here. Please listen to the episode for context.

PictureThis Video - Sharon Sobel - Web and BeyondCast - Episode 010 - Marketing Video Production

PowerPoint presentation for listeners to download

Mobile Video Tripods (on Amazon)

Lavalier microphone for smartphones/tablets (available as single or double microphone version)

Videographer - camera work and possibly primary audio (make sure they know)

Video Editor - may also be your videographer if they have the skill sets; takes the raw video and your script and edits it to the final video

Video Producer - liaison between client and other video professionals roles executing the project

Microsoft Word, Google Docs or LibreOffice Writer

YouTube

Vimeo

YouTube Live

Facebook Live

Periscope / Twitter

Instagram (15 seconds of video at a time in Stories; ~60 seconds for posts)

Instagram’s IGTV (vertical only; one-hour time limit)

Best Tool of the Week
(Ray) Ripl

(Sharon) RockNRoller Cart

Raw Text Transcript
Raw, unedited and machine-produced text transcript so there may be errors, but you can search for specific points in the episode to jump to, or to reference back to at a later date and time, by keywords or key phrases.

Voiceover Artists 0:00
Welcome to web and beyond cast were small business comes to learn about marketing and managing on the web and beyond with your host Ray Sidney-Smith.

Ray Sidney-Smith 0:11
Hello there small business owners, entrepreneurs and community Welcome to Episode 10 of Web and BeyondCast. I'm Ray Sidney-Smith and we are going to be talking today about video marketing in kind of a different way than we typically do. We're going to flip it on its head and actually talk about video marketing from the production side, we're going to talk about how to actually get the fundamentals of production getting video prepared for how do you plan out a video, how do you do scripting? How do you get this shooting right for video footage and using some of the tools for getting the video prepared. And when you need to hire a professional. I mean, so many times, there comes a point where you decide, okay, I'm going to do video, I'm going to make video part of my business marketing strategy. And then it doesn't happen, it doesn't materialize. And that's when maybe a professional needs to be brought in. And that's why today I have brought on the show with me, Sharon Sobel. She is the owner of picture this video and has been producing video projects for bu...

Welcome to Season 1, Episode 010, of Web and BeyondCast. On this cast, we will be discussing marketing video production–what it takes to get the marketing videos you need for your business created. And, to do that, I’ve brought in my go-to expert on video production, Sharon Sobel of Picture This Video. We are going to learn about what questions you should ask when starting a video project, who you’re hiring, and what platforms you should use to get the word out there about your videos once they’re made…and much more.

(If you’re reading this in a podcast directory/app, please visit http://webandbeyondcast.com/010 for clickable links and the full show notes and transcript of this cast.)

If you’d like to discuss this episode, please click here to leave a comment down below (this jumps you to the bottom of the post), or feel free to contact me here about any other questions or comments.

In this Cast

Ray Sidney-Smith, Host

Show Notes

Resources we mention, including links to them will be provided here. Please listen to the episode for context.

PictureThis Video - Sharon Sobel - Web and BeyondCast - Episode 010 - Marketing Video Production

PowerPoint presentation for listeners to download

Mobile Video Tripods (on Amazon)

Lavalier microphone for smartphones/tablets (available as single or double microphone version)

Videographer – camera work and possibly primary audio (make sure they know)

Video Editor – may also be your videographer if they have the skill sets; takes the raw video and your script and edits it to the final video

Video Producer – liaison between client and other video professionals roles executing the project

Microsoft Word, Google Docs or LibreOffice Writer

Instagram (15 seconds of video at a time in Stories; ~60 seconds for posts)

Instagram’s IGTV (vertical only; one-hour time limit)

Best Tool of the Week

(Ray) Ripl

(Sharon) RockNRoller Cart

Raw Text Transcript

Raw, unedited and machine-produced text transcript so there may be errors, but you can search for specific points in the episode to jump to, or to reference back to at a later date and time, by keywords or key phrases.

Voiceover Artists 0:00

Welcome to web and beyond cast were small business comes to learn about marketing and managing on the web and beyond with your host Ray Sidney-Smith.

Ray Sidney-Smith 0:11

Hello there small business owners, entrepreneurs and community Welcome to Episode 10 of Web and BeyondCast. I’m Ray Sidney-Smith and we are going to be talking today about video marketing in kind of a different way than we typically do. We’re going to flip it on its head and actually talk about video marketing from the production side, we’re going to talk about how to actually get the fundamentals of production getting video prepared for how do you plan out a video, how do you do scripting? How do you get this shooting right for video footage and using some of the tools for getting the video prepared. And when you need to hire a professional. I mean, so many times, there comes a point where you decide, okay, I’m going to do video, I’m going to make video part of my business marketing strategy. And then it doesn’t happen, it doesn’t materialize. And that’s when maybe a professional needs to be brought in. And that’s why today I have brought on the show with me, Sharon Sobel. She is the owner of picture this video and has been producing video projects for business clients for over 15 years, having evolved from tape to DVD to online delivery, her experience and varied skills help her clients Rest assured they’re getting someone knowledgeable and experienced in all facets of production. So she’s able to work with them to produce something within their budget. And that meets their video needs. I know Sharon from Alexandria, Virginia, where she has been a bedrock of the Alexandria small business community. And so it’s always a pleasure to be with and around Sharon. And so welcome to the show. Sharon.

Sharon Sobel 1:55

Thank you.

Ray Sidney-Smith 1:57

So we’re going to talk today about preparing and planning four, and all the various meat and potatoes of actually taking recording video, and that’s your specialty. And so I wanted to for you to just give us a little bit about what I didn’t introduce about you in the show. What what’s a little bit about your background, what got you into video, and why do you still do it today for businesses.

Sharon Sobel 2:20

I actually got interested in video in high school, I took a TV video production class and found that was my calling. That’s exactly what I wanted to do with my life. And so I got a degree from Radford University and I had an internship during that college time at a news affiliate and internships are great, you should always learn something from internships. And what I learned was, I did not want to do news. So that was valuable. I didn’t know exactly where I wanted to work. But I knew it was not news. And even No, I, I loved all of the parts of making a video product. I just didn’t like news stories being that product. So I moved up to the metro DC area, because it’s a big area, there’s a lot of different kinds of work here. And I just kind of I started in cable TV and did some work in that. And I just kept getting drawn to wanting to do more corporate and business video products that would help businesses. So that’s, that’s where I’ve been for the past 15 years. And I love the idea that businesses come to me with an idea of what they want to do. And then I help bring that to creation. And sometimes they don’t have concrete ideas. Sometimes they have goals, and then I can work with them, and collaboratively we can figure out how video can help get that goal met.

Ray Sidney-Smith 4:01

And that brings us really to the first idea or point of our discussion today, which is how do you prepare for and plan out video? I think it’s it’s something that is it’s a linear construct. And so you have to think about things in terms of storyboarding, and sometimes business owners are not linear thinkers by nature. I don’t think humans are necessarily linear thinkers by nature. Some of us are, some of some of us aren’t, I’m not going to get into a psychological debate with anyone about that. But But I think how, how do you frame that for businesses? How do you get into that mindset for planning for video?

Sharon Sobel 4:38

It’s not as hard as it seems, in that if there’s a couple of things that you need a couple questions really, you need to answer to start driving where this video products going to go? You want to identify who the audience is going to be? Is it going to be if it’s a marketing video, it’s likely going to be potential customers? If it’s a training video, it’s going to be people that already know your business, have some introduction to it. So who is the audience that’s important to answer? And what do you want them to know? And or do if you want them to buy something, you’ve got to have a pretty strong message if you just want them to be aware of your product or your business. Being aware of a product or business is very different than actually selling. If you think about Coca Cola ads, Coca Cola, they know that they’re out there, everybody knows what Coca Cola is. So at this point, they’re not necessarily asking you to please buy a Coca Cola, they are more in an awareness space now, where they just saturate the market so that you are definitely aware of Coca Cola anytime you’re near soda stand. So it’s, it’s a different kind of video? And then how does your product or service stand out in the marketplace? What makes it different? Why did you get into your business or the way that you do your business? Then I think Lastly, and probably the hardest question to ask is, what is this video going to look like, you can have a range of styles out there, it can be a testimonial of you, or someone with your company speaking directly to camera. That’s probably the simplest and most inexpensive video to produce. It could be a case study where you get your customers to actually kind of speak on your behalf, they had a problem they came to you this is how you solved it. Or maybe you’re a fan of those whiteboard explainer videos that are out there, those are really great when you don’t have a lot of actual video visuals available. Or you’ve got kind of an abstract concept that’s a little hard to get video of. But you don’t want necessarily just someone talking about it on camera, it’s a bit more dynamic, you can do those and kind of a package deal. So it’s a bit more predictable. So that’s the last part is kind of Pun intended picturing this video. So once you picture the video, that’s the last component, and then you can get moving.

Ray Sidney-Smith 7:26

The idea here is to create a formalized kind of method for how you’re going to produce videos, and maybe mapping out a workflow diagram, maybe a flowchart of what’s going to demand what over time, because really, as a business owner, we know that we’re going to want systems in place that are going to be replicable. And that’ll make it easier the next time in the next time in the next time. So that first time out, it’s going to be a little bit more work. But that means then every time thereafter, that hard work done up front is going to kind of cascade and bring a greater productivity to your video making process. I wanted you to touch base a little bit with me, Sharon, on the scripting process. I know that you have kind of your own thoughts on this, what what’s the what’s the sort of method or the questions you asked about scripting a video

Sharon Sobel 8:21

scripting your video, there’s a couple of points about scripting it that people can get into trouble with by not scripting, it. scripting ensures that you have everything covered audio and video wise. The way that I work when I’m doing a script is I make a two column script. And one column is going to be the audio everything that you’re hearing. The other column is the video everything that you’re seeing. So the audio is usually the easiest part to do. Because it provides you know, the, the script that narration for your video, you don’t want to just do a two paragraph essay. That’s great. But what are we going to see, paragraphs are great for radio and two column scripts are great for video. So once you’ve got all of the audio written down, then you can start thinking about what are people going to see when they hear that part? Are they going to see the person on camera reading it is that going to be a voiceover and we see other things will there be graphics needed, all of that kind of stuff. So that’s why I prefer to have a two column script because you’re covering both the audio and the video and you’re not leaving anything out, Sharon has actually provided us with a really great PowerPoint presentation that she has put together for what we’re talking about here today. So it’s kind of a cliff notes version in it, there’s actually a wonderful diagram, you know, sort of snapshot of one of these scripts that is a sample for you to be able to look at. So as you are listening to Sharon, you can go run over there to the show notes web and beyond cast. com forward slash 010, the episode number and you will find a link to this. So Sharon continued telling us about kind of the two column approach to scripting video with video in one column and audio and the other. Yeah, sure. And thanks for referring to that PowerPoint, because that helps here, if you are going to look at that PowerPoint, there’s actually you’ll see four columns. And the far left is the running time column, which is the amount of time that that actual shot is estimated to take then there’s the video column, what you’re going to see the audio column, what you’re going to hear, and then the last column is TRT that’s total running time, I find that’s helpful. Because if you’re aiming to not have a video more than two minutes long, if you’re not experienced in writing, you don’t know how long or short things take. So you can just do the math on the right hand side. So you see like the first one is two seconds, then the next one’s three seconds, which makes the total running time five and it just adds up on the right hand side, you can see here that everything that is on the audio side is matched on the video side with what we will be seeing at that time. I will say to add on to this, that beginner video, people will think that the video has to reflect what the audio is meaning if the line is and the sunset graciously into the distance we actually see a sun setting it doesn’t have to be that it can be something subtle or different or graphic that complements what the audio is. But it does speak for itself video can speak for itself on occasion.

Ray Sidney-Smith 11:58

Yeah, and I think that’s really good for people to know is that sometimes we want we want to sometimes be literal in audio and that’s really important when you’re on a podcast like we are but video is they’re basically pictures at 20 frames per second, right, right. Or the although there could be different frames per second but you know, as a as your as you’re watching moving images, it can be far more evocative and an explanatory than, than the words and so remember that you’re trying to portray emotion and emotion as I frequently saying workshops, right. So video is supposed to explain motion and emotion and that by itself without any words can be very, very can can fill in the gaps of what you need to be said in words. I’d like to transition us into talking about shooting now the the motion part of video how how do we how do we position ourselves with some maybe tips and tricks from you from your experience in terms of getting video footage because, you know, the reality is, is that we we if we’re going to do it ourselves if you know like if I’m going to shoot video and DIY a project, I don’t have a video background. So my my goal is to get competent video. And so I’m hoping that you can give our listeners some tips to up their game.

Sharon Sobel 13:18

So I’m not gonna sit here and tell you that like camera to use what camera not to use, that’s another day. Truthfully, you can use a tablet or an iPhone and shoot great video. Or you can use a standard camcorder or larger camera. It’s totally up to your resources and what you are comfortable with and experienced with. But all of those devices will produce great video. That’s That’s a true story. However, operator error does come into play.

So that can be avoided with tripods. They are your friend, you can get tripods for tablets and iPhone mobile devices. I’ve seen them on Amazon pretty inexpensively, I would suggest that and then there’s some basics for shooting, try and have even lighting with not deep shadows. Avoid shooting into areas like windows that have much brighter light behind this object, because they’re going to the subject will just be completely darkened by that basic framing, meaning not too much headroom, not too much space between the top of the person’s head and the top of your frame. Those are the basics for shooting it’s really practice as far as zoom controls, and, and knowing what looks good frame wise. And, and those kinds of things. If you if you have a complex video, that’s the part that you may want to not do yourself. It just but if you’re just shooting your CEO, sitting in a chair, talking about the company that’s not really that hard. You can, you can probably do that yourself and and have a great product. So it really depends on the complexity of what you’re trying to get. As far as whether you need a professional for shooting or your video is so simple that you can do it on your own.

Ray Sidney-Smith 15:14

I know that I’ve experienced the issue with daylight or having to brighter light against a chroma key back screen about Well, you’ve gotten

Sharon Sobel 15:23

really advanced, right? Yeah,

Ray Sidney-Smith 15:27

yeah, exactly. And so. So it’s, it’s actually taken quite a bit of time of adjusting to getting the right Kelvin lighting.

Sharon Sobel 15:35

That’s really intermediate Ray.

Ray Sidney-Smith 15:36

Yeah, I know.

But, but I just want to mention it for people. Because I think that you think that just having big bright light on the subject, even not behind the subject, right, which, as you said, you know, having good Good, good light on person. But too much light can also be a bad thing. It can wash up a person out. I recently did a seminar where I was interviewed, and I just happened to be set up in a space because I travel all the time, I don’t control all of my spaces. And so I was in this environment and it just had this big, bright light, it looked like the light of God on me. And, and so so it just, it just washed me out and find you know, I was able to deliver the audio content, but from a video perspective, you know, it looked like I was like walking toward the light. So dear,

Sharon Sobel 16:27

that’s not the kind of video you wanted to make.

Ray Sidney-Smith 16:29

No, no, but you know, just talking heads. But, you know, still you should be aware that there is too much light, absolutely potential as well. You mentioned the idea of shots and the scene and so on, so forth. He talked a little bit about audio and what people should really think about when it comes to video and audio. I know that I frequently say to people, when I do video marketing workshops, that they should really pay more attention to the quality of the audio than the quality of the video. Do you agree or disagree when it’s a DIY kind of situation?

Sharon Sobel 17:02

I absolutely agree. And I think a lot of people are fooled into thinking that because their device, their camera, whatever has a built in mic, that they’ve got the audio covered. And I one of the first things I tell people is that is not your primary microphone, that is your secondary microphone. It should be is for background or redundancy in case your primary microphone goes down. You haven’t lost everything. But I I strongly suggest that all of your sound should be miked. If you have someone that’s able to have a lovely or microphone put on them. If they’re the only person speaking in the scene, I definitely recommend that there are wireless versions. And there are hardwired plugin versions. Even for smartphones and tablets. They have these when I say primary microphone, that would be the microphones closest to your sound source, whether that is a person or you’re recording that the wording of the food processor you’re selling or whatever. It’s the microphone that is getting the cleanest version of your sound.

Ray Sidney-Smith 18:18

That’s great advice. Thank you. I know that you also mentioned simple DIY and then getting more complex and even as I was talking about the green screen and the lighting and so forth, he said, Okay, now that’s intermediate that’s, that’s more in the the higher level stuff. Can we talk about when when you want to get a professional to help you with video, most business owners have no idea what the first step is even so can you give us some of the the kind of step by step solutions you should look for. With regard to video marketing, video professionals, not marketing professionals, video professionals like yourself, and what we should all look for in a great videographer.

Sharon Sobel 19:04

Well, I’m gonna just back up a little bit and say, if you remember the beginning of our conversation, when we were talking about how do you start with your video project? And I said, is basically some questions you need to answer. Who is your audience? What do you want them to know? And or do how do you stand out those kinds of things about a start, first of all, coming up with what kind of video are you producing that really has to come first, if you’re going to then identify who you need to help you. And it may be just help that you need, you may not need everything handled real quick, I’m just going to go over three different kinds of people the basics of a video, any video product. So there’s a videographer and they do the camera work, they’ll do minimal or standard audio recording, they’re going to do the shooting for you and you want them to record the primary audio, make sure you let them know so that they bring the right gear for that, then you have an editor. Now, sometimes your videographer and editor can be the same person, if they have both those skill sets, it’s not always the case, there will be a videography process, which is the shooting there will be an editing process, which is the editing. So if the same person can do both of those things, that’s fantastic. But the editor is going to edit the video, usually per the script that they get from the client. And some editors like to have the client sit with them while they’re doing the editing. And some editors and clients would prefer to be separate. And just show me the first version, I’ll tell you what you need to fix. OK, now I’m going to look at the next version, fix these things. Okay, now we’ve got a winner. Great, I will tell you that sitting with an editor is a bit like watching sausage get made, you may not want to watch the process. But in the end, you will enjoy the product.

And then the third person is a video producer, a video producer is not necessarily the client, the video producer usually is is more of a liaison between the client and any of the people that are doing the work to carry out the vision, the budget and the video, basically, from start to finish. They make sure that all of the problems that you might not realize are down the road, they make sure that those get ironed out before they happen. They can take a more proactive approach in creating the video.

Ray Sidney-Smith 21:51

That’s a great explanation. I think that’s really helpful for business owners. Because if you’re not in the business, how are you supposed to know that there are actually three different professionals who work on video, right. And I think that’s, that’s really, really helpful. So do you have a a, an understanding about the difference in who you should hire and what particular environments you know, like you said, there was kind of an explainer video with maybe animation. And then there’s the talking head kind of scenarios are, are there are there general things that people should pay attention to, when it comes to choosing one particular professional over another. I know, that’s a super gross generalization. But any, any little, any little hints or tips there would be helpful.

Sharon Sobel 22:32

So once you have an idea of what you want, what kind of video project you want, once you start talking to video producers, and that’s where I would start as a video producer, really ask them if they have done these kinds of projects, just like you’re envisioning. And if you don’t, if you’re not exactly sure how to communicate what you want, I find a really good idea for my clients is there’s a ton of videos out there on YouTube. And a lot of times, it helps if someone says, I want to, I really like this part of this video. I don’t like this part. And I like the graphics. And this they can give me they can show me examples. It’s sort of like having pictures before you go to your hairdresser, you may not be able to, you know, communicate what you want it to look like. But once you see it, you’re like, Yes, I like this, but not the curly part. If you can give some examples, then it gives them a good idea of what they’re going to be in for. And whether they believe they can do that job for you. If they’ve done it before. Or if it’s just kind of a cousin of work that they have done already, I think you should ask for proposal, you want to think about your video projects, sort of like a construction project? I think so the video producer is really like the general foreman, the general forming keeps everyone in line make sure everybody shows up on time knows what they need to do. That’s what the video producer does it just like you would expect a proposal and quote from any big construction project that you need to have done, you should expect the same from a video producer asked about their payment policy, are they charging you in advance? Are they charging you after they’ve delivered the product for myself? My company generally we we do it in phases, because I think it helps small business owners with cash flow. So and it helps me with cash flow, to be honest. So we bill at the pre production stage, the production stage, and then a month after the product has been delivered, it breaks the payment up into three different payments. One of the most important things I think you should ask is how would the company handle a change in the scope of the project that could affect the cost. Unfortunately, I and along with many other video producers, when they first started, they got burned a lot, because people would start with one vision. And then as the project progressed, things would go wrong. Or they would change their mind down this or that. And if there’s not communication between the producer and the client, the producer is going to end up not being able to charge for that. And it’s it’s not a good feeling. If you again, going back to the construction analogy, if you decide to change your floor tile, from vinyl to porcelain, that’s a price difference. And your contract was originally for vinyl. So there needs to be a process in place that both sides understand that will be put into effect if the project change because that it’s not unusual for a project to change along the way. Ask them how long the process will take. And if that is in their proposal, any deadlines or milestones that you can expect? And then lastly, how do they charge for editing? How do they calculate how much editing a project will take? So some people charge on a flat fee for editing based on the project. Other people charging hourly amount? And if they’re charging an hourly amount, you want to understand how they calculate that. And it’s not that you have the answer for for how they’re calculating that. But you want to make sure they have an answer. That sounds a little odd. I know. But like for myself, I know that it takes me depending on the product, it may take me to two hours per one minute of finished video of editing time. So if you come to me and say you want a five minute video, I’m going to say okay, the editing will probably take maybe 10 to 12 hours, I’ll put in two hours of you know, buffer just in case things go wrong. That’s why I say ask that question. Because otherwise, they may be really not understanding how long a project will take. They might actually even overcharge you because they don’t want to get burnt.

Ray Sidney-Smith 27:24

I want to take a step back and and talk about tools. We’re going to get to the best tool of the week. But I wanted I wanted to talk specifically about some of these video tools with you. Because I think that sometimes you come across a video project and you need to figure out what you’re going to use to make these things happen. And it’s kind of like going back to your construction analogy. You need to know what kind of wrench you’re going to need. You need to know what kind of hammer what are the what are the supplies you’re going to need? Can you go over a little bit for us what you need in the scripting shooting and editing process. If you you are going to DIY project and if you’re going to provide if you’re going to hire a professional Do you need any of these tools yourself in in the process? Because I think that i think it’s it’s legitimate to know are you going to need video hosting for example, even though you’re not producing the video at the end of the day, you’re going to be handed a video and and what do you do with that thing.

Sharon Sobel 28:24

So for scripting, I just use Microsoft Word using the table feature

that I think most people have Microsoft Word as far as shooting

I mentioned you can use whatever device you have smartphone tablet camcorder, but record the sound with a microphone plugged into it, not just a camera mic. And if your device does not have a means to plug in a microphone of some sort. Do not use it. Please do not use it for recording video.

Then editing. There’s, there’s I’ve got in the PowerPoint. Five different things that people can look at as far as editing. And one of them actually will allow you to create an animated explainer video for up to 45 seconds. That might be something to try out. That’s for free just to get your feet wet. I guess there’s a couple other editing apps out there that allow you to kind of DIY your editing. There’s a YouTube video editor, there’s another thing to record, convert and compress your videos for online delivery. And of course, you do need a place to put those videos. So you know, my world is creating videos. But I’m counting on the fact that you as my client know what you’re going to do with those videos, I’m going to defer to you on that Ray for that kind of advice.

Ray Sidney-Smith 29:56

Totally. And so so that takes us kind of to the one of the points we were discussing in the ramp up to us talking today was the fact that in your world, your job is to help with the production of video and editing and then finalizing the product. But it’s not marketing the video how to get it seen is not your job. And I think that I think that a lot of people miss that fact in the video marketing world, right. We hear about video marketing, we hear about the importance of video marketing. And it is important. I mean, the world is going toward video slowly but surely. And we are seeing all kinds of new platforms come alive. And so I wanted to talk a little bit about this and get your thoughts on it as well, first and foremost, to say that once you have a final video, whether it’s a 32nd video, a 10 second video, for example, for Instagram stories all the way up to full length feature length films, you need to get it someplace. So you know, you need to figure out we’re going to host it you need to figure out also how you were going to distribute that video from a marketing perspective and how you’re going to use that as it within a broader content strategy. So think about these things in terms of what the videos goal is going back to what Sharon said earlier, what’s the what’s the reason for creating this video? Why do you want it created? And what’s its message going to be and look at the overarching business itself to figure out how video will be used integrated with all of the various other marketing and sales features are you going to use this video as a part of your sales presentation is it going to be something that’s just available to to potential customers on their journey from top of the funnel, you know, someone who’s just interested in your business to middle of the funnel, who’s a lead to eventually someone who is a who’s ready to buy now customer. So as you understand these various parts of where the video is going to be utilized, then you can much better understand what kind of video you’re going to create. We have a couple of platforms that are really important today. And I want to cover those platforms and kind of hear your thoughts, Sharon in terms of which ones you see more clients wanting to produce for today, at least from the professional hiring side. And then I can kind of give an idea in terms of the DIY side. So first is YouTube. We’ve already mentioned YouTube. There’s Vimeo. And then we have the we have Instagram Instagrams actually split into two different categories. Now as of just recently Instagram launched something called IPTV so you have Instagram video which is available within stories which is limited to 10 seconds and then you have Instagram posts also I believe there’s a 10 second limitation on that and now Instagram has produced IPTV there’s actually a separate app although I don’t believe you need the separate app in order to experience it TV I’ve downloaded and installed it just because I wanted to be experience the the pure IPTV world and so I ggV is actually very different from all of the other video that’s out there though so i g TV is vertical as opposed to in landscape mode so you’re watching it purely in portrait you can’t publish in in landscape if you publish in landscape than it shrinks it down and makes it vertical so it looks horrible and the idea is is that it’s for a mobile first new to the new technology young people so so these are young people who are who have never really experienced the landscape video they’re there on mobile only world and they are experienced that so i ggV is very cool very new and for the right businesses this can be very powerful because it allows you to create video with your tablet or your smartphone right wherever you are and it’s much more I want to say authentic or real but it’s not meant to be highly produced necessarily it’s meant to be a interaction and engagement tool you you’re allowed up to an hour of video as opposed to 10 seconds so that’s a that’s a big difference and you recorded on your phone you upload it you edit it potentially you know on your phone and then and then upload it directly so you have a lot of latitude there and and we’ll see as more businesses become aware of IPTV and then utilizing that that service. Then we switch gears to the live video. And right now we have YouTube Live, we have Facebook Live. And we have Periscope, which is owned by Twitter. And so you’ll see the the live streams in Twitter provided by by Periscope. And these are again, options for different kinds of video. YouTube Live is available within your mobile phone in the YouTube app, you just click on the little camera icon and boom, you can YouTube Live, right? Same thing with Facebook Live, you can do it on your desktop on your computer. Or you can do it on the tablet through the Facebook app. And then Periscope, which is available through the Twitter app. And again, that’s mobile only. And again, that’s that kind of vertical video. Although I believe you can you can do landscape periscope or Twitter live video. And so you have those options as well. So you have to really decide how to plan out your video strategy to match whether or not you’re going to do something live. Or you’re going to have something pre recorded and then distributed over time. Sharon Have you seen more people doing more or less since you pay attention to the video world? Are you seeing more people do more types of videos in in an on particular platforms?

Sharon Sobel 35:51

Yeah. Um, thanks for asking about that. I think YouTube is still the traditional outlet that people think first and foremost when it comes to putting their videos online. And YouTube has definitely improved over the years. And the fact that you can pretty easily embed the YouTube player into a website does make it appealing, or you don’t have to get too complicated

the Instagram thing, it’s I gotta be honest, it’s a little new to me. And that was intriguing. I’m going to look more into that. And then as far as live video, what I really call web streaming, those have definitely been used more I want to say in like corporate event video. So maybe it’s a product launch that you’ve got, and you want to, you know, not just share it with the 50 people that are there at your office that day, when you’re launching a new product, but you want to share it with the world, you can use web streaming to do that as a live event.

And then that’s also been used in a much bigger scale as far as conferences and conventions that may want to start using those platforms to show particular maybe a keynote or just a

you know, a breakout session that would be of interest to people, that kind of thing.

Ray Sidney-Smith 37:31

What I always say the businesses is you need to think about every moment in your business was an opportunity to capture content, right. And there is there’s no question in my mind that businesses have content to share, they just don’t think about the opportunities to capture it, they don’t have the systems in place. And so if you’re listening, your job is to create the systems to be able to capture the content so that it matches your strategy. And so just as Sharon said, you know, the idea that you have various types of things that happened throughout your business life cycle, you need to figure out which moments are for which audiences, right, so the the corporate board meeting that you have once a year, if you’re a corporation, or you know, an established entity that has a requirement for it, that’s probably not the most exciting luxurious thing to video. But you know, you might record that for stakeholders, maybe not with audio, but it becomes really great B roll kind of that background video that’s playing while you put some text on it, you know, you’re not, you’re not actually airing any of the things that are actually said. But the background video is now seeing all of the various public faces of your company together in the same room, discussing pertinent, important issues. And now you can place text on top of that’s talking about, you know, new exciting things that are being discussed about the business. And that might be really great for stakeholders. Whereas if you’re a pastry shop, and you want to capture the morning pastry coming out of the oven, you might have to train your pastry chef or your other staff who is making the coffee and who’s getting the display put together to turn on Periscope or YouTube live with their phone and broadcasting that through your your social channels to be able to let people know as they wake up in the morning, they see the YouTube Live for your pastry shop or your cafe and they see those fresh baked goods and that coffee steaming out of the pot and being made and that’s going to excite them about your brand and wanting to come make that pitstop on their way to work to come buy from you as as opposed to buying from Starbucks, or Dunkin Donuts, or one of the other large commercial brands, you need to be able to really use video in ways that are not difficult. But you need to learn how to create the systems to capture the moments

Sharon Sobel 40:08

I love that point about it doesn’t seem very dynamic to capture imagery at a corporate board meeting. But you know, one of the first things that I asked when I meet with a new client is what media assets Do you already have in hand that we might be able to use that will save you money, I don’t have to reshoot it, we don’t have to stage it, you already have this stuff. And you own the copyrights so we can include it in your video. So I love the idea of getting a lot of media there. Even though you don’t necessarily know how it’s going to be used down the road, maintaining a library of it, and in some way at your company is it can be very helpful later. And cost saving.

Ray Sidney-Smith 40:54

I love it. I love the idea of being useful and cost saving.

And we as we near the end of our our discussion about this particular topic. And then we’ll get to best tool of the week do you have any parting thoughts for small business owners who are looking to do video

Sharon Sobel 41:11

we’ve covered a lot in this conversation. And I think it’s it’s just really important that business owners understand first of all, who their audience is, what their mission is in creating the video. But you know, my I think the bottom line for me is, it doesn’t matter how great your video is, or how many of them you have. If you don’t have a plan in place to get other eyes on them. All of your efforts are in vain. If nobody looks at them.

Ray Sidney-Smith 41:44

I couldn’t agree more. I couldn’t agree more. And thank you. Thank you for that now up best tool of the week, this is where I get a chance to share with you. And our guest gets to share with you their best tool favorite tool that they’re currently using. And of course, tools change. So take it for what it is. But we’re going to talk today about two different tools. One that both Sharon and myself are really excited about of late. So I’m going to start with the with an application called ripple. And that is spelled r i p L. And again, there are links to this in the show notes. And so ripple is a video an animated video tool that allows you to share to Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, and LinkedIn all in one tap. There is an iPhone app. And there is a Google Android app in the Play Store. And how it works is that you add photos and text to each post, you choose a layout, you kind of have a theme or what they call a style to customize each of these posts. And then the then you write your caption, add your hash hash tags, and so on, so forth. And ripple produces a video from that content, and then pushes it out to all of the social channels that you want it to. It is brilliant. And the way that it operates. There’s a free version. And then there is a pro version. And the pro version comes with many more animated designs, it allows you to be able to put your logo on every post, you can have more images in each of the designs, you can add music and, and more fonts. And you can also schedule posts. And then of course, save the videos locally in the pro version. So the pro version is really quite worth it. But I’d say try out the free version first, see if it works for you for what you’re trying to do. And then you can use ripple on the pro version. And like I said, I’ve, I’ve now been testing it with several clients. And it’s been a really game changer for them. Because for the everyday kinds of posts, again, going back to the pastry shop kind of environment, being able to push out the ephemeral video that needs to go out all the time that having a tool that just can produce it as opposed to the more professional stuff that Sharon and I were talking about earlier. This is This creates a professional video but more for a femoral post. So I’m going to turn it over to you. Now. Sharon, you have a pretty interesting tool of the week that I would not have guessed when when you set it along to me. And then I then I checked out the website for it. And I was like, I could use this at home.

So So tell us a little bit about the rock and roller cart.

Sharon Sobel 44:39

I swear I I spent like a week thinking about how I was going to answer that. When you told me I had to come up with a tool because there’s a lot of great things out there that I loved. I’m going to check out this ripple thing but the rock and roller car it was the very first thing I bought when I decided to be self employed in video production. And I still have the same one that I bought over 15 years ago. So I’m like that’s got to be a favorite thing, right? I mean, I’ve had it for 15 years. I use it every time I have a shoot. And just so you guys know what this thing is. It’s a cart that allows you to allows me to carry big cases of video gear but you can use it however you like. And it has eight different configurations. It has wheels, you can get the wheels that are inflatable or you can get hard rubberized ones. And I think you get the hard rubberized ones. That thing is going to last last forever. I had like a little tune up done on it a couple months ago at Ace Hardware. I just brought my card and I was like it’s a little wobbly. Can you check this screw and and they just tightened it all up. For me. It was great. So and it collapses. And it fits like in my car behind my backseat. So the fact that it’s so strong and compact and versatile. That is why it is my favorite tool.

Ray Sidney-Smith 46:03

I think that’s fantastic. Yeah, they have all of these various wheels they have. The the cart itself is is amazing. As you said it’s it’s highly configurable and you’re moving things of any kind. It just looks phenomenal. It’s great. And it just stores easily love it. Thank you for sharing that. And so this brings us to the end of our conversation. Sharon Sobel of picture this video, how can people learn more about you stay in touch with you get in touch with you if they wanted to.

Sharon Sobel 46:35

So to get in touch with me, you just go to my website. All of the social stuff is there Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, and you can see more of the stuff that I’m about and stuff that I’ve produced. PictureThisVideo.net

Ray Sidney-Smith 46:48

thank you so much Sharon, for joining me here today on web and beyondcast.

Sharon Sobel 46:53

You’re welcome. Thanks for having me.

Ray Sidney-Smith 46:54

Thanks for listening to web and beyond cast where small business comes to learn about marketing and managing on the web and beyond. I’m your host Ray Sidney-Smith. Until next time, here’s to your small business success on the web and beyond.