(Un)fortunately, there isn’t an exact science to the immediately known success of one type or style of video. Aside from the obvious attributes that make a video – messaging, talent, music, art, tone, etc. – there are an infinite number of directions to take a video: informational, advertorial, testimonial, event coverage, explanatory, and so on. With no clear “right or wrong” to creating a successful video, what’s the solution? Create them all and see what works the best for your business!
One of Studio-C’s clients, McGladrey LLP, the large, national assurance, tax, and consulting firm, understands this basic notion. Over the course of two years, they’ve consistently come to us for a large variety of videos (over 50 to date). We think it makes a great case study on how a corporation can use video for many purposes and directives. For example, they’ve used video for recruitment, internal communications, industry/media communications, merger and sales acquisitions, hiring announcements, service line explainers, office tours, client testimonials, training, both to highlight and promote their philanthropic efforts, for company meetings and events, and of course social media:
According to Kim McLaughlin, Talent Operations Manager, “At McGladrey, we use video to attract talent, to share thought leadership with the marketplace and to reinforce our culture with our employees. It’s quick; it’s impactful; it’s fun! You can say so much more in a 1-minute video than you can in a copy-heavy brochure, webpage or blog post. And people will more than likely chose watching something over reading something. We chose video to bring our people to life and give a glimpse inside McGladrey that we couldn’t otherwise create using other media.”
After creating a large variety of video content, you can start to see trends in engagement with your audiences and what subjectively “works” and what doesn’t. Yes, this fundamental “trial-and-error” format may seem daunting at first, but ultimately creating video allows for amazing opportunities to be creative with your business’ goals. Testing the waters in a new video direction for your business could lead to new or higher engagement and brand awareness.
The take away: try it all with video.