Archive for the 'Rich Media' Category
User generated content is a hot topic right now. Many businesses are trying to encourage their customers to submit content (photos, video, etc.) as part of their new media marketing efforts.
One really fantastic example is in this case not a business but the State of Minnesota’s tourism office. They’re calling the campaign “My Favorite Minnesota.” The basic premise of this new marketing campaign is “Who knows more about having fun in Minnesota than Minnesotans?“
They started out by recruiting 15 “experts” on different travel and tourism interests in the state who put together their lists of favorite destination spots. The lists include photos, videos, personal rankings, and more. Altogether it’s a whole lot of really great information for anyone interested in doing any traveling in Minnesota.
To expand on their base site, they are running a contest to encourage other enthusiasts to create their own lists of favorite places, and asking them to submit photos and video as well. This is a GREAT way to enlist the help of others to make a fantastic tool even better.
Are there ways your business could do something like this to encourage your customers to submit content that can help you create a valuable community online?
(Hat tip to Patrick Schaber for making me aware of this great site.)
Technorati Tags: my favorite minnesota, user generated content, video, state of minnesota, tourism
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A Few months back I posted some thoughts about Adam Steen’s post on encouraging business owners to get working on an elevator pitch. (Also check out his main blog site if you’re not a regular reader.)
My suggestion was to record yourself pitching your idea on video. A virtual elevator pitch.
Apparently I wasn’t the only one thinking along these lines. It seems a new video sharing community has popped up in the last month funded by Paypal co-founder Peter Thiel, and former Chairman of MySpace, Richard Rosenblat, among others.
The new video community, Vator.tv, (as in elevator pitch) is designed to give business owners, entrepreneurs, investors, and others a place to pitch ideas using video, and to learn about other businesses, pitches and ideas… all the while networking with other like-minded, forward-thinking people.
Sounds to me like a great idea!! The business community has been waiting for a “YouTube for business” and I feel like this idea has incredible potential!! If nothing else, this new community gives business owners another tool to reach a more business-specific audience than some of the other well-known video communities.
Again, that’s Vator.tv. Check it out!
[If anyone doesn’t know, we’re working on putting together several packages to help entrepreneurs use video to promote their businesses. We’ll be offering consulting, video production, editing, hosting, and assistance with posting to various video communities. Stay tuned or give us a shout for more details!]
Technorati Tags: video promotion, video pitch, web video, vator, elevator pitch, youtube for business, youtube, adam steen
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Coming up on Monday, July 16, Google is launching a promo for the upcoming third Bourne movie, Bourne Ultimatum. Dubbed The Ultimate Search for Bourne with Google, this new promo idea from Universal Pictures and Google will simultaneously help raise awareness of the movie as well as drive viewers to Google’s products: search, maps, images, translation, gadgets, and YouTube.
What a creative way to jointly promote the products of two very different companies!!
What ways could your business partner with another to creatively promote both your businesses?
Technorati Tags: google, bourne, jason bourne, bourne ultimatum, universal pictures, google search, google maps, google images, google translation, google gadgets, youtube
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Do you run advertising in offline publications?
Do you spend money on direct mail marketing?
Do you hand out business cards to potential clients?
If you answered yes to any of these questions, this post is for you.
Let me start by telling you a quick story. I recently received a post card in the mail from a local real estate agency. The two pictured agents were trying to get me interested in some town homes for sale here in Ankeny.
In order for someone to contact them they only printed a phone number and a physical address for their office on the card. No web site address… no easy way for me to get more information. Sadly, I think they really mis-spent their money on this mailing, because I cannot imagine anyone in the demographic they were trying to sell to wanting to do anything other than look for more information online. That’s what I would have wanted to do.
And I would not have wanted to land directly on their corporate web site either. No, I would want to go directly to learn more information about these specific properties they were marketing to me.
Imagine if they had constructed either a mini-site, or even a sub-section on their existing site just to provide really great information about these properties. I could have learned about special financing, the qualities that make the neighborhood special, watched video of ducks peacefully floating by on the pond, looked at photos of the properties themselves and maybe even been taken on a virtual tour of the properties by one of the sales people who could have taken the time to build my trust long before I bothered to pick up my phone and call. Now that would have been effective!!
So, you spend time and money trying to get your products and services noticed… how can you use that offline message to bring people online? What details and useful information could you provide online to exponentially increase the power of your message? How can you craft your message in such a way as to encourage people to learn more… on their time… on their terms… online?
Next time you are planning a marketing project, give me a shout. We can work together to develop a plan (offline and online) that empowers your audience to understand all of the things they need to know to make an informed decision.
Technorati Tags: Offline marketing, online marketing, direct mail, mini sites, internet marketing, design
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MonetizeMedia allows content owners to make money on their videos, publishers to create communities around video content, and advertisers a new medium to reach their audience. Hat tip to Greg Verdino for the link.
UstreamTV is a platform that provides live interactive video for everyone.
Anyone with a camera and an Internet connection can use Ustream to broadcast to a global audience. Hat tip to Rodney Rumford for the link. Rodney also is involved in a couple of interesting new web 2.0 video-related technology startups: VideoSticky.com and Mojopages.com
Welcome to TV 2.0!! New video startup Joost.com has entered pubic beta. TechCrunch has been giving out free invites to readers who are interested. Already many high-profile networks and content providers are supplying free video content for Joost.
An interesting new concept in user-generated commercials has popped up. Startup Qoof.com dubs its video library “USERMERCIALS”. According to their web site, you can upload your own usermercial and they will give you $5.00.
Startup veotag.com is offering businesses the ability to “tag” their audio and video to create links that jump right to the appropriate location in a video file, create chapter headings, tables of contents and allow search engines the ability to see what’s inside audio or video files.
For travelers, and those using maps to “explore” new places… EveryScape is a new startup that is planning to mash up maps with 360 degree virtual tours (maybe video too?). As it stands right now, the concept is great, but I would say they have a little work to do on their user interface. I found it extremely cumbersome to use. If they don’t fix it, they’re going to lose users from the get-go. Cool idea though.
That’s it for the video links today! If anyone has any other interesting video sites worth sharing, shoot me an email or post in comments below.
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everyscape,
greg verdino,
mojopages,
monetizemedia,
qoof,
rodney rumford,
techcrunch,
ustreamtv,
video sticky,
interactive video,
joost,
usermercials,
veotag,
web video,
video
Why shouldn’t you put video in a box? Well, you can. And it’s perfectly fine. I just wanted to point out that video on the web need not live in that standard old rectangular box shape we’ve all been parking ourselves in front of for decades.
Granted, video cameras still record images in that shape, but with a few tricks and some cropping or masking, that video can take on new life as a really long or really tall rectangle, a square, a circle, an organic shape, or anything the mind can imagine… With a few more tricks, it can even ‘float’ on a page without any confining borders whatsoever.
Ok. “Great,” you say, “but so what?”
I’m just suggesting that we try to think outside of the boundaries that seem set in stone. Video has always been a rectangle. And a very squarish one at that… well, with HDTV it’s wider, but still not much different.
Things that are different, get noticed. Unique ways of delivering information cause viewers to pause (parden the pun) and pay attention a little bit more.
Just something to think about as we explore the new video possibilities that are becoming available to us as a powerful new tool to communicate ideas and information. Boxes are fine, just don’t be constrained by them.
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I’m a Mac guy by nature. But when I see something great come along in the Windows world, I do try to take note. One thing I came across today was a new video studio that Dell has put together to provide free online video information for users in the categories of “home,” “small business,” and “IT pro.”
StudioDell is designed to help you get the most from your Dell experience. Through videos and podcasts, we’ll share Dell’s expertise on emerging technologies and use interactive tools to communicate directly with you.
I haven’t gone through and watched very many of these yet, but I thought the tool was very well done and the videos did seem to be helpful, informative and were produced well. Overall, I think this is a fabulous tool to help connect with Dell’s end-users while keeping its customers informed of the latest and greatest in technology.
Not only do I encourage you to take a look at this tool for your own knowledge, but I also want to encourage you to think about how you might use this sort of technology to connect with your customers and share relevant information that pertains to your line of business.
I’ll definitely be thinking about ways we can use technology like this in our web studio.
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I stumbled across a great article at BtoB Online about using video in email. For businesses wanting to extend the value of their email marketing content — video by email is a great opportunity. For those who are more technically inclined, the article has some great tips for using video in email messages to subscribers and mentions the success rate of one particular company using this new technology.
As with any email marketing plan, businesses need to be sure to provide relevant content in their video email campaigns. This as a great opportunity to improve upon current email marketing content and more effectively communicate with subscribers on a personal level. If your business is currently sending out newsletters or other subscription-based information, it might be time to consider adding a video component to them.
Some ideas for content:
- Your people: Our businesses are ultimately all about the relationships we have with the people we call customers. What a great way to tell your customers more about who you are, build their trust, and strengthen relationships! Don’t limit it to CEO’s, owners and managers! Include the whole team!
- Improving the lives of your customers (a.k.a Your product or service): Approached from a customer-centric perspective, think about ways you could reach out to the needs of your customers and show them how you and your products or services make their lives better.
- What makes you special: Without “tooting your own horn” there are many ways to show your customers just what it is that makes you special. You are special! You are unique! So talk about that.
- Solicit feedback: Your customers have ideas. They know what will make their lives better. Be sure to not only ask for their thoughts, but provide a convenient way of doing so. This is a very important part of the communication process. Marketing should be a two-way conversation!!! Make it so.
All right. Enough from me. What do you think? Are there ways your business could utilize video email to better connect with people? What did I leave out?
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