Product demo films are difficult to do proper. Here’s how we made one which worked…
Our first attempt at a product video turned into less than stellar.
That’s not to mention that it regarded awful; a friend of mine shot and edited it, and I think it turned out high-quality.
But we created it when we had been nevertheless young and immature as a enterprise. Before we in reality took the time to apprehend our customers as deeply as we do today.
And it showed.
It became, basically, a feature-packed “all approximately us” video press release.
And an awful lot to our chagrin, in all of our purchaser improvement, now not a single customer has used the terms “trouble-loose ticket control,” “clever automation” or “intuitive self-assist gear,” that is why looking that video now makes me balk.
We’ve come a long way considering then. We’re a little bit bigger, a touch bit smarter, and armed with a lot greater records and comments to help us inform the proper story.
We swapped out the vintage video with a testimonial video a while in the past, however we were missing anything that without a doubt confirmed our product in element to the humans that wanted to see it.
So whilst we redesigned our advertising and marketing website online a few months ago, we determined to take a new take a look at our video.
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How to Pick a Video Production Agency
In this place, we had been lucky.
We already had a super courting with Allan Branch and the group at Less Everything, the organisation at the back of Less Accounting and video corporation Less Films.
Note: Less Accounting is a Groove client, but we’re getting absolutely nothing for citing any of the corporation’s brands right here, and a weblog submit become in no way part of our discussions with them. They didn’t even know this mention became coming until the day prior to this when we reached out to confirm some factors inside the post for accuracy.
The biggest reason I mention them is due to the fact we hold getting emails like this one:
Question approximately explainer video
We had the Less parents produce a top notch testimonial video for us earlier this yr, so it turned into a no brainer to select them for this undertaking.
With that stated, we've got long past thru this system before when we took in advance stabs at making demo movies.
I’ve asked quite a few exclusive questions of capacity video partners, but truely, any exact employer can solution most of them “correctly.”
By a long way, the best screening question (that really made a clean separation among businesses we wanted to paintings with and those that we didn’t) become:
How will you method developing this video?
This query is designed to ensure that your dreams are aligned with those of the agency.
If the solution doesn’t encompass vital elements like getting a deep understanding of our potential customers and their wishes, needs and objections, in conjunction with what makes them need to buy, that’s an instant crimson flag.
We’ve achieved the paintings and may supply this information, but if the agency isn’t prioritizing that over fluffier things like “creativity,” then our desires aren’t aligned.
This also enables you get a feel for whether or not the enterprise’s undertaking control workflow suits with yours (e.G., do they use equipment that you’re familiar and secure with?), as well as a more preferred experience of what the crew could be like to work with.
Eric at Less Films additionally pointed out a terrific technical question that we ought to be asking:
Do we get to keep all the property/illustrations from the video?
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As a startup, our product is constantly evolving and enhancing, and we need to reveal off new developments. We also want which will make changes to the video if we think that parts of it is able to be working higher.
It’s viable, however, that we wouldn’t need to engage the identical employer for that work, mainly if we didn’t have a great time working with them. If it’s some thing we are able to do a whole lot less expensive — and simply as well, for minor adjustments — in-house, it’d be a poor business circulate to outsource it.
Plus, there’s no guarantee that something organisation you work with might be around whilst you need to revise your video, so it’s critical to ensure that you’ll continually have get entry to and possession of these belongings.
With a companion picked, it turned into time to get started out.
Writing the Product Video Script
While many businesses provide scriptwriting as a part of their services, it turned into crucial to our crew that we wrote the preliminary script ourselves.
We didn’t simply want to reveal off the product; we wanted the core of the script to awareness on what we already knew from our purchaser development efforts: what our clients’ burning pains are, what’s maximum important to them approximately solving those pains, and what key factors about Groove truely trigger them to join up.
Do not begin this technique till you’ve carried out the prematurely work to parent out what your customers’ largest pains are (in their own words), and precisely how your solution can resolve that pain for them.
Once we had that, we’d experience cozy handing the script off to the company for them to use their storytelling knowledge to it.
The approach that we took turned into similar to our technique to writing website copy. We took the precise language that we heard from customers in our conversations with them, and applied it to a easy drift:
Explainer video script go with the flow
Video script go with the flow
What we ended up with was a ninety-2d initial script, which we might trade numerous instances during the process.
Explainer video script
Script
I can’t strain sufficient how vital client development became to this undertaking, just as it has been to each advertising and marketing project we’ve done.
Once we have been glad with the script, we were ready to move on to production.
The 5-Step Product Video Production Process
Armed with a script, we walked via our thoughts with Eric, and he had some excellent comments for us on the way to make the tale more compelling. The way a tale comes throughout in video is completely one of a kind than the way the identical tale may stumble upon in print, so the company’s expertise is crucial here.
We agreed on a standard direction, and Eric turned into off to paintings.
1) Storyboard
A few days later, he despatched us a difficult storyboard of his imaginative and prescient for the video (click on the picture under to peer the whole storyboard).
Explainer video storyboard
Click to peer storyboard
To make things easier, Eric sent an audio walkthrough of the storyboard, which turned into surprisingly beneficial.
One lesson I’ve learned from running on some of merchandise with organizations is that “tough” approach precisely that. A lot of parents I’ve talked to about this feel timid about giving heaps of feedback, even early on, wondering that it'd offend the agency.
This couldn’t be similarly from the fact, and if your corporation doesn’t take comments nicely, run.
The technique is a collaboration, and also you gained’t get to where you want to be with out both parties being deeply worried.
Len and I had a number of feedback on the first storyboard. And the Less team turned into satisfied to get it.
Explainer video: Initial Storyboard Revisions
Initial Storyboard Revisions
After a few days of from side to side, we had a storyboard that we have been satisfied to move forward with (click on the photograph under to see the overall storyboard).
Explained video: final storyboard
Click to look very last storyboard
2) Visuals
We agreed that we preferred the illustrated appearance that Eric came up with, and it become time to paintings on visuals.
Eric focused on constructing illustrations that evoked the simplicity and emotions that we felt represented Groove, even as we focused on selecting in-app screenshots for the features which can be greater interesting to Groove potentialities.
We took plenty of greater screenshots to ensure that Eric had lots of alternatives to work with.
Explainer video: Collecting screenshots
Collecting screenshots
The heaviest lift of this entire mission, on Eric’s aspect, would be to position the pictures together and animate them, so it changed into critical to get final sign-off at the photographs before the animation commenced.
Three) Voiceover and Music
While Eric worked on the visuals, he had a few voiceover artists from Voices.Com read our script and ship us auditions.
Of the eight options, we picked our favorite, even though we still had notes for revisions.
Explainer video: VO revisions
VO Revisions
One non-obvious thing we did which has demonstrated to be very precious down the road:
Have the VO artist report change strains which you would possibly use in the future. For instance, we had them report traces that blanketed destiny integrations we had planned, in addition to exchange free trial lengths so that we ought to A/B check them afterward. This saves money and time having to track down the artist to record once more.
The procedure for picking song turned into a lot the identical. Eric sent us seven alternatives from Audio Jungle, made a advice, and we picked our favourite.
I desire that we could say we had some clinical, statistics-pushed process for the audio, however clearly we simply went with our gut on which voice and track we felt sounded most like “Groove.”
four) Putting It All Together: Rough Cut
About a month after we commenced, we had a tough reduce of our product video to review.
It was awesome to peer the video come together from our early script. Of path, even though, there had been lots of notes:
Explainer video: Rough cut notes
Rough cut notes
But we had been near, and we may want to feel it. After more than one very last revisions, we had our video.
Five) The Final Video
To say that we have been happy with the video would be a big understatement.
We eventually had a video that represented the whole thing we had found out from and approximately our customers as our organization grew up.
Unfortunately, the reality that we cherished it didn’t without a doubt rely. The handiest way to gauge the success of the task might be to check the video in the field.
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The Results
We A/B tested the brand new video on our homepage against the present testimonial video that become on there formerly.
Explainer video: Video check
Video check
After some days, the effects were clean:
Explainer video: The consequences
The outcomes
A .6% improve nets out to an eleven% growth over our previous conversion rate!
Beyond that, we get a few incredible insights from the primary e-mail that we ship to each Groove patron.
Explainer video: You're in e-mail
“You’re in” electronic mail
We’ve gotten quite a number responses similar to this one:
Explainer video: Re: You're in
Re: You’re in
In all, we spent inside the neighborhood of $five-$8K on this task, and over the years, the outcomes look like they’ll extra than pay for it.
How to Apply This to Your Business
Video may not be the pleasant medium to sell each product.
But for us, it’s boosted our conversion fee and helped us inform the Groove story to a number of customers who would possibly’ve in any other case no longer study our reproduction or attempted our app.
If you’re thinking about constructing a product video, I wish that our reviews help you are making the right selections alongside the manner, and which you become with a video that surely does what it desires to: gets people to shop for.