TheO: Another Example of Video Content Marketing Gone Right
TheO is a fusion of physical play and mobile device technology.
It was recently listed as one of the cool new toys of 2012 by
Parents Magazine and Good Housekeeping.
The founders of the company asked us to help them create a media campaign to launch their product in the toy world.
Below is one part of the whole – a 30 second loop that showcased the product at a trade show in which they garnered the title “Best Toy of 2012″ by Popular Mechanics.
Check it out. Pretty cool concept – and the video is nice, too:)
Note, too, that the “hero shot” above was taken in-house by the skilled media professionals we have on-staff, whose talents apply to imaging – still and moving.
As ever, the commitment to high quality imagery in service of the stories that help you forward your brilliant ideas and products – we believe this is what separates us from our media production peers and provides you with the greatest ROI.
Respectfully,
Whit Wales – Executive Director – DigiNovations
No More Either/Or In Your Video Production Campaign
You know in your heart as well as your gut that having video on your website in 2012 is as important and imminent as having a website was in 2002. Print wanes. Social media waxes. And, you worry.
What is one to do?
You have so many choices and decisions before you.
Perhaps you are tethered to the notion that you have to decide…DIY – do it yourself – or the “Hollywood corporate” production. Either way, you feel that you are paying a cost you cannot afford.
In DIY, you run the risk of creating such poor quality that you will turn clients away, or the process will be so time consuming that you were better off turning to a professional. Your fear in shopping for a qualified and trusted professional production company is that you will not be able to afford more than one video – and you know that you want more than a single statement. In marketing and sales it is about the campaign.
We understand and appreciate these concerns. Beyond producing exceptional videos, we think it important to be recognized as trusted partners as you create a video marketing strategy.
We are not threatened by DIY productions. We think it should be one of the many video arrows in your marketing quiver. In fact, we think it important to help guide you and your company to improve your in-house production skills.
Moreover, we understand that not every presentation need be epic in nature. Sometimes, you simply need a “CEO-Think” piece whose video imagery and graphics help to elevate the quality of the dialogue. The example below is a short film we created for the Clean Energy Council of New England upon the occasion of their annual Green Tie Gala in Boston.
The organization wanted to acknowledge current sponsors and encourage new ones while celebrating the vitality and articulate nature of the alternative energy community. We also filmed for them the keynote address and awards ceremony for internal purposes. In essence, for very little investment, we created a short marketing piece while providing them with content which they may re-purpose or use as an evaluative tool in creating next year’s program.
All this, of course, involves planning and collaboration to determine when you will want to produce a signature film that will live upon your home page for two years and influence all who view it. There are the “workhorse” videos that support the seasonal and seminal events for your company; and then there are the down-to-earth educational video blogs that will fill in the gaps and identify your organization as on that is both technically savvy and current with trends in your industry. And, of course, it goes without saying that you will want to partner with a production company that understands how to make all of your work not only web-savvy but mobile device savvy as well.
The analyses regarding the effectiveness of video on the web is compelling. It is no longer a question of “If” but “When” And in the case of “How” it is no longer “Either/Or” but “Yes – And…”
As ever, if you like our work and would like to talk, we always welcome and enjoy the opportunity.
The Thing About Text…
Have you noticed that animated text is hot?
We tire of talking heads – it requires eye contact. As a viewer, it takes energy to assess the authenticity of the presenter. If the presenter is uncomfortable; it makes us uncomfortable. And, if we don’t connect with that face and voice, we go elsewhere.
Animated text supplemented by an energized and sophisticated hip-voice – that seems to be where it’s at.
We’re not looking for “truth” – nothing so heavy. What’s wanted is something light, nimble, clever and engaging.
Interestingly, the story in a 30 second clip often becomes about the playful relationship between the visual text and the spoken script. Through the narration as the words and letters move through the frame, the words themselves become anthropomorphized – they take on a character and spirit of their own. The written word interacts with the spoken word to create a sum greater than the combination.
Here is a spirited engagement between the two forms that DigiNovations created for Cognizant. It represents one in a series of videos that will constitute a video campaign we are creating on their behalf.
Congrats to Mont Fennel, producer; and Paul Stephens, senior editor, for their collaboration on this project.
The Second Decade
Time is elastic. A decade implies the gravitas of time, and yet 10 short years ago, in October 2001, when Michael Kolowich founded DigiNovations in Concord, Massachusetts, we knew that…
The digital video revolution had begun. DV tape was 4 years old, as a result, non-linear editing had finally matured. Clients were supremely impressed when you showed them your 4 gigabyte drive. Terabyte? Shared storage? A Cloud?? Not even on the horizon…
VHS tape, while waning, in no way had given way to DVDs. 50% of US companies in the US had a website, a minority of that population included video. 32% of the population owned cellphones, but what were smart phones??
Do you remember those highly compressed postage stamps, grainy web film clips 180×120 pixels – in the old 4:3 frame format?? 30 seconds segments that took forever to load before playing back from your dial-up connection.
Ten years ago – from the start – DigiNovations was a leader in digital and web video production. Ten years later, in a world that is, essentially, tapeless, with disc media itself in decline and HD footage that may be streamed over the web to your smart phone or tablet, DigiNovations remains at the forefront. With its sister company, Knowledgevision, DigiNovations is at the vanguard of what we now know as video content marketing. 10 years ago, film was for VCRs. Productions were long form. A video presentation was the metaphorical bottle of champagne that launched a marketing campaign. Today, videos are integral elements these campaigns spun out to a multitude of formats.
Our current clients now realize that the question is no longer whether you need a video, but rather how many films – and how each of them, professionally produced or DIY/viral, will strategically build for you, one atop the other, a connection with your target audience.
As DigiNovations reviews and assesses its work over the past ten years, we hear more clearly than ever what our clients have informed us over the past decade. The value and appreciation of our services is not simply as producers of outstanding video content, but also as strategists and partners in the marketing of their companies and services.
In the spirit of responding formally to our clients and the world at large, this first blogpost of our newly designed website, re-affirms our commitment to explore and share with you great video content as well as the thinking of individuals who are experts in “what is” and “what is to come” in video content marketing.
Over the course of the next 12 months, may we help to illuminate all the great possibilities and options that await you in the field of video production and content marketing for you and your company in 2012 and beyond.
Sincerely,
Whit Wales
Executive Producer
DigiNovations
Welcome
Welcome to the DigiNovations blog.
