New visual languages, graphic interfaces, rich media content, lower video production costs and shrinking attention spans are changing how businesses communicate. In-house or outsourced, video is becoming a standard delivery medium for marketing and communications activities. Here are 22 High-Growth examples, by category:

Customer Reference Videos

1. Video Customer Testimonials (Popularity: Moderate  | Growth Potential: High)
Nothing is more compelling than seeing and hearing your customer (ideally in their own environment) extol the virtues of your products and services or explaining how you helped them achieve their business goals. These videos usually run from fifteen second snippets to a minute and are typically combined with or used to support other marketing material.

2. Video Success Stories (Popularity: Moderate  | Growth Potential: High)
Similar to a customer testimonial these videos run between one and two minutes and follow an interview format where the person on screen answers questions posed by an interviewer just off-camera. These videos are usually delivered as stand-alone marketing support materials and are often grouped with other customer success stories.

3. Man-in-the-street Interviews (Popularity: Moderate  | Growth Potential: High)
These videos are typically done to promote events and to build buzz around coming events but can also be employed to capture ‘spontaneous’ responses to targeted questions that help promote your product or service or to help differentiate the benefits of your brand compared to the real or imagined problems associated with your competitors. Soft drink companies, phone companies, fast food companies often use this format in advertising. Sometimes they are genuine. Sometimes they are completely staged. ‘Authenticity’ is becoming a style…

Product and Service Promotion

4. Product Presentations (Popularity: Moderate  | Growth Potential: High)
Product (or service) presentation videos are typically employed early in the buying cycle. Product or service presentations focus on benefits and talk from more from your customer’s perspective. They should speak clearly to how your product solves a specific business, personal or economic problem that your prospect is experiencing. They are used to help your customers and prospects differentiate between the benefits of your products and services to those of your competitors.

5. Product Demonstrations (Popularity: Moderate  | Growth Potential: High)
Product demos show how your product works and highlight the features that differentiate it from that of your competitors. Software screen captures, a 3D cut-away, or a high impact demo by a presenter are all excellent ways of showing how your product or service works. These videos are typically used to influence a prospect who is relatively far along in the sales cycle. In technology marketing these videos would be targeted at the technical approvers who need to understand how something works. In consumer marketing these would be targeted at buyers of larger ticket items who are further along the sales cycle.

6. Product Reviews (Popularity: Moderate  | Growth Potential: High)
The best product reviews are trusted third party reviews. Video reviews can be found anywhere from YouTube to various business portals. To the extent they help you, they should be referenced. You can also partner with trusted third parties to create product reviews for your own products.

7. Visual Stories (Popularity: Moderate  | Growth Potential: High)
Quickly rising in popularity, visual stories employ illustrations, animations and motion graphics with a voice-over to explain complex products or services in a simple and compelling manner.

Corporate Video

8. Training  and support video

9. Training (Popularity: High  | Growth Potential: High)
Corporate video first gained prominence with training (service, support, sales, personal development etc.) and continues to be one of the best uses of video. Online Video is a cost effective substitute for in-class training. You can also easily integrate video into online training management tools.

10. Just-in-time learning (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: High)
Contextual training videos are becoming very popular on the web. ‘How-to’ videos, video manuals, on-site video reference, quick assembly demos, and other types of video are being used to supplement or replace traditional training. Mobile video will increase the popularity of this type of video.

11. 21. Health, Legal & Safety (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: High)
The cost of dealing with health and safety related issues within organizations continues to grow. Video is one of the most effective means of minimizing these costs.

Advertising , marketing  and promotion

12. Commercials (Popularity: High  | Growth Potential: High)
While advertisers are becoming more selective in how they chose to spend their promotional dollars with broadcast television, other venues for commercials such as online video pre-roll, online sponsorships, in-game advertising, event sponsorships and in-theatre advertising are starting to take the place of broadcast / cable commercials. A proliferation of video screens cropping up on every building, device and structure will create an even more diverse set of advertising opportunities. The challenge will be to create specialized content targeted to an ever shrinking niche audience.

13. Viral Video (Popularity: High  | Growth Potential: High)
A video is viral if it is so compelling that people want to share it. (Calling a video ‘Viral’ doesn’t make it so). Viral videos have to be extremely engaging, entertaining, shocking or meaningful to be successful. Unfortunately some of the most successful viral videos have little connection (and therefore value) to any brand. (Everyone references ‘Will it Blend’ but very few viral videos are remotely this successful in actually driving sales.)

44. Email Video (Popularity: Moderate  | Growth Potential: High)
Testing has shown that open rates can double if you include video in your email marketing activities. To be effective the video should be purpose-built to elicit a specific conversion activity such as requesting a demo, more info etc.

15.  Content Marketing (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Huge)

This is a broad category that will become very important over the next months and years. Much of the content (video or otherwise) being creating today by companies is focused on selling. Focusing on solving your customers problems first and then associating your brand with those solutions will be increasingly more important and effective. (i.e. Home Depot could create a branded ‘how-to’ series that sits on their website and shows their customers how-to fix anything. They would, or course, reference tools and supplies available in their store but more importantly, they would generate tremendous value for their customers and prospects – value that would accrue to them over time.)

16. Landing pages and micro sites (Popularity: Moderate  | Growth Potential: High)
Video is beginning to replace or supplement text and graphics as a content element on many corporate websites. Landing pages can offer a more compelling call to action with video. Some micro sites on larger web properties are self contained, purpose-built conversion machines that have the singular purpose of generating a conversion activity (sign-up for more info, attend event, order something etc.). Video is becoming an important part of the conversion process.

PR Support and Community Relations

17. Video Press Releases (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: High)
The standard four paragraph press release is now being supplemented with video and rich media to tell a more engaging story. Video is now being purpose-built to directly support the important company announcements. The new challenge for press releases is to change the focus from the company to the customer. Don’t forget to shoot some B-roll while you are there- to use as VNR!

18. Community Relations Video (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: High)
If your company is out working in the community, being good corporate citizens, helping the environment or contributing to important causes you should be capturing those efforts on video. Show the world what you are doing, don’t just talk about it.

Event Video

19. Event Presentation video (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: High)
Events represent a unique confluence of expertise and opportunity – often under-leveraged. Trade Shows, meeting and conferences are usually attended by your top sales people, your corporate executives, industry experts and other influential business people. If you are speaking at an event or someone is referencing your company you should be capturing this valuable content on video.

20. Round table Sessions (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: High)
Take the opportunity at an event to corral four to six of your best customers and other industry experts, put them in room and video tape them talking about industry trends, business issues and the future of your industry. This content will be the most valuable content you could ever capture.

Other Uses of Video

21. In Store Video (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: High)
Wal-Mart has its own profitable in-store TV network that makes shoppers aware of new promotions. LCD screens are ubiquitous. In store LCD’s will be networked and customizable offering you the ability to promote your own goods and services or make money by promoting other complimentary services.

22. Mobile Video (Popularity: Low  | Growth Potential: Huge)

Yep, ‘there’s and Ap for that’. Mobile video will soon be the largest video category outside of broadcast. In the short-run, mobile video will consist of hastily re-purposed video made to fit on a mobile device. It will quickly evolve into a much more specific format – five to fifteen second hyper targeted messages that are part of geo-located and micro-niched promotions.

To read ALL 42 ways, go to Jimm Fox’s original article:

Jimm Fox is President of One Market Media – a video marketing company in Canada

Video appeals to auditory and visual learners. Not everybody enjoys reading, especially on a computer screen.  Readers have had years of “training” in watching television, they are exemplary viewers.  Watching video online is not much of a jump.

Video increases audience engagement. An ordinary text-and-images web page encourages skimming and scanning.

On the other hand, video demands that you sit and pay attention for the duration of the video – providing what you are sharing is watchable. Be careful here, too long and your viewers will be cooking dinner and listening rather than watching and engaging.

Video can forge familiarity and trust. It’s easy to hide one’s identity on the Internet, but not when you’re talking to your audience via video. They can see you, hear you, see your environment, and observe your body language. Be sure you are ready for prime time!

Viewers feel they know you better after they’ve seen you on video. This develops liking and trust much easier than plain text and static images can.

Video is more effective for certain messages. Have you ever tried explaining how to use Hootsuite to somebody over the telephone? Or via Email?

Sometimes, the best way to teach a skill is by demonstrating it. Video allows you to demonstrate various tasks, from how to change a tire to how to send pre-scheduled autoresponder messages.

VIDEO is one of the most powerful forms of communications ever developed- and when coupled with the trackability and instant gratification aspects of the web- you simply cannot lose!

*excerpts from For Bloggers By Bloggers, check it out!

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Today I post up the following for your review:

For many companies recessions are a time when short-term considerations trump long-term potential. This is not irrational thinking. It’s true that the uncertainty of recessions creates an opportunity for serious profits, and the historical record is full of companies that made successful gambles in hard times: Kraft introduced Miracle Whip in 1933 and saw it become America’s best-selling dressing in six months; Texas Instruments brought out the transistor radio in the 1954 recession; Apple launched the iPod in 2001.

Then again, the record is also full of forgotten companies that gambled and failed. The academics Peter Dickson and Joseph Giglierano have argued that companies have to worry about two kinds of failure: “sinking the boat” (wrecking the company by making a bad bet) or “missing the boat” (letting a great opportunity pass). Today, most companies are far more worried about sinking the boat than about missing it. That is why the opportunity to do what Kellogg, and Chrysler and Kraft and TI and Apple did exists. That is also why it’s so nerve-racking to try it.

Both anecdotal and empirical evidence support the case that advertising was the main factor in the growth or downfall of companies during those years. To put it bluntly, the companies which demonstrated the most growth and which rang up the most sales were those which advertised heavily. The Great Depression offers classic examples of the power of brand advertising even during times of economic crisis.

Proctor and Gamble – This is a company with a philosophy of not reducing advertising budgets during times of recession, and they certainly did not make any such reduction during the Depression. P&G has made progress in every one of the major recessions and that is no accident. When their competitors were swinging the budget axe, P&G actually increased their spending. While the Depression caused problems for many, P&G came out of it unscathed. Radio took P&G’s message into more homes than ever.

Chevrolet – During the 1920s, Fords were outselling Chevrolets by 10 to 1. In spite of the Depression, Chevrolet continued to expand its advertising budget and by 1931, the “Chevy 6″ took the lead in its field and remained there for the next five years.

Camel Cigarettes – in 1920 Camel was the top selling tobacco product. American Tobacco Company then struck back with the Lucky Strike brand and by 1929 Lucky had overtaken Camel as the number one brand. Two years later in the heart of the Depression, Chesterfield also overtook Camel. Camel countered with a massive increase in advertising spending and by doing so demonstrated the power of advertising during depressed times. By 1935, it was back on top.

Let’s return to Proctor and Gamble for a while. The president of P&G at the time was Richard Deupree. In spite of the fact that shareholders were demanding that he cut back on advertising, he knew that people were still buying essential household products. Therefore, he created radio programming that did not focus on a product. Because of that, we now have a cultural attribute known as the “soap opera.” Are shareholders always right? NO- or they would be executives instead!

So once again, those companies which took advantage of the Depression and came through in good form were those who kept their name in front of the public in spite of a lack of purchasing power.

Which type of company will YOU be? It is a decision you need to make sooner rather than later, and stick to it, and see it through.

Today’s new frontier is video on the web: websites, YouTube, online video and the like. Call me and I can help you take advantage of the power of VIDEO now, while YOUR competitors are cutting, slashing and pulling back.

Uncertainty? Who cares?!

 Video can be an extremely effective tool to explain a complex topic.  The real power of video is that it can engage several aspects of the audience’s mind at once: the senses of sight and sound as well as the emotional & the analytical.  If produced with these goals in mind, all of these aspects can be tapped.

Another trait of video that is especially handy is that (unlike a conversation) video can be meticulously crafted and perfected so that the right message is delivered CONSISTENTLY, every single time, 24/7, globally.

These are great features, right? But it’s not always so easy to know how to create and release content that fully takes advantage of all these characteristics. Here are some hard-won lessons I’ve accumulated (over the past decade or so producing content in San Francisco content gamer, tech and geek audiences ) that I hope will help you produce content that works for your goals:

Know Your Audience: It sounds like common sense but it’s easy to stray. You have to keep them in mind at each step: know what they want and what will turn them off.

Respect Your Audience: This one is also tougher than it seems, especially when time and money are short. Make the decisions that are good for your audience and it will come back to you. It’s a balance though, it has to be reasonable and “do-able”.

Define Your Goal: One video, One goal. I like to think of video like a tool (hammer,  saw or screwdriver). These tools are effective because they do one thing really well. Try and accomplish just one thing with each video and you chances of success skyrockets.

Keep it Simple: It’s tempting to want to explain everything. It’s also hard to know what to throw out. If you keep in mind the audience and the goals, it’s easier to know what fits in that box, and more importantly, what doesn’t.

Click here to read the entire list and all the details.

Contact Dane: dane@digitalaccomplice.com

And look for more creative. video ideas on our own website… and while you are here LIKE US, RETWEET US and visit our Pinterest page, too!

So it’s natural to focus on what you can control: minimizing losses and improving short-term results. And cutting spending is a good way of doing this; a major study, by the Strategic Planning Institute, of corporate behavior during the past thirty years found that reducing ad spending during recessions did improve companies’ return on capital. It also meant, though, that they grew less quickly in the years following recessions than more free-spending competitors did. But for many companies recessions are a time when short-term considerations trump long-term potential.

This is not irrational. It’s true that the uncertainty of recessions creates an opportunity for serious profits, and the historical record is full of companies that made successful gambles in hard times: Kraft introduced Miracle Whip in 1933 and saw it become America’s best-selling dressing in six months; Texas Instruments brought out the transistor radio in the 1954 recession; Apple launched the iPod in 2001. Then again, the record is also full of forgotten companies that gambled and failed. The academics Peter Dickson and Joseph Giglierano have argued that companies have to worry about two kinds of failure: “sinking the boat” (wrecking the company by making a bad bet) or “missing the boat” (letting a great opportunity pass).

Today, most companies are far more worried about sinking the boat than about missing it. That’s why the opportunity to do what Kellogg did exists. That’s also why it’s so nerve-racking to try it.

But nothing comes about without risk- and if you don’t take the risk, you may never know what would have happened! So go ahead and wait it out- play it safe, and get fired by “The Donald!” Or take a risk, introduce new products (while the cost is low!) and trump your competitors who are cutting and contracting… it WILL be worth the risk!

Chrysler’s fortunes in the Great Depression are another classic example of (marketing while your competition pulls back).

Chrysler had been the third player in the U.S. auto industry, behind G.M. and Ford. But early in the downturn it gave a big push to a new brand—Plymouth—targeted at the low end of the market, and by 1933 it had surpassed Ford to become North America’s second-biggest automaker.

On a smaller scale, Hyundai has made huge gains in market share this year, thanks to a hefty advertising budget and a guarantee to take back cars from owners who have lost their jobs.

Those gains may turn out to be temporary, but in fact the benefits from recession investment are often surprisingly long-lived, with companies maintaining their gains in market share and sales well into economic recovery.

So I ask again, why are you waiting to add video to your marketing mix?

Send in your answers- and more examples of marketing during downturns, and I’ll post them up for discussion!

Circa 1929, the Great Depression was beginning.  Bank failures made today’s same failures seem relatively innocuous.  Unemployment loomed at 25%, and every sector in the U.S. economy was adversely affected.  But people still needed to eat.  And the breakfast of choice for most Americans was “flakes and milk”.  The two largest manufacturers of breakfast cereal were Kellogg’s and Post, and both had been “neck and neck” with U.S. market share, each vying for dominance in the cereal market.

 Any idea who won?  Kellogg’s did.  The reason: They, unlike their rival, Post, that decided to “cut back” on marketing expenditures, Kellogg’s opted to increase spending, from the Great Depression’s outset through to its end.  Kellogg’s made a calculated marketing decision to advertise and promote their products aggressively-namely Corn Flakes, their hallmark brand-despite, and actually the economic downturn.  Their rationale was simple:  In knee jerk fashion, their competitors had scaled back their marketing efforts significantly, thus opening the door for Kellogg’s to blitz the market with a strong ad campaign designed to persuade consumers to Kelloggs’ touted superior quality, thereby gaining them significant market share that positioned Kellogg’s as the industry leader-which endures to this day.

Am I advocating unbridled spending? NO! But I AM advocating a strategic plan that continues to market, promote and advertise YOUR products and services- new, exciting tactics, while your competitors bury their heads in the sand.

This is the classic example that is referenced in business schools , marketing/advertising seminars and nearly everywhere else all the time. But how many other examples can you cite? In the following posts I will offer at least four more that you may or may not know… and in the meantime, send YOUR examples to me. I will research and verify them and pass them along as well!

Happy Marketing!

NOW is the time to take action- while your competitors fear the economy and wait another year to see who wins, and where the country heads in 2013. Take advantage of their reluctance to market, or test new initiatives, and beat them NOW while they are sleeping…

So- are you ready now? Give me a call and we will get you started right away.