Stop the Random Acts of Video | B2B Podcast - Content Wars EP20

Nathan Yerian: The vast majority of the time, I think what you need to do is kind of back up and say, what's the system we're operating off of? What's the overall strategy when we produce our blog? 

How do we plan that? Are we just randomly creating articles from time to time? I certainly hope not. What are we doing with our newsletter? When somebody asks for a newsletter, that's when we produce it. Webinar, same way. So all of these communication channels, we have a system and a process for. And for whatever reason, that system or process hasn't really been adopted in a B2B sense of things. 

That's what people are really missing. And you know, the framework that that we use works rather well. Um, you know, a number of our clients have been like, oh, I've never really thought of it like that. But once we see it, it's hard to unsee it and it becomes useful. And it becomes the framework that we now think about every video. It's where does this fit into this flow to make it make sense and make sure that it is part of our overall communication strategy? So one thing I find interesting is that almost everyone, not everyone, but almost everyone that calls in or fills out a form on our website or contacts us in some way, has a similar request. 

And it sounds something like this. Oh, we have a department or a division or whatever that has a need for a video, and we've been asked to go and get some sort of proposal or price or strategy for that video. And then you talk to those people, and they have a legitimate need to use video to communicate whatever their message is going to be. 

And you start to unpack how does that fit into the strategy that you're operating off of? And usually what you find is there's a lot more communication happening than just that isolated video. But so far, they've only included a single video asset in their entire campaign plan or their entire marketing initiative. 

And I find that really odd. Um, you know, you watch any marketing content, listen to any marketing content. Every single person out there is saying, you need to have a video first, video centric approach to your communications. Yet all the marketing teams that I talk to that are using video are thinking about it one video at a time, or as one of the prospects that that I spoke to recently called it. Are you saying that we have random acts of video? Uh yes, that's that's exactly what I'm saying. 

Adam Marquardt: It's definitely a problem that we see recurring all the time. And I think that it comes down to the way that it's been done. And I know that I've heard across other industries, you know, that's just the way we've always done it. 

And I think we can all admit that that is a little bit of a cop-out, but also unless they know a different way, or unless they've been taught a different way, I don't fully blame them in approaching it that way. Sure. 

Nathan Yerian: And, you know, we're we're definitely not here to to cast blame and say it's your fault or it's his fault or that none of that matters. What matters is we have a problem, we need to identify it, isolate what that looks like, and maybe give a better way or different way to move forward. Um, if you take any marketing team and any other content that they're creating, and you really suggest operating in this model, it's gonna start to seem ridiculous. 

If you say, hey, you know what? We're gonna do one blog article. We got this this campaign, and we're just gonna do this one blog article. And somehow that blog article is gonna make all the impact that we need is gonna change our campaign. It's really gonna, it's really gonna make this work. 

Everyone's gonna laugh at you. That that's ridiculous, right? That blog article doesn't have the power to do that. One blog article is not going to boil the ocean, right? Same with one webinar or one newsletter or one fill in the content blank there, same thing exists for one video. 

Can a video help? Yeah, of course. But one probably isn't the answer. And when you widen that scope out to, hey, let's not look at this campaign. Let's look at our overall marketing and communication initiatives across the organization. One starts to seem pretty freaking ridiculous. 

Adam Marquardt: I think it's easy when we're on the inside and we can see hundreds of video projects over the course of a year and we're able to identify that this pattern exists. But maybe if you're in an organization that has always operated this way, that you are looking at it from a this is what I need to accomplish right now. And you don't stop and think, is there a framework? Is there a strategy? Is there an approach that I should implement that will actually help us to create more content over the long run in a better way? 

Nathan Yerian: Oh, sure. And for a lot of these teams, in fairness, a lot of times they're not really being asked how to get it done, they're just being asked to get it done. 

They're saying, oh, hey, there's this initiative, the department needs X, go get it done. Which, okay, sure. You want to create one video, have at it. But if you as a marketing person can go back to the department and say, hey, I know you want this, but maybe we could do this a little bit of a different way, not just for this one piece, but across the board to give you more content all the time without expanding your budget in a huge way. Yeah. 

Adam Marquardt: I think you you have to look at that and say, yeah, we often see that the people that are coming with that request are usually not the ones who have been sent out for the request, right? 

So maybe it's a CMO asking a marketing manager to go get some vendors and you know, be able to look at their work and their pricing and their structure and you know, their approach and their turnaround times and kind of evaluate them against themselves. I think that that possibility exists. But if you stop and you look at the bigger picture of how it all plays together, you can realistically think through a different approach. I know the people that are coming to us asking for that single one-off video usually aren't thinking about the ramifications. There's lots of negative reasons why you wouldn't want to do one-off video. There's a few reasons where it would make sense. But as a generalization, you kind of hit on some of them, you know, it costs more. It's less effective, it's not reusable. There's so many other variables that we can go through of the way that it actually hurts you. But nobody's thinking about that when they say this is the immediate need, go solve it. Sure. 

Nathan Yerian: And and to your point, are there times that a single video makes sense? Of course there are. It would be ridiculous to assume that every time you produce video, it has to be multiple videos. 

That's that's ridiculous. But generally speaking, if you're up to something, if you want to communicate something to an audience, usually one video is not going to get that done. So you have to be open to a different approach, which you can't do if you're randomly being asked to do different videos and different things and everything's a one-off project. It doesn't work. It might check the box of we have a video for that campaign, but it does not check the box of did we use video effectively for that campaign? 

Adam Marquardt: So I think something that would be good right now, just to kind of set the stage is walk through the two examples, right? So walk through kind of the way that everybody comes to us and what they're looking for and the way that they approach it and kind of the things that they're leaving on the table by approaching it that way, and then talk about a different way that would actually yield a result that would be more economical, easier, less friction and break that down so that we can say, hey, this is what we're talking about, and then we can dig into what that would look like. 

Nathan Yerian: So look, anytime someone's coming to you from a different department or even from the marketing uh department itself, just say, hey, we need a video for X, Y, or Z. 

There's there's a disconnect there because you're only going to end up with that single video. And I think if you say, hey, it it's fine to do one-off projects, you know, from time to time, there will be times where that makes a lot of sense. But the vast majority of the time, I think what you need to do is kind of back up and say, what's the system we're operating off of? What's the what's the overall strategy when we produce our blog? 

How do we plan that? Are we just randomly creating articles from time to time? I certainly hope not. What are we doing with our newsletter? Random from time to time. When somebody asks for a newsletter, that's when we produce it. Webinar, same way. So all of these communication channels, we have a system and a process for. And for whatever reason, that system or process hasn't really been adopted in a B2B sense of things. 

Uh that's what people are really missing. And, you know, the framework that that we use that that we apply within the clients that we work with works rather well. Um, you know, a number of our clients have been like, oh, I've never really thought of it like that. But once once we see it, it's hard to unsee it and it becomes useful. And it becomes the framework that we now think about every video that we're we're going to make or we're asked to make. It's where does this fit into this flow to make it make sense and make sure that it is part of our overall communication strategy? Absolutely. 

Adam Marquardt: And knowing that in a past life, we have dove into customer research and buyer insights, looking at things from the lens of what does the prospect or in some cases the customer need to know to be able to either buy from us or continue to buy from us and looking at that and systematically saying what kind of content can kind of transcend the different areas of where a customer is, you know, what do we say is true? What is our customer say is true? And how do we be able to put information into the world that gets these prospects to start to think like we think? And that's why when we're talking about the framework that we've developed, we really have broken it down into three pillars. And these three pillars are essentially what allows you to communicate in different ways in different mediums to these prospects so that you can kind of transcend all of the different layers of where they are, what they're considering, what's stopping them, um, and really reinforce what you believe is an organization. 

Nathan Yerian: So the three video pillars that we're going to deal with today are specifically go to market videos. Um, there are three other categories that are for other business functions. But when you're talking about video in this context, many times we're talking about something that's connected to some kind of go to market motion. Those three video pillars are going to be promise, product, and proof. And they can really be used from a strategic standpoint, but also a yardstick of the videos that you're including in your overall marketing mix. Are they something that should be created? So they're both a strategic direction, but also a yardstick of are we creating something that matters here? 

Adam Marquardt: The great thing about those three pillars is that it essentially covers three different areas, right? The first one of promise covers what you think, what you believe as an organization, kind of the thought leadership side of things. And then you have your product or service. And the last one, you have your customers or proof of, hey, we say we do this, but listen to what our customers say. And having content that covers all three of those is really vital because essentially you're not just going around saying, hey, we're the best. We're saying, hey, this is what we believe. 

Do you believe what we believe? This is what we offer, and this is what our customers say about what we offer. So oftentimes we deal with companies where they kind of struggle with the me, me, me or the really heavy sales focused with their video content. But this really allows you to cover the different segments of people and where they are in the buyer's journey. 

Nathan Yerian: No, absolutely. I talked to a uh prospect last week said, Oh, we want to create a video. We've been assigned this video project, and here's what we want it to be. 

And their idea was basically let's get a script. Let's get some b-roll clips from our facility. Let's use a bunch of stock video. Let's assemble that into a four minute video, and then we'll put that into the market. And somehow that's going to make a massive change in the impression that people have of our business. And we told them that if you want to create that video, we will. 

But we shouldn't. That's not a video that's going to actually matter. It doesn't fit into any of those categories. It is not specifically about what you think or the difference that you can make for your customers' experience. It is not specifically about you, your product, your service, exactly what you're doing. 

I mean, the second your strategy includes a vast majority of stock, you're not really talking about you anymore. So a video like that doesn't fit into that framework and probably isn't something that should be created, which we communicated back to them. They they had a very self-serving script. They their plan from the start was used primarily stock. 

They didn't have the ability to create kind of some of the more aspirational uh shots that they wanted to at their facilities. And is like the reason this isn't gonna work in general, it's not going to communicate to your audience what you need to communicate is it's a script based on essentially things that aren't 100% true. You're using you're using stock to cover up what you can't show because it isn't factual or reality necessarily. Um And you don't even have anyone to put on camera to make it human. Like you're failing to show what you think, you're failing to show what you do, and you're failing to show the experience a customer's gonna have. 

You're not accomplishing anything by creating this video. And we kind of walked them through that. And, you know, in the end, they were like, you know what? And one guy even said, I I probably wouldn't watch that video. And if I did, I don't know what I would take from it. It's like, yes, thank you. 

Adam Marquardt: And I think that's that's a common flaw is like, let's create a video and shove as much information in it as we can. And we're gonna cover all three of these areas that you're talking about of what we think, what we do, and what our customers think, we're gonna shove it all in one. But the problem with that is one, you'll likely end up with a really long video. And even if you are able to somehow force all three of those in there, it's gonna be so shallow that they really won't take away much from it, uh to your point, if they even watch all of it. And, you know, there is a use case for, hey, we're gonna make an overview video that lives on the website. 

Great. Have that 30,000 foot view and kind of walk people through from an overview, because that's the goal of it. But if you're trying to actually move markets and you want to go deep and you want to show them, hey, this is what we think, this is what we do, this is what our customers think, how do you do that? You go deep with little pieces of content instead of trying to go deep with one big long piece of content. You're not creating a documentary here. 

Nathan Yerian: Yeah, everything, you know, from a video standpoint, think in single messages. There's one thing you want to communicate. You know, go back to advertising, right? Every single ad, every single good ad has a single point of communication. It has a big idea that it wants you to remember. It wants you to be able to articulate what did I just tell you? It wants you to be able to tell that to someone else. 

There's one thing that was communicated. When you use video in this context, it's basically the same thing. And there might be supporting details to whatever that big message is that you're trying to get out there. But one video should not be asked to serve the marketing function for any multifaceted piece of communication. 

You need more than one video. So I think from a high level, the big thing that we're saying is if you want to keep operating in a reactive mode, if you want to keep waiting for a new department to have a video need, or you want to keep waiting for your next campaign to strategize a single video, you can do that, but it's not what's most effective. What's most effective is being proactive, making an actual strategic communication plan when that need pops up from that department, when that new campaign comes in, that's okay. And you can fit that into this strategy, but have a strategy to begin with of what's the communication plan that we're bringing to the table when it comes to video. And that's what this framework is supposed to do. 

And, you know, the biggest pushback on this is okay. Well, if we have this this promise and we make a promise video, got it. We made a promise video. And then we have this product and we made a product video. And then we have a customer, so we made a proof video. And now we did those three things and now we're done, right? We did promise, product, proof, but but now we don't need any more videos, so we're done. If you were able to communicate 

Adam Marquardt: everything about your business in those three videos, you might want to rethink your business. Exactly. 

Nathan Yerian: Your business is multifaceted. It needs to be explained different ways to different people. And, and probably this is more important, it needs to be repeated often. When you look at the best creators online or the best companies, they don't come out and say one thing one time and then go hibernate and just hope you're gonna know it and buy. There's a there's a repetition that happens. They say it over and over and over. And before you know it, two things happen. One, you know it, but probably more importantly, you know them for it. So that when you think of whatever that concept is gonna be, whatever that thing is that they've been talking about, who do you think about? 

You think about them. That repetition has succeeded in what it was intended to do, which is imprint on your mind the message they need to communicate. That's part of that strategy, and that's what needs to happen here in all of those categories. Every element of your communication strategy needs to be something you intend to repeat. So going back to the random acts of video, a random act of video implies that you have a single video that's not going to be repeated. That message is one off and done. 

That doesn't have a good chance of being successful. Whereas if you're saying, hey, we have a series of messages about what we think about the world that we're going to repeat in different settings with different people in different environments in different angles and situations. And we're going to have it come up again and again and again. And we're going to share our perspective of the world with our audience. And they're going to understand it. They won't understand it on day one, but they might understand it on day 1000 and one. Maybe it takes two touch points. Maybe it takes 150. 

It doesn't matter. You need to be prepared to continually be delivering the what you think that is different. And hopefully you think something different than your competition does about the way that you operate, the way you solve your customers' problems, the way that you deliver to the market, the change that you're trying to make for your customer, hopefully you think about it differently. 

And you need to continually be communicating that. On the product side of things, I hope your product or service is different. And you don't have to sit there and go through features and benefits, you know, side by side. And let me tell you about this and how it's different. That's part of it. Make a features and benefits video or multiple features and benefits videos. But also, there's a lot more story assigned to that. How is this thing thought of? 

What was the origin story for that product or service? Why are you doing it? Why are you doing it the way that you're doing it? How do you do it? Can you demo it? Can you take us on an implementation? 

Can you show us that? We've we've got a client that that literally they're they're in the staffing space and they go in and they take over usually hundreds of employees at a time, and they're usually going to bring in hundreds of more after that. And it's it's a pretty big switch. And we go in and we document that implementation. We go in and we document them taking over a place of employment, having everybody start out a little bit uneasy and you know, not sure what's gonna happen. And, you know, by the end of it, they're on board for this giant transition that's gonna happen. They're able to bring hundreds of more employees into that situation. 

And their customer is also there and is excited and happy about this big transition that is a little bit nerve-wracking, but they're able to watch that transition happen from everybody's a little bit nervous to everybody's giving high fives. We don't tell that story one time. We tell that story every time they have an implementation. So you gotta look for those angles in the product of what's interesting and how can we tell this story in a different way of just sitting there, our product is better, our service is better. This is the one video that we've created. 

No. Where's the story? Find the story that communicates the message. Don't tell it one time, tell it over and over and over again. Same with your proof side of things. When you know the difference that your product or service is making for your customer, how many customers do you have that love you, that love your product, love your service, love the benefit that they get from working with you? 

You don't do it one time. We we had somebody I talked to about a month ago, and they said, Hey, we we want to get three customer testimonials for our website. I said, that's a really good starting point. They said, Well, starting point. No, we just need the three for our website. 

I said, Oh, okay, cool. So all of your customers hang out on your website. They're like, well, no, but we have, you know, campaigns and different things that drive to the website. 

I said, okay, well, that's interesting. What if you're able to just take those to your customer? And they're like, oh, so like make like social clips. And yeah, okay, we could do that. 

And I'm like, yeah. How long will it take you to go through three stories on social media? I mean, even if you made four social clips from each of those stories, you have 12. 

Are you gonna post one per month? That doesn't seem very effective to me in a social space. One per week is still, in my opinion, kind of weak. That gets you through a quarter. Yeah. What do you do the rest of the time? 

What do you do the rest of the time? At minimum, you're missing nine additional testimonials that should be filmed. Yeah. So you can't get there on one message of any kind. One, it has to be multifaceted. And two, you have to have the idea of repetition in mind when it comes to any kind of content. And honestly, video is the only one that suffers from that lack of repetition or the assignment of we only need one, which again brings us back to our random act of video concept here. 

Adam Marquardt: Yeah, no, and you're absolutely right. Because if you even look at just this, because I'm a very example-driven person and I love thinking through um examples to give the audience of where and when that shows up and what that looks like. This episode, this may be the first time you've heard the concept of the three pillars, but it also may not be. And the reason is because we've mentioned it on other episodes. But there's a good chance that now that you've heard it, next time video comes up, you're gonna say, hey, you know what? 

I actually think there's a better way to approach this. Because not only are we talking about on this episode, we're gonna talk about it in future episodes. We're gonna talk about it in social clips, we're gonna write posts about it, we're gonna talk about it. And that's just one aspect of how we approach working with our clients, but it's worth repeating because it's different and it fundamentally shifts the way that you create videos if you follow it. Absolutely. 

Nathan Yerian: And, you know, to your point, hey, the next time video comes up, this is something to examine. I would take that a step further and I would start analyzing it now, come up with a plan and actually proactively take that back to your team and say, hey, I know from time to time we use video. When we do it, I feel like we're doing it randomly, not strategically. 

And it's causing us to not be as effective as we could be. I have a different plan. Let's plan out what our message is. Let's plan the difference in how we approach the problem for our customer. Let's plan our difference in our product or our service and how we communicate it. Let's plan our difference that we make for our customers that we want our other prospects to hear. And then let's figure out how many opportunities we have to capture our promise, how many opportunities we have to capture our product, and how many opportunities we have to capture our proof and how we're gonna deliver that to the market, not one time, not because we have a campaign, but all the time consistently so that our entire audience can see what we think, what we do, and ultimately the change that we make for our customers, our content will be better, it will be more purposeful, and it'll be more effective if what we're up to is changing the hearts and minds of our audience, winning trust and earning their business. 

Adam Marquardt: So we've talked a lot kind of in theory about this strategy and this framework and this approach. But I think it even goes a step further than that. If you, if you took a step back and you went to leadership, whoever that may be, and you ask them one very simple question and you say, Hey, do we want to communicate to the market what we think, what we do, and the results that we get? And the answer is yes, then you just got buy-in for applying this framework to your video approach. Yeah. 

Nathan Yerian: And if the answer is no, you don't have a video problem, you have a leadership problem.