Let’s Talk About SEO

A few simple steps to help you move your website up the search engine ladder

First thing’s first, for anyone that is new to all the online business jargon, SEO simply stands for ‘Search Engine Optimisation’ and its function is to help push your website to the top of any search engine. However, with your help provided, you can help push your website further to the top of search engines so whenever someone uses certain words and phrases to search for businesses like yours, you can make sure to be that users first click!

 A search engines’ job is to simply act upon the request of the user and provide the best match to what they are searching, based on popularity and relevance. The way search engines provide this information is based on a series of links from your website to the database that the search engine holds. This database is found by ‘crawlers’: imagine tiny people running through a network of imaginery wires inside the search engine, looking for useful keywords and information to determine the relevance and popularity of links on your website that will help to push your site to the top of search enquiries. Whether you are building your own website or if someone is doing it for you, it is important to understand how to create a site rich with information that helps users and consumers find you easily.

 There are several ways to help your website climb to the top. One way search engines determines the popularity and relevance is based on what the user is typing into the search engine to look for specific services, products and information. So, keeping the titles and subtitles of each page of your site is accurate and descriptive is a good place to start. Adding text links to each page will help people navigate people through your site, whilst also allowing search engines to understand how relevant you are in relation to certain searches.

 Keep your URL simple and keyword rich. This will not only help users to find you quicker but will help keep you near the top of search engines. Speaking of key words, make sure to not keep key words (i.e. your company name or the service you offer) hidden from the search engine ‘crawlers’ in different forms of media, such as images or videos.

Keeping it simple and clear for the purpose of your URL and key words and links n your site are very useful for SEA to understand the relevance of your site, however, annotating your website in a way that someone would actually describe images or videos could help SEO recognise the content of what you are presenting. For example, rather than just writing ‘Building a Table’ as a How-To video for DIY beginners, you may elaborate on the content to something someone would actually search ‘How to build a large kitchen table for beginners’. This helps both the SEO and user find and understand your content before clicking.

 Keeping your content fresh and updated is also key to keeping it near the top. Sites that haven’t been updates in years may lose its relevance and popularity so will lose traction and fall down the list searches. Keeping your site updated is not only a must for your current customers but to also attracting new ones and gaining popularity on all search engines.

Understanding what people are searching for is key to organizing your site and tailoring it for the user. Is your typical user searching for your specific page? (i.e. typing in your company name or something similar?) Are they searching for a product or service that you, or anyone else, are providing? Or, are they searching for information that could relate to your product?

Being visible for your customer in the first few suggestions on their search could be crucial to you gaining business. Being a top result on a search page results in the highest amount of traffic to your website, which will ultimately gain you a higher volume of potential customers. So, be smart about your SEO and the rest will be history! If you need any more tricks and tips or would simply like to talk to one of our experts, give us a call today, we would love to hear from you.

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Generation Now

THE POWER OF THE ONLINE BLOGGER

10 years ago, if you muttered the words ‘blogger’, ‘vlogger’ or ‘YouTuber’ in the presence of a business professional, you would probably be greeted with a bemused look upon their face. 20 years ago, those words merely didn’t exist, let alone become a valid stream of income. YouTube, the main platform for the 21^st Century ‘blogger’, has enabled people to connect with the rest of the world by simply using home-recorded videos created by someone with a hobby. A savvy blogger filming themselves doing a simple review on a product or a tutorial on how to create ‘the perfect red lip’ has now snowballed into creating some of the highest earning, self-employed, influential people all over the world. We delve into the lives of these savvy business men and women, and how it can help you.

How do they make money?

To begin with, YouTube was just a platform to give people the outlet they wanted to show off their talents or hobbies, expanding from written online blogs. The more views a video would receive and interest it gained would entice advertisers to place their commercial on said video. For example, an advert with the latest type of lipstick may be shown on a bloggers video of a make-up tutorial, providing that blogger attracted a substantial amount of viewers. Advertisers then pay YouTube, who take some of the cut and then pass on the rest to the video blogger who created the tutorial. However, these types of earnings may look like pennies compared to the impact these ‘YouTubers’ are making.

Branding and Merchandise

Many YouTubers have moved on from the traditional income stream of advertising (although, don’t get me wrong, some of the biggest names online get a hell of a lot from one major company advertising on their video). Some of the most popular bloggers are now a household name and create bigger income streams from the likes of branding and merchandise. This can include partnering with big brands to creating their own brand. Some have gone on to release sell-out books, make-up lines, fashion labels/brands and even just branding their own imaging on merchandise can earn them a big buck. Some partner with major brands in order to promote themselves and sell a product and most of them create videos with a certain product to talk about, in which case, they have to label the video as an ‘#AD’ (by law).

 

Stars of the show

You think we’re joking? Well, just to make you more familiar with the process, we present to you some of the ‘stars’ of the show…

Zoella (Zoe Sugg)

One of the most influential YouTubers on the internet. With a whopping 11.2 million subscribers to her channel and over 840 million views on her videos, anything she promotes, sells. She has more followers than Barack Obama and had an invite to have tea with Prince Harry, but this isn’t merely enough. Some of her accolades include a sell out beauty collection with Superdrug in 2015 and her own book ‘Girl Online’ selling over 80,000 copies in the first week, making her the fastest selling debut novelist since records began. She began her blog in 2009, sat in her bedroom of the family home, because of this she is now known as one of the biggest influencers for young people in Britain with an estimated net worth of £3m.

Alfie Deyes

Or ‘Mr. Zoella’ is the other half to Zoe Sugg. Both popular YouTubers in their own right before becoming a couple, Alfie commands a subscribing audience of 5.4 million and over 435 million views to his channel ‘PointlessBlog’. For young viewers, this channel is about fun challenges, games and… eating candy on camera (Yep, you heard us correctly, this particular ‘candy eating’ video, that was uploaded less than a month ago, boasts almost 2 million views to date).

Pixiwoo

In 2008, Samantha Chapman, previously a make-up artist, sat in front of her webcam, ‘bored one day’ and decided to start filming make-up tutorials online. Her sister, Nicola, then joined her in the venture and together they produced the channel (and now brand name) ‘Pixiwoo’. Aside from their YouTube channel creating a sizable stream of income, they also have their own range of cosmetic brushes and worked with some big names within the fashion and celebrity industry, whilst also running a five-day make-up course from their studio in Norwich.

These are just a mere few of the hugely successful Bloggers/Vloggers/YouTubers/Influencers, whatever you want to call them! Below are some of the rest that are extremely powerful in their own right.

Samantha Maria

Subscribers: 1.8M

Views: 151M

Formerly known as ‘beautycrush’, this influencer began creating fashion, styling and make-up videos and now, with her boyfriend, run a sell-out fashion label ‘Novem & Knight’ and still earn off creating personal and sponsored videos.

Patricia Bright

Subscribers: 955k

Views: 84M

Previously working in finance, Patricia now runs a hair extension brand alongside her blogging as well as being a brand ambassador for Loreal.

Tanya Burr

Subscribers: 3.6M

Views: 311M

Alongside Zoella, she has been a ‘cover girl’ for one of the best selling glossy magazines in the UK and has a sell-out make up range in Superdrug.

In The Frow

Subscribers: 522k

Views: 28M

‘Inthefrow’ is a brand created by Victoria, a writer, photographer and editor. She is now an ambassador for Loreal alongside Patricia Bright whilst running a successful written blog and online YouTube videos. Known as a ‘lifestyle’ blogger, she talks about high-end fashion, make-up, food and travel.

 

What does this mean for you?

The above are some of the most sought after names within the online industry – and outside. So making this work for you and your business could really prove difficult. However, we are just demonstrating the sheer scope of media and culture that these names possess. It is these people that are the future of advertising and how, you, as a business owner, could be able to connect with your costumer in the most efficient way.

Reaching Out

We are a big supporter of producing great quality content and videos for any business. Connecting with the blogging community now has a huge advantage in many ways. You could start your own blog, depending on what type of business you have. Creating an authentic way to connect to your target market and making that translatable through both yourself and your products could be a double win for you and your company. If you aren’t as fond of the idea of creating your own blog or you dealing with a business that is on a much more grand scale, then doing your research and reaching out to the influencers of today could seriously win you big interest from consumers you didn’t even know existed.

Authenticity

More often than not, some YouTubers won’t agree to advertise something that they haven’t tried or they are not passionate about. Sending out products to relevant and popular Bloggers that talk to your target audience could lead to an unsponsored ‘ad’ with them talking about your product simply because they love it. Free. Advertising. What more could you want? It could consist of paying for one of your ads to appear at the beginning of their videos (depending on the popularity of the blogger, this could be a costly affair), or even paying for a sponsored ad where you partner up and/or pay the blogger to advertise your product or service on their channel. But remember, keep it authentic, only target people you think will understand the product and love it as much as you do!

Happy to help!

Want to create your own professional video or learn more on other great marketing ideas? Please contact us today! We look forward to helping you get the most out of your business.

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Best Viral Ad Campaigns of All Time

How the Admen get your money

Have you ever wondered how businesses create ad campaigns that become viral? Or more to the point, how they BECOME viral. Well, unfortunately, there isn’t much science to it, although many of the viral campaigns tend to have one thing in common – a good old case of the feels. Often it is the poignant, silly or downright outrageous campaigns that take over our social media feeds in a matter of hours. It is also often the best one’s that have people thinking about, talking about and/or humming along too (you can’t deny that you have never had Phil Collins ‘In the Air Tonight’ stuck in your head for months after Cadbury’s ‘Gorilla’ ad campaign). Getting your brand out there and raising awareness via social media is becoming increasingly more difficult with the excessive amount of content being shared every second of the day. So, we hope to inspire you and get your creative juices flowing by compiling a list of, what we think are, the 10 best ad campaign of all time.

 1. Dairy Milk (gorilla & eyebrows)

YouTube View Count to Date ‘Eyebrows’: 1.5m 

YouTube View Count to Date ‘Gorilla’: 8.5m

If it is one thing Cadbury has managed to achieve, it is a string of super successful (and creative) ad campaigns. Their aim? To create adverts that would spark both conversation and reaction. Using nostalgia as a tool to engage the older consumers and an utterly silly concept to connect with their younger viewers. Simply genius.

2. Old Spice

YouTube View Count to Date: 53m

The genius for the Old Spice advert that famously declared “I’m on a horse” lies with the fact that they filmed the whole advert in one take! They cunningly recorded this advert in one take by simply moving backdrops, and using a very well rehearsed horse, of course. The ability to offer a product to the male consumer whilst also appealing to their female counter parts with the tag line “This is what your man could smell like” is sheer brilliance.

3. Think! Don’t Drink and Drive

YouTube View Count to Date: 119k

This ad campaign may have only had 119k views on YouTube to date, but that does not reflect the impact that this particular advert, and other similar to it, have had. It seems that the most effective road safety adverts are those that communicate with the viewer in the most simple, real and, sometimes, shocking way. This advert in particular focuses less on the graphicness of how damaging drinking and driving can be and instead emphasizes the impact that drink driving can have on your life. It shows a man behind the bar responding to a customer, who is about to buy a drink, with a series of consequences of drink-driving. This includes a driving ban, which leads to job loss, which can lead to jail time and not being able to support your family. Powerful stuff.

4. Dove Evolution

YouTube View Count to Date: 18.7m

Dove have been ambassadors for ‘Real Women’ for a long time, so their long standing campaign stays true to its ethos and uses women of all shapes, sizes and colour to represent their brand in each of their adverts. Their campaign aims to not only support women’s bodies, but also celebrate them. This brand connects with their target audience by showing the viewer that most ad campaigns that promote beauty and skin care products use technology to achieve an unattainable and unrealistic standard of what we believe, as a society, is deemed as ‘beautiful’. Using this method ultimately aims to gain trust from the viewers and ‘expose’ other skin care and beauty companies.

5. Three #DancePonyDance

YouTube View Count to Date: 12.5m

Using a similar method to the Cadbury campaign, mobile company, Three, intend on engaging their viewers with an advert that supplies a catchy song and an utterly ridiculous concept of a pony moonwalking. Three also tap into the need to connect through social media platforms by adding the hashtag #DancePonyDance. The result of this hashtag is a way to spark conversation over social media that advertise their product whilst making people laugh and not take it too seriously. Ultimately, this leads to the video being shared through various online platforms multiple amounts of times and sparking interest in the product itself.

6. Evian Baby and Me

YouTube View Count to Date: 130m

I don’t know about you, but I know many adults who dreams of a simpler time. A time where we didn’t pay bills; a time where we could pull silly faces and dance in public and no one would bat an eyelid; A time where we could let loose and be ourselves. That time for many people is their childhood. This is probably why this advert has had a whopping 130 million views, because we simply can’t get enough of how relatable it is. A bunch of adults walking past a large mirror through a busy street and spot there reflections, but their reflections being their former self as a baby. They start to dance and make silly faces and it is the connection with their childhood. The tagline ‘Pure and Natural’ that Evian hope to show us that being our young and unassuming self is not a bad thing. Quite the opposite.

7. Carrie coffee shop

YouTube View Count to Date: 66.4m

In recent years, hidden camera pranks have become one of the most likely to go viral videos on the Internet. It gathers viewers due to its intrigue of its outcome and desire to know why the prank has been carried out. Whether it is a friend pranking an old friend, a stranger making someone in their path jump or a guerilla ad campaign, we love to see people shocked. This ad campaign doesn’t reveal its true agenda until the end of the set of pranks to reveal it was, in fact, an advert for the upcoming cinematic horror remake of ‘Carrie’. The original was a 70’s classic that was being remade for the likes of us 21st century folks, so they had to catch our attention some how. Using a group of actors in a seemingly normal setting of a coffee shop to trick the unassuming public that someone amongst them had telekinetic powers that can throw another human being across the room is was had us hooked and watching right through to the end.

8. Always #likeagirl

YouTube View Count to Date: 62.2m

Always have used an ad campaign that touches on the strength of women and how, no matter what their bodies are going through, they should never be underestimated. They asked a group of young boys and older girls how they would do certain things as ‘a girl’, such as ‘run like a girl’ and ‘throw like a girl’. They all responded with meek and flimsy actions. Then they asked a series of young girls, that are seemingly unaware of the certain pressures put on them as a female, the exact same questions. The result? They acted out the same actions just as strong and fast as the boys when asked to carry out the same actions. They aim to show that women are conditioned into thinking they aren’t as physically capable as men and illustrate that this is not the case, especially when using their product.

9. John Lewis Christmas Ads

YouTube View Count to Date: <50m

Ah, The John Lewis Christmas Advert. It is one we wait for, as a nation, all year long. We don’t expect anything less than a good old tug of the heart-strings and an emotional song to boot. Each year they do not fail to disappoint, from a little boy befriending a penguin, to snow people falling in love, it uses a little bit of magic with the theme of love to show us that John Lewis are the people to go to in order to get your loved ones the best at Christmas time. And don’t we all know it.

10. O2 ‘Be More Dog’

YouTube View Count to Date: 181k

What is more adorable than a fluffy fat cat wearing a headset, telling a room of people that they can be whoever they want to be, even if they feel like they are a completely different species? Nothing! That is why we have come together to enjoy this advert in all its glory. O2 have managed to capture motivation using the most lethal weapon possible to advertise their product. This genius move shows us that you don’t have to live your life with tedious routine, but in fact you can take enjoyment from every day activities like running and jumping (and catching sticks). Of course this is a metaphor for inspiration to grab life by the… Well, you know what we’re trying to say. Either way, we love this little fur ball and everything he represents.

As you can see, each advert is incredibly different and creative, yet each one of them has the ability to capture our hearts’ and minds in many different ways, and we love them for it. If this has simply not provided you with enough inspiration for your next video marketing venture, then our experts at Stormnet Media would love to help you.

 

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How to build a killer website

Make your website a traffic magnet

There are many reasons as to why consumers want to come back to you and your business for your services; great products/service, wonderful customer service and efficiency, just to name three.

However, you need to be able to grasp that consumers’ attention in the first place, in order to attract them to use your services. You could offer the most spectacular services, but if you cannot display these qualities through a professional and clear website, then you might as well forget it! We want to make sure that you can make the most of your website with tips and ideas from design, to multimedia, to the technical stuff that encourages your customers to click back to your website.

The Content

In order to start layering and building your website, you need to have the content ready, or at least concrete ideas of how you want your website to look and the information that will go into it. This information may include a brief overview of your business alongside images or videos and links that you would like to appear on your landing page. It should also include any necessary information that you need to add to your website, such as, cost of services and/or products, images of products and links to relevant social media sites. Without this, you will merely have a domain name!

The Knowledge

Do your research on competing businesses. Have a look at other websites for similar businesses, both successful and unsuccessful. This way you can educate yourself on what looks appealing to you if you were their consumer and what to avoid, if you think it looks clunky and unappealing. This is also a useful tactic during the creation of your website and build of your business, so you can keep up to date on who is on top on how they are attracting customers to their site. However, be careful not to plagiarise other designs or information, use the research information as a helpful guide of ‘Do’s’ and ‘Don’ts’.

The Design

Going from research on competing websites that you may have looked through, what do you notice of the more popular or successful ones? Generally, they will have a more clear and clutter-free landing page, clear titles and a clear navigational system to guide you through their site. Making sure you have a clean, brand recognizable and professional looking logo is crucial as it is what the customer first sees when they hit your landing page for the first time and how they will recognize you in the future.

If it is your first time building a brand or logo then you may benefit from spending that little bit extra on a professional to help design your logo – it is the attention to detail that will be worth it in the long run. Depending on the type of business you are, not all styles and designs of logos will have the same effect, so make sure it fits the theme of your business, for example, neutral colours and simple lettering may be used for a modern interior design company, however, bright colours with a bubble style logo will be more appropriate for a kids toy shop site. Either way, make sure it encompasses the feel and style of your business!

Note: As said previously, attention to detail is crucial! Make sure you look at every single button on your website in order to create the most appealing links to other desired pages.

The Multimedia

Having a vast variety of multimedia for your consumers to feast on is all the more appealing and encourages people to look into more depth of your website out of curiosity for what you have to offer– as Aristotle once said “All men have the desire to know”!

In the ages where social media is king, having more interesting and cryptic-at-first-glance images and short concise videos across your website will encourage your consumers to click on to your site in order to view them in greater detail, so we suggest, much like your logo and brand, that you do not skimp on these. Investing in a professional videos and photos shows will illustrate to customers that you really take care of all aspects of your business.

The Technical

We know what you’re thinking… ‘Technical’ = Boring. Things such as making sure all your links work and getting yourself to the top of search engines is the sort of stuff that makes the world that is your website spin with greatness, however, it can often be the most time consuming and frustrating part of the process.

Checking all of the finer details and all of the more technical aspects of moving your website through the ranks and to be the top choice of service in your particular field. It is also important to make sure your site has many links to and from it for many reasons; having a larger amount of links going to and from your website is important to show how active it is, however, you want those links to be trustworthy and coming from a quality source.

Having 100 links from spam websites that are linked to yours won’t install trust in your site and users, which in turn, reflects in your business; having 50 links that go back to your website through trusted sources, i.e. non-profit organisations, government websites, etc. will create trust in your domain. Keep your links as fresh as possible! Keeping up to date and making sure that the links going to and from your website are still popular and relevant is important on keeping your site up to date.

 

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Simple Tips on How to Drive Traffic to Your New Website

Whether it’s the interview of your dreams or the date of your dreams, here at Stormnet Media,  we believe that first impressions are crucial. We cannot stress enough how important it is to have that first step polished. Whether it is your new website or you are launching a new app, it is important to make sure that it is not only ready to impress your consumers, but it is finished and launched with a cherry on top. It is that extra ‘je ne sais quoi’ that takes a mediocre pop record to a legendary hit, so with that in mind, we have put together some simple tips that will take your website from ‘one-hit-wonder’ to ‘hall-of-fame’ chart topper!

Content, content, content!

No article on our website would be complete without discussing our favourite topic, and that is… Content! We love content. However, it is no good just thinking about the initial launch and beginning processes. Even if you have the most incredible content to launch with your new site and you have your target audience hooked, it would not maintain its credibility if it was not nurtured and developed. This means making sure that you have enough ideas for new content as possible, in order to keep your consumers updated as consistently as possible. If you upload new videos, blogs or images to your website every Wednesday, stay committed. It is important that your audience sees you are passionate about growing your business by keeping them informed, and will make customers more likely to want to come back to your site or app in order to check out the new content.

Research

Before you can upload the wonderful content that you have waiting and ready to go, make sure that you have thoroughly done your research. Searching the latest trends on social media, website forums relating to your business or similar topics and keeping track of changes within your business world with email alerts will help to consistently develop your business. Keeping up to date with the latest news and social goings on surrounding the business that you are trying to launch will open your eyes to both the competition and help you to judge better on predicting what might be the next step forward for your business. It depends what type of new business you are launching, but sometimes it is even worth asking, what the savvy social world call ‘social influencers’. These are the people on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram that are known for having the most followers, simply for tapping into niche markets and turning them into trends. In the creative industries, such as fashion and music, it can be a massive leap in popularity and drive for your website if associated with these online forces.

Bold, Bright and Social

In world where now communicate through text, video and imagery, whether it is for business or pleasure, you would be correct in thinking that it is an important part of the western culture. No matter what business you are, it would be silly not to keep your website or app updated with new images and videos to catch the consumers interest. Keeping the multimedia content on your site user friendly is super important; it is simple things such as keeping the images on your website ‘pinterest-friendly’ to encourage your potential customers to do a little bit of advertising for you by ‘re-pinning’ your most recent images. It may not have to be an image either, if your company is a lot more keen on spreading a message, then attaching ‘memes’ to your site with ideas such as inspirational quotes or interesting info graph’s that link back to your website, will drive in more and more people. However, be sure to keep video content short and sweet. With the culture of social media, it is that instant gratification that people are now used too, videos on Instagram and Vine are often between 6-15 seconds long! Yet, it is these short videos that seem to go viral on the web within minutes of them being posted online.

Stay Interactive

As we have mentioned earlier on in this article, keeping your content updated is important, in order to show customers that you are developing as a business in order to tailor to their needs. This is also true with looking at, discussing and changing with feedback. There is nothing worse than feeling as though a business you have recently bought into has, not only not lived up to the customer’s expectations, but then also, not taking on their feedback positively or even at all. As long as it is appropriate for the style of business that you are creating and ensuring that you have the man power for it, it may be worth taking advantage of all the fantastic platforms within your reach in order to get in touch with your customers. People like to know that their voice is being heard, so being able to assist people and further their experience with your company, it may lead to free advertising in the form of ‘Word of Mouth’ from your most loyal customers.

SEO

Many people shy away from the, often mammoth, task of making sure that you have effective and working links to and from your website. Your site should be SEO friendly in order to optimize the amount of traffic that you could potentially be driving to your site, should you be doing it correctly. As long as you have both on-line and off-line link backs to your website with titles that incorporate the most popular search terms relating to your site, then the more people you will be attracting and help you to climb the rankings on search engines such as Google. Be careful with your link backs and ensure that the sites that are linking your audience to you website are reputable and trusted sites, because as we said, first impressions count, therefore, people won’t want to click on your site if you are linked to a dodgy or untrusted site. Simple things such as using relevant terms and phrases attached to the images on your site; using key words in the titles and headers on your page or simply creating shareable content that is of high quality using key words and interesting headings will ensure the click-count becomes higher.

There are many more things that we would love to advise you on, so if you would like more information on how to maximize the potential of your website or app then please don’t hesitate to contact us!

 

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Animation Vs. Live-Action: What is best for your business?

Don’t know whether to go for animation or live action – let us help you decide.

There are many things to consider when thinking about the best way to create, produce and market your start up or advertising video. As you well know, it comes down to your budget and your audience, but how do you utilise both of these factors to benefit your business in the most successful way? We want to look at the pros and cons of using animation versus live action video techniques in order to help you decide exactly what your business needs.

Budget

No matter what style of video or website, this is always our number one priority when considering the project that we are getting involved with. You have to have a realistic outlook of how much you are willing to spend on your start up or advertising video. By creating a reasonable budget, it allows you to have a better idea of how to create a suitable video without over or under doing it.

Audience

It may sound blaringly obvious, but when creating your start up video, the most important thing to think about is your audience. Who is going to be watching this video? How will this video make create more clicks for your website? These are important things to think about when you are deciding between whether you want to use live action or animated video. It is not enough to think, “I’d love to have an animated video of a dog running through a garden!” or “we need to have a live action shot of a man standing by a river” without thinking about the appropriateness for the demographic and the different effects that they have (Although, I’m not sure what this particular business would be marketing, to be honest with you!) However, what we are trying to say is, appropriateness is key and the decision between animated and live action could make or break the barrier between you and your desired audience, so think carefully.

Appropriateness

We are not trying to say that animated videos are not effective, as we at Stormnet Media love a good animated video and they can be very informative, concise and fun. But sometimes, depending on the message you want to convey and considering the audience, some videos may benefit more from a human touch. Having a well-known face to bring a message alive can really instill trust in your business, as it can illustrate certain professionalism to your campaign.

Resources

So, you have considered your budget and thought about which type of video is better for your business and how you would like to market it. But before you start putting the final touches to your mood board of ideas, have a think about your resources, as this can ultimately effect your decision about the use of animated versus live action. If you are outsourcing in order to produce your video, there is often not much difference in price, but of course costs will vary depending on the style of your video, production time and length, etc. If you are wanting to do a DIY job or you know someone that may be useful to talk or appear in your video then it is possible to do a live action video without outsourcing, however, this is much more difficult when it comes to animation.

DIY and live action

With a greater quality of affordable technology at our fingertips, it is no surprise that you can see and endless amount of ‘vloggers’ running businesses from their bedrooms using smartphones and cameras. With this in mind, there are so many pieces of technology that make it much easier for you to produce your own live action videos using things such as GoPro’s, iPhone’s and Drones. However, the devil is in the detail, and often it is the professional touch of a seasoned video producer that creates that final touch to your video. DIY can be truly magnificent when utilised and put together in the right way, and for many of these vloggers we have spoken about, it is endearing because it is very personal and conversational. However, if you seek a more professional look for your video then there is often no replacing the experience of a good video production team to advise and guide you.

Animation

Animation can be a great tool for a concise but fun start up or advertising video. We are big fans of the use of animated videos as there are no limits of what you can create because there are so many possibilities. DIY animation can be much more difficult to create at home unless you are knowledgeable in all aspects that come with it. There are many things to consider when creating an animated video, such as voice-overs, sound effects and illustrations. Unless you know what you are doing with animations, it can be very time-consuming and often less cost effective than outsourcing the talent to do it for you. A film such as Disney favourite, ‘Up’, is a great example how to use animation in a way that touches the audience and creating an invaluable emotional connection between the audience and the characters (the animation and a great storyline of course!). Due to the advanced animations that we can now create, it shows that you don’t always have to use live action to truly connect with your audience emotionally.

As you can see, both techniques can be very effective but there are may things to think about when considering how to use them. So, if you cannot decide between whether to use live action or animation for your start up, advertising or promotional video, or if you need an advice or quote then we would love to help you.

 

 

 

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