Inside Small Business | Small Business & Home Business Marketing

Is Producing a Marketing Video a Good Investment?

Greg Womble, President of WOMCOM

Moviemaking isn’t just the domain of west coast producers. Large corporations have been making “marketing videos” for years, and, just like their Hollywood counterparts, often get mixed results. Unlike the entertainment industry, however, they rarely know their ROI.

Now, online business video is everywhere—and produced by everybody. “Making a video” is certainly more affordable for small- and mid-sized companies, but you might agree with me that many online videos today are vacant of quality and content.

Most businesses can benefit from a well-made online marketing film (let’s start differentiating your video product from the masses by using film, a term that connotes quality and timelessness) if it’s well-made and serves a purpose in your overall marketing strategy.

However, in producing online film content the “R” in ROI may mean a certain number of hits to your website or more qualified email inquiries about a job posting by HR. You’ve got to know what you want before you can expect any marketing tool to assist you in getting it.

“Yes” answers to these questions will assist you in deciding if it’s a good investment for your company:

1. Are our company’s values, key messages, and target audiences/markets clearly defined and written out?

2. Does our company have a flexible marketing plan in place with funds to implement the marketing in new and creative ways?

3. Are all of our primary marketing tools and tactics in place, attracting some attention from our markets and achieving some of the return we have defined in our marketing plan? Especially Internet marketing tools and tactics?

4. Realizing that the best marketing films are often slightly offbeat but always entertaining, are we really interested in telling our story in a fresh and different way?

5. Are we willing to get outside help in finding and telling the stories about our company that will help make the film successful?

If you have more than one “no” answer, don’t despair. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t produce a marketing video, it just means you probably shouldn’t IF you expect to see a discernable return on the business investment!

Greg Womble is president of WOMCOM, a project-oriented firm providing marketing planning and media producing services. For over 20 years he has written and produced film/video content for business and the entertainment industry, such as THE SCIENCE POLICE, a comedy-information TV series for Kentucky Educational Television. Contact Greg at greg@womcom.net or visit www.womcom.net.

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Update: Starting my Small Business

Marcelo Cazado, Executive Director, Floripa Angels

My first post was about the decision to start my own business. Today I will update you on what is going on since I left my job, 6 months ago.

Many entrepreneurs mention that they end up making something different from their initial idea. Well I face a similar experience. After launching a consultancy company I have realized there is an ocean of opportunities to foster entrepreneurship in Brazil, and then I also started a Business Angel association – called Floripa Angels - this December.

It is the first business angel network in the Southern Brazil. A business angel association in a nutshell is a network of successful business people interested in promoting entrepreneurship in their countries.

By the way, I do think it is an excellent idea to lead 2 businesses as long as they have strong synergies between each other. It is also fundamental to strengthen your business network and have mentors, colleagues, close friends and other people to share experiences, ideas and to build partnerships. Also it is a pretty good idea to invest some time writing your business plan and keeping it tracked.

Likewise, we know that the sky is the limit but keep an eye on your cash-flow.

And finally, stick to your decision because many job offers are likely to pop up for you. After all you are an entrepreneur, not exactly the easiest path but the more rewarding one. I am sure we are on the right track to build something my team and I will be proud of in ten years time.

Related Topics: Entrepreneurship, Marketing    6 Comments