8 top tips and examples of producing great low cost video from scratch

If you are new to marketing with video, starting simple could be the key. Throughout the process of creating less expensive and less challenging video content, you will learn the ropes and be inspired to build upon the basics. The learning process will generate ideas that will contribute to developing a more thought-through video marketing strategy; putting you in the position of being able to justify bigger budgets in the future.

Examples of successful video using a bootstrapping approach

Here are some great examples showing just how effective low cost videos can be....... This example shows screencasting in action - as well as showing you how to use Screenflow as a tool for yourself!: The production of this video animation was definitely not inexpensive. However, it shows how mobile phones can produce great results: Finally, this video…

A practical approach to creating more effective content

Whether you are running a large scale publishing website, ecommerce site or simply a blog, today's marketing has a common theme; the requirement for amazing content to encourage engagement and sharing leading to sales. Utilising members from your marketing, PR & editorial team to form ideas for your site or client requires effective use of a meeting or thought shower as some people would say [a new term for the editor, apparently a politically correct version of brainstorm]. As with all meetings without the right structure they can quickly become a waste of time, hopefully the steps below will help you achieve a productive thought shower.

Thought shower prerequisites - understand current content marketing

Any meeting requires preparation, but equally this doesn’t need to be over engineered. Insights are key to empowering people in this thought shower. Answering the following questions about your existing content marketing…

We're now in a constantly changing digital landscape

Did you see this Comscore report about "Digital Omnivores"?  I think it's really useful for marketers.  Not because the information is revolutionary in any way, but because it's offering some seriously hard facts that can be taken to management to support business cases, marketing planning and ideas generation for marketing. It may help to have this in light of your own analytics, maybe it can help inform decisions that you're thinking of making, or even realise that you need to make. Increased WiFi availability and mobile broadband adoption in countries like the U.S., Australia and the U.K. are driving connectivity. Mobile phones already drive digital traffic around the world, while tablets are gaining steam. Tablets traditionally required a WiFi connection to access the Internet, whereas now they're increasingly driving traffic using mobile broadband access…

Scribblers shows how content marketing can be integrated into the Facebook timeline and website to help generate sales

I think case studies are a great way to learn; to discover techniques to improve marketing. In this example, we look at how online retailer Scribblers blends Facebook, email and web as one part of effective use of social media marketing.

About the case study company

Scribblers is a successful online retailer supplying calligraphers throughout the world with stock and advice ‘to meet all their calligraphy needs’. You can read a more detailed version of this case study also.

Scribblers uses an integrated mix of digital communication channels to reach and engage its niche target market. A combination of Facebook advertising and social marketing, occasional specialist magazine articles and shows, and a continuous presence in search using Google Adwords and SEO, is effective in driving new visitors to its website hub and Facebook…

Making the case for a winning localisation strategy

In my experience, many companies give localisation very little thought until growth begins to stagnate and they are forced to look at additional revenue from international markets. So what happens when you have exhausted the potential in your domestic market? Organisations are generally faced with two choices: 1. Develop new products or services to get more traction in your own back yard 2. Sell your existing products or services on a global scale Since developing innovative products and services can be an expensive, high-risk strategy, it is not surprising that companies will opt to tap into international markets as a preference. What may surprise you, however, is that very few have any sort of strategy around their localisation programs and so they eventually lose out to savvy competitors who were quicker at adapting to selling to a global audience.

Making the business case for localisation

Convincing Finance Directors…

New report highlights the top luxury brands and the challenge of ongoing engagement

Firstly, it's important to remember that the luxury market really has been slow to adapt to social media marketing. Largely ignoring the channel in the early days, most likely since it's nothing akin to the world that luxury brands are used to, advertising orientated essentially. It's what they know, and how the communicate to the mass audience. For a short period it seemed that luxury brands had come to truly appreciate social media’s ability to reach its customers, brands like Porshche and Burberry have started out and done very well, and let's not forget is was only 2010 when Prada, Jimmy Choo, Hugo Boss and Marc Jacobs set up their first online storefronts! Today the most aggressive, or forward looking, of these companies are Macy’s, Sephora, Lancôme, Michael Kors and IWC,…

Explainer videos for marketing story telling

I'm writing this post about explainer videos since we've just created a new explainer for Smart Insights, which you can see below. At the same time I thought it was worth showing how you could use explainer videos in your own marketing. Here's our new explainer video created by First 10 Digital, it's part product description and part brand story telling since we wanted to give potential new users a flavour of why we exist. We hope it works in conveying what we're about?

The king of content marketing?

They're a major tool amongst all the content marketing options. Some might argue Explainer's are the tool in the content marketing toolkbox. They offer a way to capture and hold the user's attention, and communicate…

How to use the new Facebook scheduling feature for weekend engagement

Despite Facebook engagement rates in multiple sectors rocketing at the weekends, on Sunday in particular, reports from organisations such as Buddy Media show that very few brands are in fact posting content at the weekend. Those brands that do post outside of normal business hours enjoy 20% higher engagement rates. One of the reasons for this tardiness is likely to have been the lack of ability, until recently, to schedule updates on Facebook without using a third party tool such as Tweetdeck or Hootsuite. Furthermore, using these may not be a great idea. The Facebook Edgerank algorithm appears to favour posts inserted directly into its platform rather than those scheduled via Hootsuite. Eloqua claim that there is 61% less visibility when a third party tool is used rather than manual…

3 top tips to encourage sharing and 7 bad habits to avoid

Social media enthusiasts tend to look at press releases, and public relations in general, with a jaundiced eye. As a heavy social media user since 2005, I must admit I have read thousands of press releases I wouldn’t dream of sharing with my social communities. Nevertheless, I am an optimist! I believe the PR industry can adapt and publish press releases that are highly shareable on social platforms.

Three good reasons press releases should be socially shareable

Should press release writers care about social media sharing? I can think of three extremely important reasons: Social media exposes a firm to new groups of prospects and referrers. Social shares from influential social media participants increase a firm’s credibility. Social sharing may have a rippling effect that improves brand awareness. Unfortunately, many…

Alert: June 13th 2012 ICANN gTLD announcement gives new creative opportunities or scope for more trademark infringements?

Value/Importance: [rating=2] (It won’t be an option used by most companies) Recommended link: ICANN announcement and FAQ

Our summary of the domain name changes

Over the years we’re used to the periodic release of new top-level domains such as .info or .name. This new approach is more significant, ICANN, the domain authority describes it as “The new gTLD program is one the most substantive changes to the Domain Name System (DNS) in the Internet’s history”. Today, the first names applications were revealed on June 13th. They have been kept secret, but the examples above have all been applied for. Some that caught my eye are: .baby .life .design .Paris .degree .dell .hotel .coupon .gripe This ICANN video gives a good introduction to the reasons behind the changes and the…