In 1984, Steve Jobs played American president Franklin Delano Roosevelt in an internal corporate video spoofing the traditional ‘rally the troops’ message. What lessons can we, as marketers using corporate video, take from this newly unearthed gem?

1. TREAT EVERY VIDEO AS IF IT WERE PUBLIC
   At first blush, the ‘Steve Jobs as FDR’ video seems almost embarrassing.  It’s a poor imitation – he almost seems more like The Penguin from the old Batman TV show than FDR.  But the video was produced for a Sales conference, and was meant to ‘rally the troops.’  Instead of staring into a camera in a studio and delivering weak motivational copy – the typical troop rallying corporate video, it’s a fun take on the concept.  He’s literally rallying the troops.  We see it now, and it’s a fun piece of nostalgia instead of a discarded piece of corporate collateral.
2. ALWAYS PUT YOUR BEST FOOT FORWARD
   Where the ‘Steve Jobs as FDR’ video could have become embarrassing is if the production values were low.  Cardboard tanks. T-shirt uniforms.  Too many non-actors trying to act.  Don’t do it.  If you’re going to commit to creating a marketing asset, commit to making it as high quality as you can within your time and budget constraints.  Again, you’re planning on being big someday, and you want this thing to be remembered fondly. If you try to make a fun corporate video and it doesn’t pan out, don’t be afraid to burn all of the tapes, shred the digital files, and move on.
3. EVERY VIDEO IS AN OPPORTUNITY
   Jobs gets his ‘rah-rah’ pitch out there humorously, and then nails the Apple tagline at the end, ‘Insaaaaaaanely Great.’  It’s a great moment, reinforcing Apple’s 1984 corporate branding in a quick, off-handed, and genuinely funny way.  Now, not everyone making corporate video is going to have a Steve Jobs to pull something like that off (the rest of the video is pretty cringe-worthy), but it’s important to always be on the lookout for little opportunities when you’re producing corporate videos.  How can we enhance our brand here?  Is there a way we can better show off our strengths?  Are we missing an opportunity with this video?  Ask the hard questions, and keep working to hone your video before, during, and after production. In an incredibly brief segment, Jobs nails down SO many ideas.  We’re at war (with IBM).  We’re the good guys.  We will win.  We have positioning.  We make better products.  That kind of message density is seldom by accident, and often requires dozens of revisions, but it’s worth it.  It demonstrates a level of care and attention to detail to your viewers (often your customers) beyond the quality of the video itself.

Have you ever thought about creating a ‘fun’ corporate video?  What are some of the best analogies for your industry, your positioning, and your product/service?  Producing a spoof video can be great for company morale (get everyone involved) and you wind up with a great marketing asset and, hopefully just like the ‘Jobs as FDR’ video, a fun piece of nostalgia to look back on years from now.

So here’s our quick test of the new raytracing engine in After Effects CS6:

Overall, it’s incredibly easy to work with for anyone already familiar with After Effects. There are a few new materials to work with, and some new light-related options to get used to, and outputting is S-L-O-W (this 8 second animation took about 10 minutes to render on a fully tricked-out Macbook Pro), but real 3D is a great capability, and we’re looking forward to adding it to our ‘bag of tricks’.

Has your business developed a great app for the iPhone, iPad or an Android device?  Like most things,  the best way to show off your app is with video!  Rewatchable can produce  a professional, fast moving video that shows off your iOS app or Android app in action.

Why do you need an app video?   Of course, your app video is a must for your website but also app videos can help create a buzz in social media.  If you want happy users to talk about your app on Facebook, Twitter etc.  you better have a video they can share.  Also, an app video is a great way to provide a tutorial for your customers so they understand the app’s capabilities and benefits.  Your developers worked hard to create your app.  You were able to get customers to actually download the app.  Now, you better make sure customers understand how to use the app and actually want to use it.  The sad fact is most apps that get downloaded are never used more than once or twice.  A video app can help users see the benefits of your app so they actually want to use your app!

Here’s an example of a app video produced by Rewatchable.  Need an iOS app video or Android app video? Give us a call at 978.666.4068.

Rewatchable Boston Area Video Production

But why does HTML5 video matter?  What’s the big deal with having to fall back to Flash?  We live in an increasingly mobile world, and mobile devices are only as good as their battery life.  Flash, while ubiquitous, also has a reputation for killing the battery life on laptops, tablets, and smartphones, which is why companies like Apple have rejected it.  Properly implemented HTML5 video (check out our homepage on an iPad or iPhone to see Wistia’s terrific Matador player in action) lets sites offer up video without compromising battery life.

Before and After Color Grading (click to expand)

One of the most important – and most often overlooked – components of video is color correction, or color grading, and last night’s State of the Union Address offers an unprecedented example of what poor color grading can do to reduce the quality of video.

During last night’s telecast, the primary camera feed was badly discolored.  Note how President Barack Obama (center) appears yellowish-green, and House Speaker John Boehner (right), a man with famously orange, tanned skin appears to have normal skin tone.  The problem didn’t seem to exist from any other camera angles, and appeared across all of the television networks (although it looked like CBS was attempting to compensate in the second hour), and so was likely the result of incorrect white balance in that one camera.  For whatever reason (probably security), adjustments couldn’t be made live, and the capability must not have existed in the control room to adjust the image before it was sent out to the networks, and so the result was an evening with a president that looked like a nauseous Kermit the Frog.

So how does this relate to corporate video?  Well, in the world of non-live video, we have the ability to fix and enhance these images after the fact using color-correction filters and specialty software.  Most offices use some form of fluorescent light (or worse, mixed light), which can leave untreated images discolored similarly to the State of the Union.  Light-skinned subjects appear to have a yellow cast, and dark-skinned ones look green.  Getting good white balance during your shoot is key, but simple adjustment to a set of three color wheels can fix – even enhance – your images to return your subjects to their natural color so that viewers aren’t distracted and clients aren’t offended by the way they look.  Take a look at the before and after picture with this post.  If Barack Obama were your CEO, would you rather deliver corporate video that looked like the top image or the bottom?  It took less than two minutes to grade the bottom image, and the difference in quality is night and day.  Color correction is one of the easiest and most effective ways to add production value to your corporate video, and it’s fairly easy to get the hang of.

Want to learn more? Here are some good resources:

Vimeo Video School – Introduction to Color Correction

Prolost – Color Correcting Canon 7D Footage

Color Correction in iMovie – MacWorld

You can hope that Google and YouTube guess what your video is about or you can tell them!  Video Search Engine Optimization is the process of letting search engines know what your video is about so the search engine can show your video based on your keywords.   Every video you add to YouTube should include tags and a title that specifically describe your video.   Google and other search engines will use those tags and titles to index your video.

Tags help but if you want Google to know exactly what is being said in your video you can simply add subtitles or a transcript to your video with the exact words being spoken.  If you create a video about green tractors and the people in the video speak a lot about green tractors your video is much more likely to show up in Google and other search engines.  If the subtitles / transcript has many instance of the words ‘green’ and ‘tractor’ Google will know exactly what the video is about.

Adding subtitles and transcripts is super easy.  1) Simply create a .TXT file that has the exact words spoken in the video.  2) Click on the “Edit captions/subtitles” button above your video.  3) Click on the “Add New Captions or Transcript” button. 4) Select “Transcript File” 5) Upload your .TXT file.

NOTE: We find it is better/easier  to select the “Transcript File” option rather than the “Caption File” option because the Caption File option requires that you also add exact time codes.  The “Transcript File” option only requires the actual words spoken during the video. Google’s speech recognition software will figure out when to add the subtitles to match your video.

We have created a quick tutorial video to help with adding subtitles and transcriptions to YouTube videos.  During our video, you will see  we add a transcript file to a recent tutorial video we have created to help businesses embed video in HTML on their website/blog using Youtube videos.  You can check out the original video How To Embed Video In HTML Using YouTube Videos and you can see a help page we created How To Embed Video

Add Subtitles & Transcripts To YouTube To Help With Video Search Engine Optimization 

Rewatchable is a video production company based near Boston, Massachusetts.

Lots of marketing professionals would love to hire a video production company but just don’t have the budget for an expensive video production so they decide to go the Do-It-Yourself route.  Unfortunately, video production is easier in theory than in practice.  Every video production poses different challenges and opportunities and lots can go wrong.

At Rewatchable,  we have scoured the  web and seen it all from Do-It-Yourselfers. Amateur business videos (sounds funny doesn’t it?) run the gamut from great to awful.  The biggest mistake we see  is the “video producer” does not pay attention to sound quality.

The  reality is most consumer grade video camera equipment has awful sound recording capabilities.  In many cases, executive videos are ruined because the sound is inaudible or it sounds like the video production was done in a giant auditorium filled with echoes.  The problem is twofold. The microphone on the camera is of low quality and it is just too far away from the person being interviewed.

For your amateur business video production, you really have three choices.

If you are lucky, your consumer-grade video camera might have an “audio in” jack so that you can plug in an external microphone.  You can then plug in a high quality microphone and move it closer to the interviewee.  One of our favorite microphones is the VideoMic from Rode.  The VideoMic produces a great sound and is affordable at about $150. There are also a wide selection of wired and wireless lavaliere microphones available that can plug into a consumer-grade video camera with “audio in” jacks”

The second choice is to get your video camera as close as possible to the subject. Play back your footage during the actual video production to see if it sounds half decent. If it  doesn’t sound good, cancel the video production and don’t waste your executive’s time and good will.  Nothing will kill interest in future video productions more than when an executive says all the right things perfectly but you screw up the audio/video production.

The final option is to use a separate recording device to supplement the video camera’s bad microphone.  You can get secondary audio with a high-quality audio recorder like a Zoom H4N or even a Flip camera hidden close by.   The Flip camera won’t pick up excellent sound but it should be more than adequate as long as it is very close to the person being interviewed.  The only problem with secondary audio is you will need to sync the audio yourself with video editing software like Final Cut Pro X or if you find that too difficult you will need to engage a professional video editing service like Rewatchable, Inc.  You will pay less than you would have paid for a full video production but you will still need to budget for the audio synching and the end result can’t be guaranteed.

Rewatchable is a video production company based in Beverly, Massachusetts near Boston.

]]> http://www.rewatchable.com/video-production-tip-for-do-it-yourselfer-tip-1/feed/ 1 http://www.rewatchable.com/manually-force-hd-playback-on-netflix-watch-instantly/ http://www.rewatchable.com/manually-force-hd-playback-on-netflix-watch-instantly/#comments Mon, 26 Dec 2011 18:29:36 +0000 Ryan Reed http://www.rewatchable.com/?p=2763 Netflix’s Watch Instantly is a great way to catch up on movies and tv shows, but sometimes it’s automatic selection of your video’s bit rate (quality) can leave you with something less than your connection can actually handle.  To manually select your quality (and hence, force HD playback), click on the video once it’s started to ensure that it’s your top window, and then press:

Control + Shift + Option/Alt + S

Now, at Rewatchable HQ we have ludicrous-speed Internet, so I always just choose the lowest option to ensure that I’m pulling the best version of the stream that Netflix has to offer (most movies seem to top out at 1750kbps – a speed that even most cheap DSL lines can handle), but you can tune the manual selection to your available connection to find that perfect quality / performance combination that works for you.

Thanks to Jud Stephenson for the tip.

We produce lots of business talking head videos, user conference videos, training videos, customer testimonial videos, marketing videos and more.  We love each experience like our children because we get the opportunity to meet interesting people and we also get to learn about new businesses, markets and technologies.  One day we might be in a chemical plant, another  day we might be at a scientific user conference and the next we can be shooting a CEO video for a cool technology start-up company.

Sometimes though we get to produce videos that are particularly fun.   Just a couple of weeks ago, we shot some video at the 2011 Riverfeast for Boston radio station The River 92.5.  Riverfeast is an annual charity event banquet, silent auction and concert to benefit The Greater Boston Foodbank. It is held at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, MA.   The event was a blast and featured some great music from Bob Schneider and Scars On 45.  We had lots of fun shooting and editing a short video montage that will be used by The River 92.5 to promote next years event.

The video is only about 30 seconds long.   If you love great music perfomances and good times check out the event video and definitely check out the real event next year.

 Scars On 45

Bob Schneider

Rewatchable is a Boston Event Video Company

Your best salesperson might well be your customer.  Customers are allowed to rave about your business in ways that your salespeople just cannot.  Even if your salesperson is raving about your products, services and company, they just are not as believable as a real client because they are paid employees.  Customers on the other hand can speak from the heart about real-life customer experiences while praising your business.

Ask yourself this question. Do you think propsective employees would be more likely to do business with your organization if they heard from happy customers?   The answer is OF COURSE.  Prospects are usually nervous about doing business with new vendors and need to get the “warm and fuzzies” before they get too involved in the sales process. Customer testimonial videos are a very powerful way to establish credibility and to reassure prospective clients.

We want to help Boston area businesses sell more in 2012 so we are offering special pricing on our customer testimonial videos.  We will visit either your office or your client’s office and capture video of your customer raving about your company, your service or product.

The process is very simple.  We will first research your company and develop questions appropriate for your business and industry.  During a 30 minute shoot,  we will simply ask your customer open-ended questions and let your customer speak for themselves.  We will also help them relax so they come off well on camera.  Next, we will edit the best answers that show off your customer and your business in the best possible light.  Finally, we will color-correct the video, add b-roll & text graphics and generally polish the video so it looks great for your website,  social media and email marketing campaigns.  The entire video production process can be completed in a couple of weeks.

Any customer testimonial purchased before the end of December, 2011 is now specially priced at only $1,200.  The customer testimonial shoot must be scheduled before January 31st, 2012. The video production needs to take place in the Greater Boston area. To receive the special pricing just mention the “Sell More in 2012 Special”

CUSTOMER TESTIMONIAL VIDEO EXAMPLE

Wistia Customer Testimonial Video  

Rewatchable – Customer Testimonial

At Rewatchable, we think of ourselves as less of a standard video production company and more of a marketing/social media video company.    We are interested in anything related to marketing, public relations and social media because we are always looking for new ways to help our customers spread their message.  David Meerman Scott is a social media guru we have followed for a long time so we were thrilled to have the opportunity to work with him recently.  We first met David at a Direct Marketing Association event in Boston this fall where we produced a video for our client SAS .  The idea of the video was to take a keynote speech and make it even more rewatchable with some video editing polish.  In the video, you will see David talk about new opportunities related to marketing, PR and social media. VIDEO LINK: The Power of Real-Time Marketing Takes Focus at DMA2011  In the video, you will see David is particularly passionate as he talks to the audience about social media ROI and how it is measured.

David liked our first video, so a couple weeks later, we met with him at his office to produce a short video focused entirely on Social Media ROI.  In the video, we were able to use footage David has taken on his flip cam from speaking events all over the world. In the video, David asks various audiences about measuring social media ROI compared to measuring ROI for devices like iPhones and Blackberries.  It is interesting to see how similar the answers are and even more interesting to see David rant about the hypocrisy.

Social Media ROI Video 

Not only is David a great author, he is also a fantastic public speaker.   His keynote speech was terrific but we were really impressed to see how natural he was on-camera for the  Social Media ROI video.  We are accustomed to taking our time with on-camera talent until the person in front of the lens is very comfortable.  We also provide coaching as needed to make sure we get the best content we can.  David needed NO coaching.  He is a real pro and we were done with the shoot within about 15 minutes!

Below is a list of some of David’s books.

The New Rules of Marketing & PR

Real-Time Marketing and PR

World Wide Rave

Marketing Lessons from the Grateful Dead

Below is a list of some articles/videos related to Social Media ROI

Social Media ROI: Stop Worrying, Start Interacting

Measuring Social Media ROI: 3 Things to Consider

9 Important Elements of a Social Media ROI Report

How to Estimate Your Social Media Return on Investment

Social Media ROI: Socialnomics (VIDEO)

Social Media ROI(VIDEO)

Rewatchable – Video Production Boston, MA

HubSpot is a marketing automation firm based in Cambridge, MA.  They are a leader in all things internet marketing so we watch their blog for inbound marketing tips.  We thought our readers might be particularly interested in today’s post 12 Tips to Instantly Enhance Video Production Quality

The blog post has some great video production tips plus some interesting factoids like “”by 2013, 90% of internet traffic is expected to be video.”   Below, we have consolidated the video production tips but we encourage you to read the full post. 12 Tips to Instantly Enhance Video Production Quality

Top Pre-Production Tips:

1. Be original.

2. Plan it out.

3. Be selective when choosing video subjects.

4. Carefully consider the set.

Top Production Tips:

5. Be cognizant of sound quality.

6. Set up lights.

7. Use a tripod.

8. Focus.

9. Obey the ‘rule of thirds.’

Top Post-Production  Editing Tips:

10. Align the flow of the video with the emotional response you want to evoke in viewers.

11. Leverage b-roll

12. Optimize video text.

HubSpot is a marketing automation company based in Cambridge, MA.

Rewatchable is a Boston based video production company located in Beverly, MA

Here’s a quick tutorial (not client work) we threw together on how to remove photos from Photo Stream in Apple’s new iCloud. In an industry where we’re often working with screen capture and screen grabs, hopefully this will prove useful to other folks using iPhones, iPads, and iCloud in general.

That’s exactly how Netflix spent their summer vacation.  Game over, goodnight Netflix, it was a fun ride, see you at the fire sale, right?  Not so fast. Netflix has built its industry-leading shipping and streaming operations around constantly observing, measuring and responding to information about the quality of its service.  In this instance, strategy was just another service, and in an act as surprising and laudable as the company-splitting strategy was baffling, CEO and co-founder Reed Hastings this morning announced that Netflix was abandoning the decision, and that Netflix would proceed business-as-usual as a single service.  Wow.  Solid.  Throw in some nice content-acquisition agreements, and all of a sudden Netflix is the belle of the ball again.  Awesome win for responsive management, and an awesome win for consumers who love video.

The real loser in all of this?  @Qwikster, the kid whose Twitter handle Netflix would surely have been forced to spend seven figures to acquire if they had followed through with the rebrand.  Ouch.  So close.

Like many editors, we’re working our way through a love-hate relationship with Final Cut Pro X at Rewatchable.  On one hand, it’s missing a ton of pro features, can’t roundtrip with Motion (or anything else), and is packed with erratic behavior and inexplicable bugs.  On the other hand, editing is remarkably faster thanks to the program’s emphasis on thumbnails and waveforms, and the scrubbing features allow editors to focus on story far more – and far more quickly – than traditional non-linear editors.  When it works, it’s perfect for what we do.  When it doesn’t work, we lose big chunks of time finding workarounds and recreating work in more stable software.

Just a few weeks ago, the first major revision to Final Cut Pro X (iTunes link) was released by Apple, taking the software from 10.0 to 10.0.1.  Here’s what we’ve noticed since updating:

Pros:

• Much more stable.  With FCPX 10.0, you could expect to crash once or twice an hour.  Now, I crash once or twice a day.  Can’t wait ’til it gets to ‘doesn’t crash’, but the stability improvements are dramatic and welcome.
• Full Screen View.  It was insane that 10.0 didn’t ship with this. The new methodology behind Final Cut Pro X really demands one big screen, and you want every possible pixel of that one big screen available for editing, monitoring, and selecting footage.
• Multiple Clip Syncing. In version 10.0, if you selected a single audio clip and multiple video clips, they just wouldn’t sync.  The resulting compound clip would just be a big pile of unsynced clips.  Now, with 10.0.1, it works great.  The ultimate testament to how well this feature is coming along is that it was able to sync some peaked-audio footage that Pluraleyes couldn’t.  Can’t believe this fix didn’t make the release notes.  For DSLR shops like Rewatchable, this was the biggest feature fix.

Cons:

• Still incredibly slow loading projects.  If you have a disk with more than 3-4 projects on it, the loading of the project window takes far too long.  I currently have six two-minute projects and one one-hour project on my drive, and it takes over a minute to go from launch to being able to work.  That’s with a fast SSD and a Firewire 800 media drive.  Unacceptable.
• Unpredictable output.  Sometimes you’ll get a project looking perfect in the timeline, and when you export it, the resulting file has random crazy audio problems, kerning issues on fonts, or blips on transitions.  Part of what’s beautiful about Final Cut Pro X is how simple the output process has become.  Part of what’s infuriating about Final Cut Pro X is how little control or input you have when things go wrong with that output, even when using Compressor.
• Font issues.  Occasionally, when you load a project, fonts will change.  Weights.  Faces.  On their own.  For no reason.  We work predominantly on short-form videos, so it’s easy enough to check and repair fonts before final delivery, but if you work on longer videos consistently, I could see this being a real showstopper.

Rewatchable videos are edited on Apple computers connected to Apple displays.  We use Apple Final Cut Pro X to edit our videos, Apple iPads as slates, teleprompters, and note-takers on set.  We communicate using Apple iPhones.  We deliver our videos in Apple Quicktime H.264.  Take away these tools, and our videos – our entire class of videos – can’t exist.  As amazing as it sounds when you consider Apple’s expensive reputation, you simply can’t create professional videos in our price range without the Apple products that Steve Jobs ushered into existence over the past 14 years.

So thanks Steve, and everyone he’s inspired, for everything.

Introducing Vimeo Music Store from Andrea Allen on Vimeo.

So what’s the big deal?  Vimeo Music Store addresses a lingering problem in the world of corporate video.  The music that comes with production software like Final Cut Studio, Logic, etc. is all over the place in terms of quality, tone, and length.  These free libraries are a nice starting point for production companies, but you’ve probably heard the half a dozen or so good tracks in hundreds upon thousands upon millions of online videos and tv spots.  The next step up from these tracks has traditionally been to license music from commercial music producers.  Unfortunately, the largest of these shops determined en masse that online use should be more expensive than corporate/industrial use, and perpetual licensing typically started at around $2000/track.  If you’ve got a $20,000 production budget, that’s all well and good, but when you’re trying to produce quality two minute videos in the <$5,000 range, you can’t afford to drop 40% of your budget on a jingle.

Music can be a powerful tool for creating mood, adding production value, and smoothing over rough spots in corporate video.  Resources like the Vimeo Music Store and iStockPhoto (which has even better pricing but is horrendous to search) are a great start for bringing sanity to the market and increasing the quality of corporate videos everywhere.

Serious marketers are always looking for ways to increase web conversions. Probably the best way to juice up conversions is by creating great landing pages with compelling calls-to-action.   At Rewatchable, we are always looking for innovative ways businesses are using video marketing. That’s why we are super interested in a new offering from Concord, MA based KnowledgeVision.  The new service is called Talking Landing Pages. KnowledgeVision Introduces the Talking Landing Page for B2B Marketing and Lead Generation  The name of the service really speaks for itself.  KnowledgeVision is helping marketers enhance static landing pages by adding dynamic video presentations.

“Business-to-business marketers are constantly looking for high-performing ways to convert web visitors into leads. Until now, they’ve done this through good copywriting and illustration on ‘landing pages’ – that is, static pages designed to capture vital contact information from visitors to a website. With KnowledgeVision’s Talking Landing Page, web visitors are greeted with a multimedia experience that delivers the marketer’s message with much higher impact. This leads to higher conversion rates and a more memorable experience. The Talking Landing Page is a distinct competitive advantage for innovative marketers.”

Michael Kolowich  CEO and founder of KnowledgeVision.

At Rewatchable, we are big, big believers in web marketing video so we love the idea. KnowledgeVision offers services that helps businesses create presentation videos from camera-based video along with PowerPoint decks.   We predict businesses will soon start to see an increase in conversions when the are using web video on landing pages.   We also predict the question will soon not be “why use video on landing pages?” but “why would we not use video on landing pages?”

Rewatchable – Video Production Boston, Massachusetts

Vimeo is a wonderful video hosting company that has been around for several years.  Vimeo.com is the first choice for many video producers due to its reliability, easy-to-use interface and excellent video quality.  There’s always been something strange about Vimeo though… Until recently, they did not want to host your video production if you intended to embed your video on a commercial/business website.  They were not just concerned about websites trying to make money directly off views of the video.  Vimeo simply didn’t want to be used by any business websites.  Got a hair salon video production? No! Got a restaurant video production? Too bad! Want to embed a customer testimonial video? Forget about it!

Vimeo was only interested in working with individual users and video producers like Rewatchable.  All that changed this month, as Vimeo started offering Vimeo Pro accounts.  For the first time, Vimeo wants to host your video productions!  Of course, they are charging for the service but the rate is very reasonable.  The video hosting service costs only $199 per year and allows a business website up to 250,000 embedded video plays and 50 GB of video storage.

Rewatchable – Boston, MA Videographers

Microsoft is not really known for their sense of humor.    Yet, they have done a nice job of putting together a funny corporate video that mocks Gmail as they try to promote Office 365.   Not sure if the video has reached viral video status but one version of it has clocked in with more than 750,000 views on YouTube.  The video first appeared at  a Microsoft conference in July to rally their sales troops and supposedly has not been approved by Microsoft for public consumption.  In fact, if you look closely at the video you will notice it is marked as Unlisted and typical keyword tagging used to promote videos has not been done.  Unlisted video can only be seen if linked to or embedded on another website.  Unlisted YouTube videos do not show up in Google or YouTube search results.

The sales video features Gmail Man (GmailMan).  Gmail Man can’t seem to resist reading personal details of user emails as he serves up contextual advertising.  Of course, in the video Gmail Man not only does lots of snooping he also gets the context wrong.  The video is pretty funny. The video production company used by Microsoft did a great job of keeping the video funny and fast moving.

Of course, Microsoft doesn’t mention that although Gmail serves up ads their real competitor Google Apps has ads off as the default.  One of the benefits of using funny corporate videos is you don’t necessarily need to tell the whole story.

 One of the funniest things about the video is that Google themselves is nice enough to host it on their ad-serving video hosting service YouTube.

Gmail Man Video

GmailMan Video

Rewatchable – Boston Videography

Free online video editor, Jaycut, has been a great resource for anyone looking to do quick and dirty video editing online.   That all changed this afternoon as JayCut announce their video editing service has been gobbled up by RIM.  Apparently,  RIM bought the video editing company to enhance the video editing capabilities of their PlayBook product.  Not sure what this means for non-RIM users wanting to just do some video editing online.  Currently,  the service is not taking new users but they are not saying they won’t take new users in the future.  In fact, the statement on their website about the acquisition makes them  seem downright giddy about future of video editing.

JayCut Official Statement

Oh what an exciting day!  Today we can share the news that JayCut has just become a part of Research In Motion (RIM), creators of BlackBerry® smartphones, BlackBerry® PlayBook™ and a lot of other cool products. Now we’re joining forces to share what we do best: video editing.   The value proposition for JayCut was simply awesome: we can stay creative and we get to focus solely on developing great video editing tools, which has the potential to be used by many millions of users. We have a new ally and hereby challenge the future of video editing to be more awesome. Stay tuned.

Rewatchable is a Boston Video Company

The internet is abuzz about a new, alleged iTunes killer called Spotify.  Spotify has been rumored to come to the US for many years and now you can get a free Spotify acount if you are lucky enough to get an invite to the service.  The service boasts more than 15 million songs that you can listen to on your PC or mobile device.  The music service is ad supported and limits listening time unless you get a premium account.  The service has been a big hit in Europe so their launch in the US will be very interesting to watch.

But Rewatchable is a video production company, so why do we care about a music service?  Well, we really don’t care so much about the service itself.  We care about how Spotify has undertaken to promote themselves.  Check out www.spotify.com and you will notice a large amount of web real estate is dedicated to web video that introduces the service in a very simple and effective manner.  The web video allows someone checking out the service to understand what the company offers in about 1 minute. The web video was created without cameras by carefully using text animation, basic image animation and of course music. So far, the video already has around 100,000 views on YouTube.

Rewatchable – Boston Videographers

Can video help SEO?  As a video production company specializing in web videos, we are probably pretty biased when it comes to answering questions about video helping search engine optimization. With that said, our answer is an unequivocal YES.  For a less biased look at the question, check out a recent article by SEO gurus Wordtracker.com 5 ways video can seriously help your SEO.

Here are 3 reasons Rewatchable believes Video helps SEO.

1) Google loves great websites.  How does Google know a website is great?  Google tracks how long visitors stay on a website.   If the visitor, takes a quick look and abandons the site that is a pretty good indication to Google that the site did not deliver the content the web searcher was seeking.  On the other hand,  if the Google searcher clicks on a search result and does not immediately come back to Google looking for better results that is a pretty good indication the website if offering content that is useful to the searcher.  Video helps in two ways.  1) If a web visitor watches a 2 minute video they will necessarily be on the site 2 minutes longer than they would be if they did not watch the video.  2) After watching a a good web video, the website visitor should be more invested in researching the organization and will likely check out more pages on the website.

2)  Need links to your website?  The description field of a YouTube video allows you to link directly back to your website.  Plus, if you have a good video other websites will naturally link to your video and your site.

3) Videos show up in Google search results.  Even if someone doesn’t find your site directly they might find your video in Google search results.  For instance, if you Google the term “customer testimonial video” you should find a video for Rewatchable. We find once someone finds that video they often click on the link back to Rewatchable.com or Google Rewatchable to find out more about us.

Rewatchable – Boston Videographers

The venture capital community is getting hip to the fact that web video is taking off in a big way.  Last year, YouTube announced that 24 hours of video was uploaded to their site every minute.  Just recently, they announced the number has doubled to 48 hours of video uploaded every minute.  With that kind of volume, there is money to be made and businesses to be launched.

The latest example of investment in web video is Animoto.  The company has raised $25 million led by Spectrum Equity Investors with participation from existing investors Madrona Venture Group and Amazon.com.  The Daily Start-Up: Animoto In Motion With $25M For Cool Videos Animoto is a web video creation service that is going after both personal users and business users.  Essentially, the company offers a simple to use online video slideshow creator.  If you own a MAC, you probably don’t need Animoto because MACs already come with easy to use slideshow software (iPhoto) that creates beautiful, compelling slideshows.  However, Animoto is great for someone who doesn’t want to mess with new software but wants to easily convert their photos into visually interesting videos.  The freemium service allows anyone to use the service to create videos up to 30 seconds in lenth.  If you want to create longer web videos or if you want to use commercial music it will cost you.

The business offering (Animoto Pro) might not be quite right for some businesses but it is a great option for businesses that already have a stock pile of beautiful photos.  For restaurants and real estate firms that want to start testing the web video waters, the price is right at only $39 per month.  (SHAMELESS PLUG – If your restaurant wants a real live video made with real video production equipment created just for you check out our restaurant video page)

Anumoto describes themselves this way on their website, “In the works since 2005, Animoto was founded to help people better share their stories and express themselves through online media by innovating technologies in the field of video production. Using the latest in entertainment post-production technologies, Animoto is designed to bridge the gap between the high production value of film and television, and the more “amateur” feeling of most user-created videos and photo albums.”

While not for everyone, Animoto can help create beautiful web videos in minutes.  The same sort of “slideshow web video” of lesser quality would have required a web developer and thousands of dollars in the not so distant past. As we start to see new versions of web video become available, we can expect to see that YouTube upload number continue to increase.   As always, at Rewatchable we are excited to see web video being used in more and more innovative and powerful ways.

Rewatchable – Boston Area Videographers

Apple finally released their new Final Cut Pro X video editing software this week.   The release is a big deal for video editors because the software has been completely rewritten from the ground up.  Immediately after the release, many video editing experts started criticizing the video editing software for being limited and nothing  more than an enhanced version of iMovie.  Early adopters unimpressed by Apple’s Final Cut Pro X.  Other tech pundits are calling the new release an upgrade. Apple’s Final Cut Is Dead. Long Live Final Cut.

At Rewatchable,  we are very excited about the speed improvements and redesign of the video editing software.  The reality is the software may no longer be as great for Hollywood movie makers like the Cohen Brothers.  Time will tell if Hollywood studios continue to use FCP but we don’t really care.  We don’t think Apple cares much either.   Instead of offering a difficult to use video editing software that caters to a small group of people for $1,000,  FCPX is much easier to learn and only costs $299.    Good video editors will still need thousands of hours of experience. However, someone looking to do basic video editing will be able to be up in running in minutes and still get professional results.

More companies are adding corporate videos to trade shows, websites and their social media strategy mix but some have been slow to come to the party because they are concerned about costs and lost time.  Rewatchable has always been committed to helping businesses create professional videos at affordable prices.  We always will.  We believe there is no better way for a company to tell their story than with video.   FCPX takes away much of the complexity of video editing and will inevitably allow more corporate users to be more creative in exploiting video assets they already have.  In short, Final Cut Pro X will create  a whole new army of corporate video evangelists.  As Martha Stewart would say, “that’s a good thing!”

Rewatchable Boston, MA Videographers

The 2011 Videographer Awards have been announced.  Rewatchable is very pleased to be recognized in the area of web video production for our 92.5 The River video.   The River is a popular Boston area radio station located in Haverhill, MA.  Read more about the Videographer Award in this press release Boston Video Company Rewatchable Inc. Wins Videographer Award

Rewatchable – Boston Videographers

1) We host our videos for free!

2) We host our videos right alongside skateboarding dogs and hilarious weddings!

The reality is YouTube is an incredibly stable and easy place to host business videos. YouTube even provides video analytics to help businesses understand important information about demographics and viewership.

Good news!  Last week, YouTube announced a new “logoless” option that is more business video friendly.  The new option strips away the YouTube logo from the bottom right corner of the video. Now, businesses can embed video on their website and have a cleaner look without telegraphing the video is hosted on YouTube.

To Remove the YouTube logo, “At the end of the video URL in your embed code, just add the code ?modestbranding=1 and the player will show without the YouTube logo in the control bar.”   Note a small YouTube text label will still show above the video when a user hovers over the player.

More information about removing the YouTube Logo on YouTube’s blog  - Remove YouTube Logo

Rewatchable – Boston Videographers

PAN Communications is a PR firm out of Andover, MA and they did something really smart to promote their upcoming move to downtown Boston, MA.  They created a simple, fun video with very quick clips from employees talking about why they are excited about their move to Boston.   The video moves along quickly and introduces the viewer to employees who seem genuinely excited about going to Boston.

We are guessing the video was produced internally rather than by an outsourced video production company.   Doesn’t matter – it is still great.  Some web videos don’t require video production companies and can be produced pretty quickly and easily by simply using a Flip cam and video editing software like iMovie.    One of the smart moves PAN made was to keep this video simple.  The employees did not need to remember complicated lines or think of answers off the top of their head.  They simply needed to state why they are excited to go to Boston in a couple of words.  The benefit of that approach is none of the employees seemed nervous and no single employee went on and on with a long answer.   Because they kept the content so simple, the video editing was probably pretty easy.

Their new address will be 255 State Street Boston, MA.

Rewatchable – Boston Videographers

Our Video Production Company Loves The Beverly Cummings Center

Rewatchable moved into the Cummings Center in Beverly, MA about a year and a half ago.  We love the Cummings Center for many reasons.  The Cummings Center complex is huge with over 2 million square feet and 500 diverse businesses.  At the Cummings Center, we have a daycare, hair salon, gym,  post office, dry cleaner and lots of great restaurants.  More importantly, we have lots of neighbors with businesses of all sizes from start-ups to large established companies.

Walking through the long hallways, it is inspiring to see so many businesses and so much innovation.  Plus, there’s a fringe benefit to having so many neighbors.  If we need an accountant, lawyer or other professional services there are plenty to choose from right under the same roof.   The same is true in reverse.  If a business at the Cummings Center needs video production services, they know we are local and not working out of our Mom’s basement.  We also get the benefit of less travel being needed when we work with our neighbors.  Instead of blocking out an hour to travel down to Boston we can leave for the shoot 5 minutes before we need to get there.

In just the last two days we have had two interesting video productions right here in the Cummings Center.  Details below:

Webinar Video Production 05/12/11

We have a very smart neighbor that does quarterly webinars for their customers.  The webinar usually features their CEO and an industry expert.  They use the traditional technology you would expect with a webinar – speakerphone and webinar service. However, they also ask us to produce a video after the fact that they can share with their customers that missed the webinar or attendees who  just want to share the information with other people in their organization or elsewhere.  The video allows them to repurpose content they have already created while also providing more options for their customers.   The company is a thought leader in their field so it is a pleasure to produce their videos as we learn neat stuff.

CEO Video Production 05/13/11

We have another really smart customer with a brilliant idea about how to communicate with his employees.  He showed up at our door a month ago asking if we could produce a series of videos so that he could answer questions from his employees located throughout the world as well as right here in the Cummings Center.   The answer was a big yes.  We helped shape the video, kept it at a reasonable duration and we can edit out parts of the video he decides he might not like after he sees it. Although, he was so good and so “real” with his employees we don’t anticipate there will be much video editing required.  We also will color correct the video and of course we used professional audio equipment so the audio will sound great.  Home grown CEO videos can be terrible if the audio is not done right.  Effective leadership starts with great communication –  one thing we know for sure after today’s shoot – this CEO is a great communicator and we’re guessing a pretty terrific leader!

Rewatchable – Massachusetts Videographers.

Google can be criticized for many things but they are still a friend to small business.  Google evens the playing field for small businesses and lets them compete with the big guys.  20 years ago if you told a restaurant owner there was a way for them to get in front of more new customers than restaurants like McDonalds, Pizza Hut and Dominos they would be skeptical.  If you told them they could do it for free the same person would laugh in your face.

Everyone knows Google Search allows businesses of all sizes to get found.  Sometimes businesses pay for the privilege of getting found but the smart ones use search engine optimization techniques to get found in the natural search results for free.  Really smart businesses have discovered Google Places.  Google Places allows small businesses to create a profile page that will show up prominently on the first page of google results.

Below is an example of what searcher sees if they are searching for the term “Boston Restaurants”  The first 7 results are all Google Places results.

If the searcher clicks on the Google Places profile to the right of the listing they will be brought to restaurant’s Google places profile.

A Google Places listing is free and easy to create. The best part is the restaurant owner can add both photos and videos to the listing to entice customers to come visit their restaurant.  According to the video below, Google will even send a photographer to the business for a free photo shoot if the restaurant is interested.  Of course, if any restaurant in the Boston area is interested in adding high quality videos to their listing or anyplace else Rewatchable can help.  Just check out our Boston Restaurant Videos page. Google Places is available for most local businesses – not just restaurants.

Google Marketing Video Promoting Google Places

Rewatchable – Boston Videographers

Rewatchable is known by many companies in Massachusetts as Boston’s “marketing video company”.  We love marketing videos. We love to help companies of all sizes move the needle.  We love to help companies sell more and grow their business.   However, we do also offer video production services beyond just standard marketing videos.

Our second love is helping businesses with training videos.  Sure, training videos are not usually quite as sexy as marketing videos but they can be just as important.  Good training videos can help to get prospects, salespeople and the media excited about your latest and greatest product.  The more people who understand and can talk about your product the better chance your product has to succeed.   Live training will always be needed but training videos have some distinct advantages.

Training Video Advantages

1) Training videos get produced one time but can be used for the entire lifecycle of a product.

2) Training videos are “always on”.  Someone wants to learn about  your product at 3AM?  No problem.

3) Training videos can be watched from virtually any place someone has access to the web or a DVD player.

4) Training videos can be measured.   With video hosting services like Wistia, training departments can check to see which parts of their training videos are getting the most and least attention.

5)  Training Videos can be incredibly precise.  Live training sessions can go “off the rails” as an instructor or students start to interject their opinions or misinformation.  Content in training videos can be reviewed and approved.

6) A training video can be a cleverly disguised marketing video.   It might not make sense to fly in a prospect or reseller to attend a training session. However, a short training video can be distributed widely and can be used to help get the word out about some new product features and functions.  If your reseller in Topeka watches the training its a bonus but probably not a necessity.  Video allows you  to share training sessions with many more parties without the extra cost.

7) Training videos can be rewound and paused.  A long day sitting in a classroom can lead to thoughts of your engine light warning or  your upcoming wedding anniversary.   Miss something in a training room?  Too bad.  Miss something in a training video? No problem – just rewind or pause to get a closer look.

Refresher training is easy with training videos.   We all forget some of what we have learned over time.  It usually doesn’t make sense and can be embarrassing to re-attend a live training session.  An on-demand training video allows someone to revisit pertinent information at a time and place of their choosing.

9) Training videos can be segmented.   Much of the information in a live training session can run together.   Training videos allow for segmentation so that learners can dive into a specific subject matter.

10) Many live training sessions come with a free lunch and expensive catering bills.  With training videos, the learner is on their own for lunch!

If your business needs help with training videos Rewatchable can help.   If your business is based near Boston, Massachusetts we can get you on our calendar within a few days.  If you are based outside of the Boston, MA area we can fly out to you within a few weeks or you can fly in your instructor to Boston and we can shoot your video in a hotel conference room.

Planning a training session in the Boston area in the future?  Let us know now and we will pencil you into our calendar to make sure we are available if you decide you need us.

Rewatchable – Boston, MA Videographers

Do you need Boston based videographers for a video project in the next month?  We are planning to be in downtown Boston, MA  on Friday May 20, 2011. If you can schedule your video for that same  date we will shoot and edit our standard Rewatchable video for only $2,000!  1-2 videographers will shoot your video for up to 2 hours and you will receive 5 hours of video editing.  Because our video production process is different than some of the old-fashioned video production companies in the Boston area our videographers can set up in minutes – 2 hours should be plenty of time for your video production.  To qualify for this special pricing, your business must be located in downtown Boston.

Interested in shooting a no-hassle video with professional videographers at your business?  Just give us a call @ 978.666.4068 and reference our “Boston Videographers Sale”

Rewatchable is based about 20 miles North of Boston, Massachusetts.

Say what ever you want about the guy above but we can all agree he is not a professional videographer!

Rewatchable – Boston Videographers

We wrapped up shooting on Tuesday of this week.  Our video crew is a few years out of college so we had a ton of fun being back on a college campus.   We had heard good things about Stonehill College before hitting the campus but we were blown away by the quality of both their students and staff.

Our mandate is to produce fun videos that will both inform and entertain prospective students looking to learn more about the college.  We are happy with what we have produced so far but more importantly the college seems to be very happy with the videos we have delivered.  The truth is we could never have done it without such a great partner.  With such a tight deadline, we needed to collaborate in the truest sense of the word.  At every step, we could rely on the college coming through with the right plan, the right prop and the right student talent.

At Rewatchable, we always talk about how our video production equipment is compact and portable for a reason.  We don’t want to waste our client’s time as they wait for us to set up lights and lug large cameras from one place to the next.  Stonehill looked at several Boston video production companies and they tell us one of the reasons they chose Rewatchable is they liked the fact that our video production process is highly efficient yet we still deliver super high quality video.  Most days we were done early with the videos even though we had only slotted 2-4 hours per video for each shoot.  We never could have gotten so much done with traditional video production equipment needing elaborate lighting design.

One other thing, we were so impressed with the beauty of the campus and the quality of their really smart and super friendly students, we pretty much plan on sending our kids to Stonehill College.  Of course, we expect they will have some say in the matter!

Rewatchable is a video production company located near Boston, MA

The best video production in the world does not guarantee a video will go viral. If your company is selling “database management middleware” it will probably be very difficult to create video content that is appealing to the masses. Of course, you shouldn’t really care about the masses you should care about potential customers. We can help produce video content that is appealing to your audience that is interested in database management middleware.  We might not get you millions of views but if we get you hundreds from the right people you will easily be able to justify the cost of the video production.

Truly viral videos are completely driven by great content.   A very successful viral corporate video was released just this February by Corning Glass.  In just over two months the video has gotten nearly  12 million views.  Instead of a boring corporate video about glass with great video production, Corning created a fascinating look into the future and showed off potential uses of their glass in inspiring ways.  The video is so good it clearly has inspired viewers to rewatch and share the video.  With 12 million views, Corning was able to get to the masses but more importantly  every glass buyer (ie: potential customer) in the world has likely seen the video by now.

You can view the video below.

Rewatchable is a Boston, MA video production company.

Our friends at Wistia have produced a beautiful corporate video that shows off their team and new office space in Somerville, MA in a fun and whimsical way.  Wistia is a video hosting company that offers a powerful video hosting solution with unbeatable video metrics.  The video was produced by a Rhode Island based video production company called CRL Media Group.  They did a great job with the video and with the music!

Check out the video below…

Next New Networks was launched in 2007 and since that time has garnered over 2 billion views and 6 million subscribers. The company credits their success to  partnering with over 60 independent producers including The Gregory Brothers.  The Gregory Brothers are best known for their Bed Intruder video and more recently a new mash-up video featuring Charlie Sheen.

According to the New York Times, the acquisition will cost YouTube less than $50 million.  Both companies also say actual video production will be limited and instead Next New Networks will be used to help discover new video content.

Rewatchable is a corporate video production company based near Boston, MA.

Two Massachusetts companies are teaming up to make it easier for companies to create and publish online video presentations. Waltham, MA based Brainshark offers an on-demand business communications tool which helps corporate users create presentations with rich media like video. Think of “Brainsharks” as Powerpoint presentations on steroids.  Cambridge, MA based Brightcove is an online video platform that provides video hosting and tracking services for corporation and media outlets throughout the world.  The partnership will allow Brainshark customers to publish their presentation directly to Brightcove’s online video platform.

BrainShark, Brightcove partner for video distribution

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts Videographer

The article is very interesting and suggests there is a big difference between a videographer and a video production professional. We tend to agree.  We think there is a distinction between a video production professional and your standard run-of-the-mill videographer. A videographer is fine for a dance recital or graduation ceremony but great corporate videos are created by video production professionals not just any videographer.

At Rewatchable, we use the best video production technology available to us and we try to find the best angles/shots but what we bring to the table is much more than that.  We are completely consumed with making sure we get the content/story right for our clients.

We understand a good looking video is not worth much if it does not communicate our client’s message in a powerful way.  That’s why from the beginning to the end of the video production process we work with our clients to understand their messaging so we can tell their story in a clear, concise, persuasive and powerful way with video.

When a web visitor/prospect clicks on a video we have produced for a client, we want the viewer to be entertained and persuaded. We want that prospect to take a closer look at the company, product or service featured in the video.    We also help our clients after the video is produced with web marketing  by assisting them with video search engine optimization services.  One of our customers www.Jaho.com wanted their video to get found whenever someone searches for the term “siphon coffee shop” in Google.  Another customer, Smashfly wanted their video to get found when someone searches for the phrase “recruitment marketing software” in Google.  In each case, we were able to make sure each of  the marketing videos showed up in Google on the first page!

CLICK TO READ REEL SEO ARTCLE “Do Video Production Pros Need to Know Web Video Marketing?”

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts video production company.

Visual learners comprise 65% of the public, and auditory learners make up another 30%, so it’s no wonder video is the way people learn best.  Conveniently for us B2B marketers, video also conveys more information per minute than any other media platform.

The article also has a good list of “Top 10 online video promotion strategies.”  The article goes into depth for each recommendation but you can find a shortened version of recommendation below.

1. Search optimize your video with text summary.
2. Replace static ads with viral pay-per-click (PPC) displays.
3. Capture sales leads with longer form video.
4. Bolster conversion with YouTube promotion and Call-To-Action overlays.
5. Integrate video into your email marketing.
6. Increase downloads of marketing collateral with a video-enabled landing page.
7. Leverage social media. Promote your online videos across all marketing channels – on social media sites, your blog, as well as personal and corporate profiles.
8. Feature videos on your website.
9. It’s all about control… and a consistent brand.
10. Create sales videos to engage and qualify buyers.

B2C Marketing Insider covers everything from social media to online marketing to consumer and content marketing to branding and pubic relations.  It is great to see “non-video” marketing experts like B2C Marketing Insider starting to notice and evangelize about the power of marketing video just like we have been for some time.

Rewatchable - Boston Videographer

Need to do some quick and dirty video editing? Got an Android Honeycomb 3 Tablet?  Google showed off their new video editing app this week and SlashGear added a video of the demonstration below.  Very cool?  Yes.  Will it put video editing services out of business?  Probably not any time soon!

Android Video Editing App App Demonstration Video

Rewatchable – Massachusetts Videographers

Pixability is located in Kendall Square in Cambridge, MA.  According to the Boston Globe story linked below about 15% of Pixability’s customers are located in the Massachusetts area.  www.pixability.com

Pixability pulls in $1 million, to help small businesses add video to their marketing toolkit

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts Videography Company

How to avoid being nervous at your next video shoot.

Of course, people will always be nervous about the prospect of being recorded on video.  However, Rewatchable does everything in our power to make sure someone starring in one of our video productions is as relaxed as possible.  We use specialized HD video cameras that can excel with just the natural light available in most environments. By avoiding big lights, you don’t need to worry about getting hot, squinting and sweating as you are trying to think of what you want to say next.  Our small, discrete cameras cause many people we work with to literally forget there is a camera rolling. They end up speaking authentically and passionately as they would in normal conversation.  Also, we work hard to understand our customers goals before we start any video production.  By asking thoughtful questions we make sure the people appearing in our videos are engaged as  they answer relevant questions.  Lastly, we are very nice people on set and off!

Rewatchable – Boston Videographers

Every salesperson occasionally gets a voicemail from a customer raving about their wonderful experience with a particular product or service.   The voicemail usually gets forwarded around the sales team and eventually forwarded up the chain to the CEO and other executives.  Most companies get their fair share of negative feedback from customers so everyone is always thrilled to hear from happy customers.

Of course, every positive voicemail is a huge opportunity.  First,  the sales rep should call back as soon as possible while the customer is still excited about the company.  The call-back is a great opportunity to build the relationship with the customer and let the customer know their business and feedback is appreciated.  The sales rep should also check to see if perhaps the customer might be interested in being a phone reference for future customers.  Many happy customers are excited to provide phone references because they like the product or service but also because they also want to keep a close relationship with their vendor.   They want to make sure they are “taken care of” if something ever goes wrong.

Before the sales rep gets off the phone with the customer,  they should also ask for permission to use the audio from the voicemail on the company’s website and in a company customer testimonial video.  If the customer balks at the idea, the sales rep should let it go and again thank the customer for the positive feedback.  If the customer agrees to let the company use their voicemail in a customer testimonial video, the sales rep should thank the customer on the phone but also quickly follow up with an email so there is a record of the customer’s consent.  Of course, if the customer changes their mind down the line the video should be removed or changed but it is a good idea to have written consent in case the customer forgets all about it or moves on to another company.

Now that you have permission to use the customer voicemail, it is easy to make a customer testimonial video.   You can make a standalone customer testimonial video based on one customer interaction or you can take several customer voicemails to make a compilation video.  If you are a do-it-yourself video editor,  you can make a very simple video by simply showing your company logo and perhaps pertinent product pages with the voicemail track underneath the video with some light music.

A real voicemail is so authentic that the video will be powerful even if the production value is not stellar.   However, it is probably worth a small investment to work with a video production company like Rewatchable to make a spectacular video that can be used on your website, in social media and with email marketing campaigns for a long time.   Graphic animations, text call-outs and audio correction tools can go a long way to turn a basic video into a compelling, professional and rewatchable video.

Got a great voicemail?  Call us today and we will build a great customer testimonial video for you.  Need a traditional customer testimonial video? - we can produce those videos as well!

Rewatchable – Video Production MA

fflick’s technology mines data about movies from sites like Twitter and then carefully organizes the data and scores movies based on what Twitter users seem to love or hate.  According to fflick CEO Kurt Wilms, fflick was just the beginning as there were plans to use the same technology for other verticals like TV shows, music, video games etc.   That all changed last week when YouTube acquired fflick.   No one is saying how much the four fflick founders (and former Digg employees) got but it must have been a pretty sweet offer to get them to cash-in on the burgeoning technology.

According to a YouTube blog post,  the company plans to use the technology to help users connect “with the great videos talked about all over the web, and surface the best of those conversations.”

Don’t be surprised to also see YouTube’s video scoring algorithm get better.  YouTube knows if they can serve up better videos more often they will get more views for longer periods of time and in the long run will be able to sell more advertising. fflicks “sentiment processor” can interpret a comment like “I want to see Inception so bad” as a positive comment and give it  a positive score.  In the YouTube universe, the same technology could be used to give a comment like “I like this video” a score of 3 on a scale of 1-5 while giving a comment like “this video is unbelievably Rewatchable” a score of 5.

For more about fflick and its founders check out  the YouTube video below. (fflick discussion starts 17 minutes in http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bUTmfC0Sz0c#t=17m22s)

Rewatchable – Video Production MA

The Video SEO test went well!  Now, if you type Boston Corporate Video into Google you should see our video thumbnail right next to a video from the legendary band BOSTON right in the middle of the page.  Plus, because we linked back to rewatchable.com from a YouTube video related to “Boston corporate video” our website has also jumped to page 1 of Google.

Instead of paying for a Google ad, is there a search term that could help your business get found using video?  Maybe we can help you make an inexpensive video that  would give you front page placement on Google.  We always want to help our customers with Video Search Engine Optimization and we never charge extra for it.

Rewatchable is MA Video production company.

UPDATE – This page and the video is still listed on Page 1 of Google for the term Boston Corporate Video  as of May 10, 2011.

Learn more about Rewatchable corporate video production.

InMaps is an interesting concept but how do you tell the world?  Video of course! LinkedIn produced a 1 minute video and threw it up on YouTube yesterday – so far it has about 15,000 views.   LinkedIn InMaps Video

The video is not exactly a GoDaddy super bowl ad but it is well produced and informative as it touts the new service.  Many technology companies struggle with the same problem LinkedIn had here.   Companies can spend months, quarters or even years developing a new software, website or other technology that risks going unnoticed if it is not properly promoted.  However, with a small budget, good screencast and quick video production a great video can be produced and propagated throughout the web.   A well edited, well produced video is the perfect vehicle to educate, promote and get people excited about your new baby.

I’m not sure if I love LinkedIn’s new baby but I do love that they are using video marketing effectively.

Rewatchable - Video Production MA

Some times our new clients don’t know exactly what they want their video productions to look like but examples can be very helpful.  With that in mind, we’ve created a page that profiles Massachusetts corporate videos that Rewatchable did NOT produce.  When you let us know about your project, feel free to reference video(s) on our  Massachusetts Corporate Video Page.  Just let us know. “I want it  to look like that one” or “I DON’T want it to look like that one.

Thanks to the other Massachusetts video production companies and corporate video production departments that produced the videos and made them public. We will keep adding more videos as we find them.  If you know of a good corporate video please let us know.

Link - Massachusetts Corporate Video

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts corporate video production company.

HubSpot’s Marketing VP Mike Volpe and marketing writer David Meerman Scott go toe-to-toe with opposing viewpoints in a very informative video .  Meerman Scott seems to believe almost everything should be freely available without the need for a user to fill out a form.  Volpe believes some content should be freely available but some content should be protected by forms to create a database of leads for sales people.   I agree with Volpe.  If the content is good enough and the form is short enough, people will gladly fork over basic info.  Once the sales department has a tiny amount of information about the prospect they can start doing their job but until then they cannot.

In this case, HubSpot does a wonderful job of creating a really compelling trailer video to create interest.  They do not ask for any contact info to view the trailer video but they do ask for minimal information to view the full video.   It makes sense that a person willing to invest 25 minutes of their time to watch a video would also be ok with providing some basic information.  By contrast, a person just looking to glance at a blog post or short (uninformative) video probably is not willing to divulge their contact details.

HubSpot has been producing videos for years and their video production quality keeps improving.  Years ago the HubSpot seemed to have the philosophy that any video was good video if the content was good.  Now, I’m sure Volpe understands that a poorly produced video locked behind a form will lead to disappointed viewers less likely to buy HubSpot’s marketing software.  In this case, the video and video trailer scored well on both content and video production quality.

THE VIDEO ABOVE  IS AVAILABLE WITHOUT THE NEED TO DIVULGE YOUR CONTACT INFO WHICH IS OK WITH HUBSPOT.    YOU WILL FIND OUT WHY IF YOU WATCH THE ENTIRE VIDEO.

Rewatchable - Video Production Massachusetts

Of course, the page represents only a sample of our customer videos.  Some of the videos we create are intended for small audiences or are only intended for internal use within a corporation.   If you don’t see the type of video production you are looking for please ask us about what we can do for you.

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts based video production company.

We love Google.  They bring us all kinds of great clients from all over Massachusetts.  We rank well in Google for terms like “Boston Video Production”, “Massachusetts Video Production”, “Video Production Boston”, “Boston Corporate Video”, “Customer Testimonial Video” and many, many other very important search terms.  Thanks Google!

Small problem.  We are a video production company based in Beverly, MA.  Beverly is the home of many wonderful businesses that could use our services to enhance their online video strategy.  We are located at the Cummings Center in Beverly and there are hundreds of businesses at The Cummings Center alone.   If any of those businesses were to turn to Google and search for the term “video production Beverly” or “beverly video production” they would not find us until they got to page 4! In the world of Google , if you are on page 4, you do not exist!

Luckily, some more specific searches do put us on the front page.  ”Video Production in Beverly” shows our Google Universal Listing.

“Beverly, MA video production company” and “Beverly, Massachusetts video production” also usually lands us on the front page. However, the fact remains someone looking for video services would be very likely to just Google “Beverly video production” and expect Google to figure it out.  I hope this post helps Google figure it out!

While you are at it Google, you might also want to list us for “Beverly Videographers”, “Beverly Videography” and “Beverly Video Company.”

The thing about Google is if an exact phrase does not exist on a page on your website it is unlikely to get listed for that term. Repeating the terms makes it much more likely your site gets found.   Google also likes when a Page Title describes the page using the search term. That is why if you look at the top of your browser you will see this page is titled Beverly Video Production Company.

I hope this post helps Rewatchable get better placement for the term Beverly Video Production and helps our readers learn more about search engine optimization.

Rewatchable is a Beverly video production company.   (links using the search term also help!)

Why would you want more YouTube subscribers?  If you have YouTube subscribers you can push out new videos and get more views.  Also, hopefully your subscribers will be inspired to comment on your video, “like” your video,  ”favorite” your video and maybe even add your video to their FaceBook page or blog.   The more your video is viewed and commented on the more likely your video will have success with video search engine optimization (VSEO)  so you can get your video found in search engines like Google.  For instance,  if you type “customer testimonial video” into Google you should find a video from Rewatchable right on the first page because we have utilized VSEO strategies.

Rewatchable is a Boston area video marketing production company.

The bonfire was fun and making the movie trailer was easy.  You can see the video below.

Salem Christmas Tree Fire January 05, 2011 – Movie Trailer

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts corporate video production company.

Constant Contact has been growing like crazy over the past few years and they have transformed from a small company to a big company.   At the same time, email marketing has become commoditized, cheap and quick to set up.  Also, the days of CEO Gail Goodman having a personal relationship or even interaction with every Constant Contact customer are over as the company claims to service around 400,000 customers.

Goodman can not possibly speak to every customer in person but she certainly can talk to them through the magic of video. In less than 60 seconds, she thanked her customers and promised more innovation in 2011.  In the super competitive environment of email marketing tools, I’m sure many viewers of the video are more likely to stay and grow their business with Constant Contact. This was a very smart way for a great company to put a face on what otherwise could quickly become just another nameless, faceless big company.

Rewatchable is a corporate video production company based near Boston, Massachusetts.

Now, YouTube seems to have gone one step further as they have taken away the video duration limitation all together for some accounts.  Of course with YouTube, you can never be sure which accounts are affected and for how long the change will remain in place.

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts Videography Company

Now Vimeo is offering a freely accessible section of the site devoted to video production tutorials for beginners and advanced videographers. Vimeo’s Video School Video tutorials are produced by both Vimeo and users but are approved and organized by Vimeo staffers.

“Vimeo has an amazing community of members who enjoy sharing their knowledge to help each other reach the next level, whatever that level might be …   with Vimeo Video School we have created a structured extension of what our community members have done for one another for years – teach and share best practices.

Dae Mellencamp, General Manager, Vimeo“

Rewatchable is a Boston, MA Videography Company

related blog articles

Video Sharing Sites – List Of Video Hosting Sites

List of Boston Video Hosting Services

I won’t rehash the entire article but below you will find some interesting quotes and statistic related to online video and corporate video usage from the article.

“The basic uploading of video, it being encoded, that’s going to become part of all standard systems, it’s all the other stuff, the tracking, analytics, user experience, that’s behind the video site part.”  Thomas Madsen-Mygdal –  23 Video, Co-founder

“We more than doubled the number of our customers in the first half of 2010, and the lion’s share came from non-media customers… starting about two years ago, very organically, we got companies, non-governmental organisations, they were all looking for a platform for their video.”    Jeremy Allaire  - Brightcove, CEO

“If you think about the emotional impact [of video] and the elucidation of visual complexity – this is a genuinely transformational moment.  YouTube will have as much impact as Google in how we think about information.”  Whit Andrews – Analyst, Gartner

“We originally started with the goal of primarily working with media companies. Today about 30-40% of our business actually comes from non-media companies using video.”  Bismarck Lepe  - Ooyala, Founder and President

“We have very clear data: Video drives higher sales, there is a conversion lift in the double digit percentages, and for some it translates into a 100% lift.”  Jeremy Allaire  - Brightcove, CEO

“Video’s becoming a normal part of the web, and the web is about sites, so what we’re focused on is making it easy to build video-centric websites.”  Thomas Madsen-Mygdal – 23 Video, Co-founder

“If your website has video, then it will rank higher in Google rankings, it gives a natural lift in SEO. Users that engage with video spend more time on your website, and more time spent equals higher engagement, whether you are Nike or an NGO.”  Jeremy Allaire – Brightcove, CEO

• Gartner lists video as one of it’s top ten strategic technologies for 2011, and is predicting that by 2013 video will be commonplace online, with 25% of content viewed on the web being pictures, video or audio.

screen grab from ooyala website

Rewatchable is a Boston Corporate Video Production Company.

Brightcove is based in Cambridge, Massachusetts

“We are very excited to have Rich Silton leading VideoLink into its next era of growth. He brings to us the market savvy needed to navigate us through an exciting time in the enterprise video production industry. We are confident that Rich’s operational expertise will ensure that VideoLink will continue to lead the industry in innovative live and on-demand video production services,” said Douglas Weisman, Chairman of VideoLink.

Technically, VideoLink is a competitor of Rewatchable, Inc. as they also provide corporate video services to businesses in the Boston area.   I’m sure they are the perfect fit for some corporate clients under some circumstances.  Quite frankly, there are some video production jobs we just  say ‘no’ to because they are not the right fit for us.  If you have an upcoming Boston area video production requiring satellite trucks, webcasts or live shots or you just want to shop pricing you might want to check out VideoLink.    You can reach VideoLink at 800-841-0655 or at http://www.videolink.tv The company has video production studios in Newtown, MA as well as downtown Boston,MA.

Here’s more about VideoLink from their website.

VideoLink provides video production, transmission and creative services for networks and corporations. As a video production company in operation since 1992, we have evolved in response to changing market trends, emerging broadcast technologies and, above all, the needs and desires of our customers. During that time, VideoLink’s footprint has grown to encompass full-service production studios at our headquarters outside Boston; additional video production studios in downtown Boston, Baltimore and Philadelphia; and remote broadcast and event production capabilities throughout the U.S.

Best of luck to Rich Silton and the video production team at VideoLink!

Rewatchable is a Boston, MA Video Production company.

It turns out, the State of Massachusetts has a campaign that is trying to keep students educated in Massachusetts from leaving and settling down elsewhere.  A website set up for the campaign, features videos from various Boston celebrities including Ray Allen, Kevin Faulk and Todd English.  Each of the local personalities, talk about their positive experiences and suggest that Massachusetts is a good place to stay.  According to an article on Boston.com, the budget for the marketing campaign is less than $75,000.

The Reel SEO article does acknowledge that the videos are well produced and that it is good that the State of Massachusetts is at least trying their hand at social media and online video.   However, they go on to make fun of the lack of views on YouTube. They also suggest the videos do not seem to have purpose and they are not interesting or fun enough to go viral.

YouTube views can be a misleading indicator of failure.  Reel SEO should know better.  Although a video only has a few video views on YouTube a viewer never knows if maybe the same exact video appears somewhere else with 100,000 views.  Also, the site and YouTube channel are sure to get more views as more content is added in the coming months and years.   I’m sure Reel SEO did not have an instant audience on day 1 but instead grew their audience over years.

I’m guessing the ultimate goal of the website and the videos is to simply start a conversation about students taking their education and leaving Massachusetts.  I’m sure the creators are also happy to see traffic for the primary site Massachusetts It’s All Here coming from the videos.

As the videos get found more, I’m sure they will wind up on more blogs and embedded more on Facebook and throughout social media.    And with more exposure, I’m sure the views will increase exponentially.  The relatively small $75,000 investment should have long lasting effects.

We don’t know which Massachusetts video production company produced the videos.  If your company  would like to take credit for the videos please comment below.

Rewatchable is a corporate video production company based north of Boston, MA

This is a video we would normally sell but it turns out the Christmas tree farm was started by the Bertolon family and all proceeds are donated to charity so we are donating the video to help the farm attract new customers.   The Bertolon family is well known in this area for philanthropy and good works.  In fact, Ryan is a proud graduate of The Bertolon School of Business which is named after Henry and Donna Bertolon.

We hope you like the video.

BEVERLY CHRISTMAS TREE FARM

Lots of Wall Street investors are betting big that online video is here to stay.  Chinese web video site Youku made its debut on the New York Stock Exchange yesterday and the stock price was up 161 percent over its initial per-share price of $12.80 by the end of the day. It closed yesterday at $33.44 and is now trading $43.04

Youku, is a wildly popular web video site in China and is similar to Hulu.  The web video company reportedly has 203 million unique visitors per month.

As bigger entertainment based web video companies get better at uploading, compressing and streaming online video we should expect web video technology to get better for all of us. Translation: Small and medium sized businesses will be getting better tools for showing marketing videos and tracking their success.  As for the embedded video below from Youku, you will have to rely on the English captioning for translation.

Rewatchable – Video Production Boston, MA

Google may have lost out on its acquisition of Groupon last week but the company announced they will acquire video optimization and digital rights management (DRM) company Widevine.  The internet is swirling with speculation as to whether the company was acquired to help protect content with its DRM technology or if the acquisition will be used to better stream content with Widevine’s adaptive video streaming technology.

Our best guess is Google probably saw value in both pieces of the business.  However, the adaptive video streaming capabilities should be exciting to anyone interested in online video, YouTube and Google TV.  Three specific claims from the company’s website got our attention.  First, to enhance the user’s experience the technology determines the user’s bandwidth and provides the best picture quality available for that particular moment.  However, because it is adapting the video in realtime it will continue to provide a better version of the video as the bandwidth gets better.  Second, the video company also claims to offer a “Blu-ray-like” video experience for users.  Unlike most progressive online video, the user does not have to put up with video buffering as they jump to different parts of the video.  Instead, Widevine will just “flash video frames” as the user selects a different part of the video much like Blu-ray.  Finally, the most exciting claim for Google is the claim Widevine makes about video delivery costs.  They claim their technology offers the “lowest cost video delivery available.”  That’s got to be pretty exciting to Google as their YouTube property absorbs about 30 hours of new video per minute!

We think Google got the better deal last week while saving about 5 billion dollars.  Although, they still might buy Groupon, Google might decide to just build a Groupon killer if they have a spare 10 minutes because the technology is not exactly rocket science.   If Google builds their own ‘couponator’ they could immediately leverage their clients they have from their AdWords and DoubleClick businesses.

Below are a couple of screenshots from videos found on Widevine’s website.

Rewatchable is a Boston corporate video company.

Azuki’s website describes their video appliance/platform as follows:

The award-winning Azuki Wireless Platform™ is the most sophisticated mobile media platform on the market today. Azuki offers an efficient and highly scalable way to deploy rich media services for wireless consumption, leveraging standards such as Flash, Silverlight and iPhone OS and standardizing content acquisition for disparate sources around dynamic, feed-based ingestion.

Rewatchable video production company based in Beverly, Massachusetts.

Of course, we are also big fans of Video SEO (Video Search Engine Optimization) so we were very happy to see Wistia encouraging their customers to use video site maps in a recent blog post.  The post talks about how video sitemaps can help businesses get found in search engine results for particular keywords and provides a link to video sitemap documentation that shows how to set up video sitemaps with Wistia.

Having a tough time getting on the first page of google for competitive keywords in your industry?  It might be time to start experimenting with Video SEO and video sitemaps!

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts based video production company.

Related Blog Article – Boston Corporate Video – Video SEO Test

Is your business based in downtown Boston?  Need a corporate video for your website, social media or email marketing campaign?  If so, you are in luck.  If you book a January 2011 video production before December 15, 2010 Rewatchable will provide a 25% discount. That means a standard Rewatchable video will only be $1,875.  This special is only for downtown Boston businesses and the shoot must take place in Boston, MA.

Please be sure to schedule your video production before December 15, 2010 to get the discount. Also, please reference “Boston Corporate Video Production Special“.  This video special is for blog readers only!

Rewatchable is a corporate video production company based in Beverly, MA about 25 miles north of Boston, Massachusetts.

At Rewatchable, we are very thankful that we have had a great year.  We have met all kinds of great people and wonderful businesses.  Along the way, we think we’ve made some pretty good videos and helped businesses craft their messages and ultimately sell more.

As a way of saying thank you, we would like to help a non-profit with a video production.  If you know of a non-profit with a worthy cause that needs a Boston videographer or video editing services please let us know.  If the cause is right, we will offer a huge discount or even free videography service.   Need a videographer to record a non-profit event?  Let us know. Need videographers to produce a testimonial video or profile video for your website? Let us know.

Send us email if you know any deserving non-profit organizations in need of video assistance.  Please reference “Boston Videographers Give Thanks” in the email subject line.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Rewatchable is a based in Beverly, MA about 25 miles north of Boston, Massachusetts.

Boston Videographers For Business

Some times visitors to our website are looking to simply rent a video production studio equipped with cameras and green screens.   That’s not really our thing.  We like to work with our customers on planning, production and post-production for their videos.  We like to help our customers make great videos by helping them craft their message to help their businesses grow.

Of course, there are times when all you really need is a nice studio.   According to a press release today, a Portsmouth, NH video production company called Publica has opened a green-screen studio comprising of 625 feet of active filming space.  Along with green screens the video production studio will offer dimmable LED panels, natural lighting, blackout windows and rentals of Sony and Red One cameras and lenses.  The press release claims the studio is the “largest and most up to date green-screen video and photography facility between Boston, MA and Portland, Maine.”  The studio is located on Brewery Street in Portsmouth, NH and you can learn more about them at their website – http://www.boomerangnh.com

We can’t vouch for  the company or the studio but if you are just looking for a greenscreen studio rental North of Boston you might want to check them out.   We will likely check them out ourselves if our NH clients end up needing a local video production studio. Of course, Rewatchable also have portable green screens that can be used on location for most video shoots.

Rewatchable is a video production company based in Beverly, MA about 25 minutes north of Boston, Massachusetts.

In a press release issued this morning, Massachusetts based public relations firm Matter Communications announced they have expanded their capabilities to include professional video production capabilities.  According to the release, “To shoot, edit and create multimedia content for its clients, Matter employs a full-time, in-house video production specialist.”

‘As anyone in communications can attest, there is a marked shift from traditional journalism toward online news, and now we’re seeing those online eyes moving more and more from written content toward video.’

Scott Signore, principal and CEO, Matter Communications.

We agree with Scott.  Soon, it will be rare to find a serious business website that does not offer video as a way to educate and persuade both prospects and customers.  We welcome Matter to the Boston area video production community and we look forward to seeing their videos.

Matter Communications is a full-service public relations agency, specializing in consumer and high technology markets and is based in Newburyport, Massachusetts.   The firm lists clients including CVS, Verizon Wireless, Lexar among other high-profile business customers.

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts Video Production company.

News Video Coverage Secured By Matter Communication For Cambridge, MA Commerce Company ATG

Rewatchable believes nothing is more powerful than video when it comes to delivering marketing messages.  However, if you want to reach your audience during their morning or evening commute video is not really an option.  For that reason,  Rewatchable has teamed up with WXRV / 92.5 The River so that commuters in the Boston area can ponder how video might be able to help their business as they sit in traffic.  You can hear our radio ads during the morning and evening commute.

As a video marketing company, we could not resist adding some visuals to our radio ad to make it a bit more web friendly.

If you click our radio ad below you can see our radio ad for yourself.

Boston Video Marketing Company Radio Ad

Rewatchable is a Boston video marketing company.

The press release goes on to say ExpressBox “removes file size limitations, allowing for transfers of up to 250 GB a file, anywhere in the world”   The service is in beta currently and available to paying customers but also will be available on an on-demand basis starting in December 2010.

We hope to test the service soon to see for ourselves how quick and effective the service is with large video files.  If it works well, video production companies around the world will rejoice!

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts video production company.

Very interesting comment  considering YouTube is probably Brightcove’s single biggest competitor.   Of course,  YouTube is the worst kind of competitor because they give away video hosting for free.  So, why is Brightcove playing nice with YouTube?   Brightcove understands their ad-free video offering has features, capabilities and private sharing services that businesses will always be willing to pay for.  Also, there are still many businesses that are afraid to be associated with the skateboarding dogs and funny wedding videos that can be found on YouTube.

But, why doesn’t Brightcove just ignore the existence of YouTube?  The answer seems to be many of there customers won’t let them.  According to the article, Brightcove has heard from their customers that they want some of their content to appear on YouTube.   It only makes sense that a business spending $1,000 to $100,000 with a video production company would want their video to appear in as many places as possible.  YouTube is a logical place to add videos considering the video site gets more than 2 billion video views per day.  Also, adding videos to YouTube makes it more likely that a video might wind up in Google results.

BrightCove is not just talking about YouTube. The new Brightcove 5 platform includes “deeper analytics for HTML5, support for Apple HTTP streaming for video apps, the ability to automatically push videos to YouTube”.

Fierce Online Video Article

Brightcove 5 boasts YouTube sync, deeper analytics and ease of distribution  Read more: Brightcove 5 boasts YouTube sync, deeper analytics and ease of distribution

More About Brightcove – Brightcove Video — Jeremy Allaire

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts video production company.

According to their website, Broadcast Pix is a provider of  integrated production systems that create live video.  The company’s press release  announces, Jubilee Christian Center in San Jose, Calif., is using the Slate™ 5000 video production system to “produce in-house video presentations during services, as well as video productions for television and Internet audiences.”  Jubilee’s media director Jordan Forteza is quoted as saying “the Broadcast Pix purchase was part of an overall migration to a tapeless high definition production workflow.”

It is good to see a fellow Massachusetts video production company improving video for organizations and audiences around the world.  According to their website, Broadcast Pix was founded in 2002 and has installations in over 75 countries.

In a press release last week, PixelFlow, a Silicon Valley based video technology startup, announced the “world’s first cloud based video production delivery system.”  The company claims the software-as-a-service offering is a “Swiss army  knife” for online video collaboration and sales.

Standard features include digital asset management, secure previews, watermarking, access controls, task assignment, timeline notes, on-line payment and licensing.  The company also allows video production companies and any other video producer to easily buy and sell HD video footage.

PixelFlow CEO Shannon Skulley stated:

“The feature set for the platform came from understanding customer workflows and identifying cloud based solutions that could add immediate value to their businesses. Our service is easy to use, provides a consistent experience for the user and can be run as part of an existing website. No software and no coding required.”

Video Production in the Cloud Press Release

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts video production company.

The old cliche is true.  People buy from people!  Traditional websites can be boring, cold and generally uninviting.  A video introduction lets your prospective client hear from you directly.  Through video, you can speak to your prospect and let them know you are interested in helping them and that you are interested in hearing from them.  Video also helps you educate your potential clients about how you work and what they should expect if they become a client.   A well produced, professional video is also an upgrade to your website that tells your clients that you are a serious professional and you invest in your business.

A video business card takes less than 1 hour to shoot and can be ready in just a couple of weeks.  We don’t use big video light kits so we won’t be needing more than a few minutes to set up and you will be comfortable as we ask you some simple questions about your business.  Our standard pricing for Video Business Cards is already affordable at only $999.  However, on November 15th only, we will shoot your Video Business Card for only $500.  You will need to sign up for your video by November 1, 2010 to get this special pricing.  A video business card is 30-60 seconds in length and can be used on your website, in email and in social media.

Interested in purchasing a standard Rewatchable video production for your Cambridge business? We will need to choose a another date but we will discount our standard video pricing to $2,000 if you are interested in the full Rewatchable experience. You will need to sign up before November 1, 2010 and the video will need to happen sometime before the end of 2010.

Need help with your Cambridge, MA video production?  Give us a call at 978.666.4068.

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts based video production company.

As a video company, Wistia understands the power of customer testimonial videos.   At Wistia’s request, Rewatchable visited one of  Wistia’s  many happy customers (Sword Agencyport) to conduct a short interview.  In less than one hour, we were able to capture lots of great footage of Mike Albert talking about the many benefits of using the Wistia service.  Wistia posted the video on their website and will be experimenting with different video styles and posting the results on their blog.  We look forward to seeing the results.

Rewatchable is a Video Production Company located in Beverly, MA

Victoria Station was looking for a video highlighting their outdoor dining.  We shot around dusk on a beautiful summer evening, using two cameras, a pair of tripods, and a 6′ jib.  Used motion-tracked text to tell the story without cut-scenes that might ruin the fluidity of the shoot.  Great original music by the Ross Livermore Band, which plays frequently at Victoria Station / Vic’s Boathouse.

While this is probably the most high profile product intro video, the most prolific producer is Adam Lisagor, whose approachable, deadpan style has graced some high-end introductions for mobile payment processor Square, iPad news aggregator Flipboard, and even the newly published book Being Geek.

Product introduction videos (especially engaging, creative ones) are a great way to pique interest in a product or service that might otherwise be boring (financial services?) or difficult to explain with words (something like Flipboard, whose awesomeness you really have to *see* to understand), or something behind a pay wall, like the New Yorker magazine.  At Rewatchable, we believe that putting video front and center on your website is the best way to capture eyeballs and attention completely for a brief period of time, and the success of these product intro videos only serves to reinforce that notion.

However, even when the content is great we sometimes see beautiful video that is being played in ugly, boring and poorly functioning video players for no apparent reason.  The Dabber video player is different.  Dabber’s video players are well designed, dynamic and easy to use.  A basic non-commercial version is free and commercial video players start at only $75.

I recently had the opportunity to interview the CEO of The Dabber Agency, Daniel Daboczy.  He and co-founder Eric Webber are clearly focused on “beauty, brand management and user experience” to make online video a better experience for users and content providers.

Both Eric Weber and I have a history as curators and producers in the contemporary art-field. And since 2004 we felt a frustration over the lack of good tools to communicate worldwide as a brand. We had Youtube of course but that didn’t feel serious enough and is only a complement in communication. So Eric Weber and I started an online video channel based on the JW player where we focused on beauty, brand management and user experience. We didn’t have a big audience but everybody loved the look and feel of that channel.

In 2008 we saw an opportunity to start our own company and we set out to create The Dabber Player and The Dabber Agency both focusing on aesthetics, functionality  and user interface and experience.

It´s better because we, not being engineers, have found methods for delivery, programing and design that are unusual.  And it is better because we know how a good visual experience can captivate audiences. Our experience as curators of successful exhibitions with a critical and impatient audience has taught us how important visual communication is. The other tools out there might be perfect in technology but they lack knowledge of visual interaction.

There are several reasons. One is control of content and what kind of content you and your brand  is displayed next to. Another reason is that standard players are quite boring and can hold back aspirations in good design or user experience.  Another is that everybody needs something unique and our players can be customized in infinite ways.

First impressions last. The wow factor is something that can strengthen a brand.  A bad and ugly player is something that might bring down the value of how clients perceive you. The look is important because it tells your audience that you care and have spent time and effort on their experience.

We develop new players all the time. Some need to be tested and some are only client custom made products, but we strive towards building more and more video and other products that users simply can implement and make their online presences better.

We see that a lot more interactive video is coming. Hopefully that will be household items. Videos that you can click in if you need more info and of course beauty, depth and the entire use of the possibility that the screen gives. Of course alot more 3D films and 3D screens.

We usually give the advice to use and create something that reflects your brand. If  you are a standard company use standard methods but if you strive to be something else you should take the time and effort to find, build or use something that helps, lifts and properly displays your brand.  We have shown with The Dabber Player that it doesn’t have to cost a lot and that almost everything can be created.

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts based video production and video editing company.

As reported earlier, Twitter is slowing launching a new interface that will allow users to embed photos and videos.  The interface will also allow users at Twitter.com to view multiple accounts/tweets without ever clicking to a new page.

To show the interface in action, Twitter created a 2 minute marketing video and added it to YouTube.  At this moment, the video has been viewed more than 1.4 million times.

Twitter was careful to add the following tags to make sure the video gets found in YouTube, Google and beyond.

• New Twitter
• tweet
• tweets
• twitter
• twitter.com

Rewatchable is a video marketing company based just outside of Boston, Massachusetts.

If you are having trouble with linking from YouTube back to your website there is a simple fix.  It is very reasonable that someone might just link to their company website using the standard www.domain.com convention.  However, Google likes to make life more interesting and the link will not work unless it has the http://  piece in front of the www.  I’m sure Google could fix the YouTube url linking problem but so far they have chosen to insist on the http:// piece in order for the link to go live.   The best way to see if your YouTube link back to your website is working is to check and make sure the link turns blue. Once you see the link has turned color you should click on the link and make sure it goes to the exact page you intended.

Also, the link should be placed in the YouTube description field.  Specifically, the link back to your website should be placed at the very beginning of the description so that it is not obscured when only the description snippet is visible. (as seen below)

Most YouTube users cannot link to their website directly from the YouTube video itself.  However, YouTube does allow videos in their partner program and non-profit program to link directly back from within the video. Below, you can see an example from a video Rewatchable produced for a non-profit that helps women with post natal issues.  The link back to WAI’s website appears at the end of the video.   (to learn more about video annotation linking checking this post  YouTube Annotations – Instructions & Help )

Rewatchable is a video editing service and production company based in Beverly, Massachusetts.

Now, it’s easy to see embedded photos and videos directly on Twitter, thanks to partnerships with DailyBooth, deviantART, Etsy, Flickr, Justin.TV, Kickstarter, Kiva, Photozou, Plixi, Twitgoo, TwitPic, TwitVid, USTREAM, Vimeo, yfrog, and YouTube.

Twitter.com    09.14.10

Of course, the announcement is also great news for business and video production companies looking to promote videos and make announcements on the micro-blogging site.  Imagine your company needs to promote the release of your new product or service. How great would it be to tweet out a video announcement to thousands of interested parties?  Users will be much more likely to actually watch the video if they can see it right on Twitter.com.

The enhancements are not available yet on Twtter.com but will be rolled out to users in the near future.

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts based video production  and video editing company.

The report was released this morning and examines online video discovery, usage and engagement data from a sample of nearly 2,000 news and entertainment websites representing 3.4 billion video streams.

Some interesting findings include…

Unique viewers increased on average by 2.8 percent per month

Video consumption on newspaper sites grew the most over this period, rocketing to 65 percent more views than the previous quarter due to attention and coverage focused on the oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico.

Referral traffic for online video from Facebook and Twitter is growing faster than from traditional search engines. At current growth rates, Facebook will surpass Yahoo! within the year to be the second only to Google for video referral traffic.

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts video production & editing company.

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts video production company.

Rewatchable is a Boston video production company.

However, with the advent of Google Instant Search users will see the search term change dynamically and they will see the search results page populate instantly with results that are meaningful to them.   For instance,  you can see from the screenshot below that when a Google user in the Boston area searches for “video production” they are automatically presented with the local search query of “video production Boston.”

Why does this all matter? Well, as you are optimizing your website and your videos for SEO (Search Engine Optimization) you should be cognizant of the search terms Google is suggesting to users.  For Rewatchable, if Google is steering users towards the term “video production Boston” it doesn’t make much sense that we would only optimize our site for the term “video production Massachusetts” or even “Boston video production” as we might get missed by users relying on Google’s suggestion of “video production Boston.”

The screenshot below shows the new set of results that appears instantly when the user highlights the term “video production Boston”.   Expect to see Rewatchable there very soon…

Rewatchable is a video production company based in Beverly, MA.

To further explain the new “Google Instant” feature the company turned to their blog and of course produced a Google Instant Search video they put up on their video sharing site YouTube.

Google lists some of the following benefits for Google Instant Search:

Faster Searches: By predicting your search and showing results before you finish typing, Google Instant can save 2-5 seconds per search.

Smarter Predictions: Even when you don’t know exactly what you’re looking for, predictions help guide your search. The top prediction is shown in grey text directly in the search box, so you can stop typing as soon as you see what you need.

Instant Results: Start typing and results appear right before your eyes. Until now, you had to type a full search term, hit return, and hope for the right results. Now results appear instantly as you type, helping you see where you’re headed, every step of the way.

Google Instant Search not available on your browser yet?  Google says it may take a couple of days for everyone using Google to see the feature.  There is also an option to shut off the feature for searchers not liking the new feature.

So far, we love Google Instant Search.  This is a big shakeup for the user experience but should result in even bigger changes for anyone participating in Search Engine Optimization (SEO) activities.  Now companies will start optimizing for what Google will guess rather than what the user might guess.

Rewatchable is a video production company based in Beverly, MA.

“Brainshark for YouTube” – a new capability enabling users to easily share their Brainshark presentations as YouTube videos for free.

This is great news for companies looking to add content to their YouTube channel.  The feature should also be helpful from a video search engine optimization perspective.   Brainshark videos tagged and titled with the right keywords and uploaded to YouTube will me more likely to be found ye Google and served up on Google’s results page. Afterall, YouTube is owned by Google.

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts video production & editing company.

“Once you have Google television, you’re going to be very busy,” Schmidt said. “It’s going to ruin your evening.”

Google TV is a video interface that will be available on Sony TVs, Sony BluRay players and Logitech set top boxes starting this fall.  Couch potatoes will be able to easily search through TV listings and  will be able to download online video from the web.  The Logitech set top box will be called the Logitech Revue.  How much with the Logitech Revue cost?  Pricing is not yet available but we will be sure to update this blog post as soon as the Logitech Revue price is announced.

Google indicated they do not want to be in the content business so partnerships with TV networks and movie studios should start to roll in soon. Google also will not be charging a subscription fee.  Ultimately, Google just wants another place to sell advertising and as they make the world a more searchable place. Stay tuned…

See full details here Video Editing Service

She also goes on to say they are focused on non-commercial video content.  She says Vimeo doesn’t want and doesn’t allow mass video content like movie trailers and tv shows.   Vimeo does allow commercial video production companies like Rewatchable to share video content with clients.  However, any business using video to sell or advertise products and services should be careful to read Vimeo’s terms and conditions before adding video to the video hosting site. You can find a list of some video sharing sites suitable for business videos here: Video Sharing Sites

Interview With Vimeo General Manager Dae Mellencamp

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts Video Production Company

According to DigitalPost CEO Michael Sawtell the two companies will act as one.

“We are pleased that the acquisition has been completed and are excited about this new business opportunity. Beginning today, we are a combined company which will have an immediate positive impact on our revenues. We are also beginning the process of integrating our operations which is expected to improve efficiencies in the fourth-quarter this year.” Digital Post CEO Michael Sawtell

Hopefully, that means the Boston operation will stay put and video production capabilities will stay in Boston.  Rovion will be part of DigitalPost’s digital advertising group that will feature the “Rovion ad platform, the InPerson video format and related video production, hosting and management services.”

For now, it seems as though Rovion services will remain on Summer Street in Boston, MA and DigitalPost operations will remain in Irvine, CA.

Is Rovion moving out of Boston? If you know please comment below.

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Rewatchable is Massachusetts video production company.

Seems like Apple is committed to video.  The company provided live video streaming of their event from Apple.com and  soon they will allow their users to stream their videos throughout their houses or businesses from iTunes.

What does this mean for Apple TV?  Expect to hear much more about AirPlay soon…

Rewatchable is a Boston Video Production company.

So when does it make sense for a business to use their own video camera and just let Rewatchable do the video editing?   Well, sometimes it just isn’t practical to send out even a small crew to certain locations.  For instance, let’s consider a technology company we have been talking to in Framingham, MA.  Framingham, MA is no problem logistically but they also have many employees in India they want involved in a video production.  No problem.  That’s why Flip video cameras were invented.  The Inidan video footage can be shot on the Flip camera and we can take that  footage and enhance it with post-production video editing.   Our color correction techniques and special effects allow  us to transform standard video and make it stunning video.   Our customer can shoot their video in India and have the video edited right here in Massachusetts!

Rewatchable is a Boston based video production and editing company.

“As the video market transitions and consumers expect multi-screen engagement, service providers are enhancing their infrastructure to manage and deliver video to any device while providing a rich user experience,” said Enrique Rodriguez, senior vice president and general manager, Cisco’s Service Provider Video Technology Group.

Although the video company is based in Newton, Massachusetts the Cisco press release indicates the majority of the employees are in Toronto, Canada as part of the ExtendMedia Production group.

Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed. The acquisition is subject to various standard closing conditions and is expected to be complete in the first half of Cisco’s fiscal year 2011. Upon the close of the acquisition, the majority of the ExtendMedia team will be integrated into Cisco’s Service Provider Video Technology Group.

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Rewatchable is a Massachusetts video production company.

Ford seems pleased with the results of the online video marketing campaign.  Scott Kelly, Digital Marketing Manager, Ford. “We are looking forward to working with PointRoll on future campaigns as we continue to innovate and expand our use of contextually relevant ads.”

CAMPAIGN RESULTS

–  On average: Users spent forty percent more time with the Ford brand in comparison to traditional industry benchmarks developed by PointRoll.

–  Non-expandable video ads: Typically, 4.5 percent of consumers click,  rollover or take some sort of action with a video ad. This almost     doubled for the non-expanding video ads in this Ford campaign, with 8 percent of users engaging with the ad and taking action.

–  Expandable video ads: Additionally, 15 out of every 100 users that  expanded a panel actually started a video, and the percentage of users that completed the video in full topped PointRoll benchmarks by more  than 10 percent.

The campaign results provide fresh evidence that smart video marketing engages prospects and help companies sell more.  We should all expect to see much more online video in the form of banner advertisements.

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Rewatchable is a Massachusetts Video Production Company.

Instead of shooting the video at their customer’s location with their customer’s employees, US Web Central produces the video at their studio and they use their own video spokespeople.  Maybe not the ideal video for some businesses but the concept might work for a business that wants to build credibility without paying for a full video production.  US Web Central also offers a separate package which provides Video SEO (Search Engine Optimization) services to help ensure the marketing videos are found on search engines and video hosting sites.

Of course, we happen to think Rewatchable offers the best of all worlds by offering custom high-end video productions and video SEO services at very affordable prices.

Rewatchable is a Massachusetts video production company.

Blackmagic Design is a manufacturer of video technology products, including the DeckLink popular uncompressed capture cards and is based in Milpitas, CA.

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Rewatchable is a Massachusetts video production company.