I met Jessica Piscitelli by accident a few months ago. She and I were both at a networking event that neither of us normally attends. When I found out she was a videographer, I was intrigued. Though she records conferences, galas, and other special events, she also produces videos for promotion, training, and SEO. As a film school grad and veteran of the movie industry in NYC, she is pretty good at what she does. Check out her company at www.capture-video.com.
Jessica Piscitelli
Video marketing for SEO really caught my attention, though. I know big companies, and especially media and news organizations, use video on their websites, but I didn’t know how it aided SEO efforts. Here’s what I learned during a conversation with Jessica:
The first thing Jessica said is that video should be part of your suite of marketing tools. That sought after demographic of 18-24 year olds watch an average of 5 ½ hours of online video a month. In fact, online videos are so popular that YouTube became the 2nd largest search engine (as measured by number of searches) last year. Did not know that!
A website with a video has a 50 times greater chance of being found on the first page of results generated by a search engine as compared to a website that is text only. Fifty times! Did not know that either! [I asked Jessica why this was so, and since she doesn’t speak computer-ese either, she quickly explained it in English. Google changed the way it runs searches two years ago, so they search for anything—maps, videos, graphics—that contains the search word(s).]
Naturally, you can’t just chuck any old video up onto your website and expect it to work magic. Video length and quality are very important. Because a person’s attention span wanes around the five minute mark (for some of us, ahem, it’s a bit shorter), you’ll definitely want to keep your message short, sweet, and to the point.
The message that you are trying to get across will dictate the video’s length. If you are simply explaining how your company helps its clients, or discussing a new product you just launched, the video will be short. If you are interviewing an industry expert who uses your product or service, the video will be longer. Just remember the five minute rule of thumb.
Now, if you want people to watch and share your video, it needs to be high-quality and interesting. By high-quality, Jessica stressed that you cannot film yourself on your webcam blabbering about whatever and then post it on your website. No one will finish watching it, no one will share it, and it could ruin your professional reputation and image. Remember, video represents the quality of the product and/or services your company sells.
To keep the video interesting, you’ll definitely want a professional videographer to film and then edit it to include various images, angles, settings, etc. Just think of it this way: would you rather be in one of those TV commercials for a local business that was obviously filmed on a shoe string budget, or a commercial for a national or international brand that was filmed by a professional crew with professional actors in a fabulous location?
So, what will this cost you? “Talking head” videos start at $2,000. Yeah, I know, not cheap. But remember the search engine results for online videos, not to mention the instant sales pitch video makes, for anyone clicking on your website who doesn’t want to wade through all that text. Jessica said some clients shoot several videos at once to reduce costs a bit and then time release the videos over the course of the year. And if you are your product (a lawyer, accountant, life coach, etc.), a talking head video is a perfect way to differentiate yourself.
Check out some of the videos Jessica has produced for clients. Pretty cool! http://www.capture-video.com/video-samples.htm. And she has a very impressive list of clients to boot. After watching some of her videos, I think you’ll be saying “yay” to video marketing.
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