Serena software goes Mashup TV

I was consulting on a project and needed to evaluate the Serena software solution for a company. These guys are going to be reaping the rewards of success. Their website design just nails the target market and the usability is dead on; see, try, and buy, talk about keeping it simple. And while great design and navigation are worth the effort, it's the video content that sends this one out of park! Serena has created a video collection they call Mashup TV. They have a sense of humor, because they know we (those who surf and buy and work online) do too. Watch the parody of the Product Manager and Engineering Director bashing it out about priorities and bandwith...



From Mashup TV you can watch Michael Parker's Chalk Talk. Michael is the product manager who belongs in front of all your prospects, listen to him explain what a Business Mashup is, and more importantly why you should care. This is a value proposition statement that might be lost among all the cluttered content of another internet day if he were not right there, talking to you, and white boarding with you



Serena has all the bases covered: video to communicate their strategic value proposition, video to develop a community of users, video testimonials that serve as a personable relatable reference that is just what your next client needs to get on board. Are you using video yet?

PodCamp Boston 2007

Engaging the audience with audio. It's big and it's picking up players everyday. By now you'll know that the Aleuromedia team has an enthusiasm and passion for video as a major communication medium. We believe that video has value in everything from internal corporate messages and corporate culture pieces, to relaying what might have traditionally been a white paper with greater detail and cognition, to dynamic product demos using video, flash and screencasting tools.

That said, our desire to bridge communication gaps and to increase the efficiency with which we share information endears us to audio tools. The goal is to communicate with each other the way we are most inclined to receive it.

Podcasts are great for sharing information because they are so efficient. We can relay lots of material, in small doses, and with great frequency using podcasts. Who could deny that it is faster and easier to tell someone your story than it is to document it? Bigger still, it is more relate able to hear someone share their story. The pace of their words, the inflection, the tenor and diction all have meaning we are already prepared to process and these keys provide us with so much more than our interpretation of the written word. Check out Chris Brogan's blog to hear what I mean.

Whatever you think Podcast are, prepare yourself to learn how much more energy they conduct, check out PodCamp Boston 2007.

Baby steps...the presenters used YouTube video clips

In the past week or more I have attended a few informational events. It's great to see and hear what people are doing, especially when they are passionate about their work. The biggest disappointment for me has been something I feel almost personally, like I'm just not getting the word out and helping enough people step outside the trap of business communication norms. "Step away from the PowerPoint templates people, everything is going to be okay."

I've watched time, and time again, individual and corporate representatives swing at lobbed serves and miss (or marginally return). The people in attendance to most of these sessions have paid to be there. They want to be educated and engaged; in all respects a captive audience. In each session I've watched slide shows with bulleted lists; some suffered the "too many words" demise while others struggled with just enough words but no compelling reason to look at the material.

What's interesting though is that I am seeing evidence that we are taking baby steps in the right direction. At least twice in the this last stretch of events a presenter used a YouTube video clip. Each time they achieved focused attention and great responses to those moments in their presentations.

I can't help feeling that these presenters could have captivated us all, I mean really hit the ball out of park, if they would just allow themselves to move out of the PowerPoint Time Warp. ("It's just a jump to the left, And then a step to the right.")

HubSpot redux - another company that "gets it"

Just noticed that HubSpot has a video demo/explainer available on YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bH4imqmSLEk). This another example of how this form of communication really is the best way to reach your audience. I do wish that this video was readily available (easy to find) on the HubSpot website, though.

Art imitating life imitating art, or Internet imitating TV, as TV?

For the past couple of weeks I've been on vacation and pulled myself away from Internet and Video business. Well last week I found myself doing something I hadn't had time for most of this summer...flipping through the TV channels. Now call it Law of Attraction, or serendipity, or coincidence, but whatever it was I'm still smiling. Flipping through the channels I stumbled into a new series, i-CAUGHT on ABC.

I was surprised and captivated by the premise...but then again maybe not really surprised because I knew this was coming (is coming). I'd say the feeling was more like "impressed" the by speed and agility of those who brought the show to fruition. It is exactly the evolution I've been telling so many of you about; warning that times are changing, and if you don't recognize this progression of Video-Internet-Television, it may cost your business.

In it's own description of the program ABC claims "...we all know there's a video revolution swirling around us all - 24/7". Interesting. Powerful. Did you know about this revolution? Check out the link above, there is a video introduction of the program that is very compelling.

Its a great time to get involved, and to rethink the ways we do, what it is we do. This is just the beginning, but hold on tight, it could be a very fast ride.

“…B2B communications are NOT in video…”

In a conversation that came about after my last post regarding video as a “relevant “ communication medium in a software development businesses, I found myself facing nearly the same argument from a B2B perspective. My protagonist in this case accepted video and other forms of online media as valuable B2C vehicles but dismissed its presence in Business to Business relationships, management, and information exchanges (hence the quote). So the conversation was interesting and we debated a bit, but I knew I would have to show this individual the face of what he believed non-existent in order to help him reach the first step: Acceptance.

This morning I’m digging around my usual online news centers and thinking about trying to find some recent articles that addressed this evolution in Business communication. As I’m reading a WSJ.com article with some level of consciousness and thinking about my recent conversation, something to the right of my screen caught my eye. There was a movie box playing what “looks like video" of a glass with coins filling it. There were also words posing the questions “Do you invest in IT?”, then “Do you spend IT?”. A few seconds later, I’m recognizing this is exactly what I was talking about. The ad completes and I see Accenture, so I click the box and allow my attention to be directed at their landing page. I smiled widely. This is another place that gets it, and for all those that don’t yet, be concerned.

The landing page presents me a visually pleasing presentation of information on the value prop and solutions. Mid screen is a movie box above which has a blurb describing who the individual in the box is and why I might want to hear from her. This is known as a talking head piece (meaning a head and shoulder shot), and this piece is a video testimonial. Now I’m standing up at my desk I’m so impressed. You have no idea how many times I have advised a client to use video testimonials, they can brilliant! So of course I press play and learn from a very nice, enthusiastic woman, who happens to be a CEO at a major electric organization how Accenture products and service helped her transition her organization to a platform for growth which has lead to a 125% increase in stock. SHWING!

This is not only B2B communication (and marketing)but it is on IT, I mean this is about as dry a well of content as you can drill and they have made it engaging, informative, compelling and the most important quality, relatable. If I am a CEO with enterprise IT needs, I would listen and learn. I would pick up the phone after hearing a piece like that a gazillion times faster than after reading a white paper from …no names…let just say the other guys who don’t yet get it.

Here’s the landing page for Accenture that I saw.

BTW – the article I was reading on WSJ.com was about Dell, HP and others full court press into online video. If you haven’t seen it yet, check out it out. Dell now has a place referred to as Studio Dell that is a library of video content on everything. This is B2C communication evolution.

The WSJ article

Video really is better. No, really.

We get the same question asked frequently: "is video really better?". We think the answer is pretty obvious, but apparently, it isn't.

As an example of the sheer power of video to explain and simplify, a few folks have asked how to create certain effects in a video, or do something in Photoshop. If you've ever tried, those kinds of things are difficult to explain using words. Pictures help a little, but they're often even more confusing.

I created this screencast to demonstrate how video makes it drop dead simple to explain a concept to someone. This is a fairly simple concept, in this case, but imagine how much text would have to be written (not to mention the terminology involved) to explain this the "old fashioned" way!



How do you explain your concepts to your cutomers? I'll bet they're more complicated than drawing a 3D glassy ball!

By the way, this tutorial was created using the new Jing Project from TechSmith - check it out!

"How is this relevant to me?"...

Shortly after my last post I received some feedback from a software business owner. He still didn't get how the video "thing" was relevant to his business, outside of say executive presentations. We'd talked previously about screencasts but it had always appeared to this person that they were things to be used after a release as a marketing tool. I guess I never really explained it, it just makes so much sense to me that I figured it was obvious. My bad. Let's start from the top.

When I was actively leading a development team, we worked in a modified agile, product centric way. That means we worked with QA, Doc, ET AL, early; even in design. We delivered work product in quick measurable iterations. The "keeping everyone in the loop thing" works so much better when the loop is manageable. So we bit off bite pieces and cycled through, gaining education and information across each domain every time. This not only decreases time to market, but it takes the "crunch" at the end of a project and dismisses it completely, because by the end, everyone knows what they need to know to execute their part successfully and efficiently. Big point coming up...This included Sales. Video is more than just the sexy, it communicates so much information, so quickly, that it just makes sense to use it.

We used screencasts to get project stakeholders and the sales organization up to speed on the new features as well as the look and feel, before we even hit beta. Letting the sales team get excited about the impending release is a good thing! Furthermore putting a similar screencast of "what's new" out to your beta users is smart. It can get them engaged and ready to use the new release instead of just letting it sit in their "when I've got time for it" pile.

Once you've brought your sales team and maintenance users up to speed; it's time market and demo the bits. Again with the video. If your not using it, you're missing it. Screencasts can be created to highlight the "wow" points of the new release. Putting a 30 sec./1 min. video teaser on the product page and/or landing page has a much higher rate of conversion to contact than a picture or big words with "New!", "Just Released!", or "Version XX!".

Giving the sales team a demo product is common, but unless the prospect is hot, and not busy doing their own job, it can be really difficult to get them through a product demo successfully and with any sense of urgency. But you give your sales team a screencast, or a webcast, or both, and now they have the tools to get the prospects hooked and evaluating the purchase options. These tools reduce the sales cycle significantly. Double check me with stats from all the big guns, it's true.

So with video you can shorten the time to market by making the information flow richer and faster, you can shortened the sales cycle with webcasts and screencasts, and you can increased the rate of conversion for sales by using these tools...I'd say that's pretty relevant.

Here are some businesses that get it (these are not clients, nor am I endorsing their products or services...they are just folks that get it):

www.ecopy.com watch a video that showcases their software

www.ektron.com watch a value prop video

www.fitnh.org watch a non-profit connect donors to the cause

Communication vs. Connection Part Duh!

So previously I talked about the difference between communicating and connecting. Everyday I find myself being asked; "why video?" , "why does it make that much of a difference?"...ok so here's an example or two.

I can tell you that there is this really cool ad that uses shadow puppets to create forms of bunnies, birds, branches, and a moose. It's set to music and kinda surreal.

We all know what shadow puppets are and you should be able to imagine them being used in an artistic way...so then, I have communicated that concept to you.

I could be more descriptive, but with all the elegant writing in the world, I still do not believe that it would have the same effect. Nor do I believe that all the adjectives and adverbs I might use to articulate the imagery could hold your attention span or be recalled in conversation weeks later.

I do believe the following will engage you in just these ways.




BUT WAIT THERE'S MORE...

If your not worrying about artistic impression or want something a little more "real". I can tell you about this guy, Xin. He's an immigrant kid who studied martial arts to get by in a gang ridden neighborhood. He got really good at it and felt confident until he came up against a kick boxer who schooled him some more. Long story short, this young man wanted to be the next Jackie Chan stunt man. He could be found leaping through malls and doing acrobatics as he learned to perfect his skills. This young man, not only is an amazing aerialist, but he is the subject and the producer of an online video that has seen more than 15 million viewers. The video serves him better than any picture or text article could, and it has enabled him to reach a larger audience than he imagined.

You've got to watch this...



Still not satisfied look at these...

http://www.time.com/time/topten/2006/webvideos/01.html
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/215472/urban_ninja_takes_youtube_by_storm.html

Lies, damn lies and statistics

I'd really rather not shamelessly swipe someone else's very clever words for the title of this entry, but it's really perfect. On so many dimensions.

So, I've been doing some research. I don't like doing research, by the way. I've been trying to find some actual evidence that stuff on video is "better" than stuff not on video (printed text, still images, audio...). I got really excited when I bumbled into this statistic that I had heard of before:

people tend to remember 20 percent of what they hear, 30 percent of what they see, 50 percent of what they hear and see

Nice! Well, having been recently bit by the "due diligence" bug, I did a bit more snooping, and found this:

research indicates that we remember 20 percent of what we read, 30 percent of what we hear, 40 percent of what we see, 50 percent of what we say, 60 percent of what we do, and 90 percent of what we see, hear, say and do

Ok, so which is it? Or, more appropriately, exactly whose research?

I found only one actual citation to any published research, and that was a citation from the author of the paper itself. I found one that claimed the study was done by 3M, but no supporting evidence. I found another site that was more than willing to charge me for a business intelligence paper that seemed to be claiming that the entire thing was nothing but an urban legend. Nope, nothing on Snopes about that.