Ted Cantu Is Full Of Truth - Part 2

Take a good look at this video -- it got 15,000 hits and counting. It took pennies to make, no script, no actors, no special effects....

In fact, the product is its own special effect and it performs brilliantly in front of the camera. It was by chance that the presenter of this video was wearing a black shirt. He holds the dark hair color sample in front of his shirt and gives it a good swish and voila.... the color disappears.

Compared to my auto guys this video really did the job. When I looked at my automotive companies their videos were still getting zero views. How is this happening consistently? The answer is very simple....

The reason why is because you do not have to go for Hollywood type effects with your video on the web. In fact, it is much better if you don't. This is the kind of thing that really kills belief in your viewer. What people are looking for most on the web is realism and beleivability. That is the most important thing I can tell you.

Go for realism because realism sells.

coincidently, commercial television gets it and creates reality shows left and right. MTV has been doing this for a while to the point where it doesn't even show music anymore. People complaining to eachother on television sells. People trying to achieve a goal on television sells. This is a far cry from where television was a few years back in the 80's with over the top budgets like THE A TEAM, and TJ HOOKER....

Fat people sweating it out on the tube trying to lose weight -- thats whats hot. College kids complaining to each other in a house they cannot afford -- thats what sells.

Web video is the same way. Go for the realism......

Now try to explain this at your next middle management meeting.....


Ted Cantu IS SEO SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION, works in Detroit, Chicago and NYC.

Ted Cantu Is Full Of Truth......

Funny what can happen in just a years time. A year ago we were getting slammed for some pretty ridiculous things. The problem started when I started attacking conventional thinking in regards to advertising. It seems that a lot of us out there are mentally married to expensive advertising, pay per click, yellow pages and some other costly things....

TELEVISION VS WEB VIDEO
The comment I made about television was the one that really set the automotive industry off their rocker. The idea here is that graphics need to look dynamic, filled with rapid edits, and come off like a Hollywood commercial. We took the opposite spin on this and created hand held shots, used cheap HD cameras, and did some green screen composite shots and mocked television informercials. Yes, it was decidedly low budget but it served a purpose.

The videos that we shot for the web did everything the automotive companies didn't do. As a result we acheived 47,000 views for some of our clips and that was just on YouTube alone. My automotive companies did not fare as well. They pulled a dismal 80+ views and so it goes.....

We did a lot of other changes too in our company recently. We no longer feature models in our clips. Again, we tested this out and found out that the consumers who watch our video clips are looking for the guy next door. They do not crave Hollywood they are just looking for someone who is honest and believable.

Web video is different than television on many levels. Television has certain standards that the advertisers live to stand up to. Web video has no pretentions and is open to experimentation, off the cuff comedy, and spontaneity. It also offers a chance to communicate on a soul level than with television commercial culture.

IMPORTANT KEY POINTS TO REMEMBER
YouTube has expanded their time limit on the videos you upload. They will now accept videos that are 15 minutes in length. Keep in mind that this is in top shelf HD.