Below is a list of everything you will need to shoot professional web videos complete with cost.

Camera

Kodak Zi8 HD Pocket Video Camera $170

An excellent camera at a great price.

Highlights

• It shoots at both 1080 and 720 HD.
• External Microphone Input
• Expandable SD/SDHC card slot (up to 32 GB) – for up to 10 hours of footage.

Microphone

Audio-Technica ATR-3350 Lavalier Omnidirectional Condenser Microphone - $25

Tripod

Deluxe 57″ Camera Tripod with Carrying Case For The Kodak Zi8 Video Camera - $15

Lighting Kit

Fancierstudio 2400 Watt Lighting Kit Video Lighting Kit – $160

Total Price: $370

Extras – not necessary but recommended

ePhoto 10×12 GREEN 10×12 Foot Chroma Key Green Screen - $39

Neewer 110CM 43″ 5-in-1 Collapsible Multi-Disc Light Reflector – $17

In all honestly the equipment listed above is not the best stuff on the market. It is however the best video equipment for the price.  This equipment will allow you to shoot HD video that will look great on the web. The camera even comes with software to basic editing of the videos. If you want to get into advanced editing you will need to pony up for professional software like Adobe After Effects and/or Premier and learn how to use it as it is meant for professionals.  If you are a Mac user IMovie can allow you to do some incredible stuff. You can always send your videos to the heroes and let us apply our magic to it with advanced effects and editing. We can also edit the sound in the video. Now that we have eliminated all the excuses – Go shoot some amazing web videos for your business!

Now let’s  cover how to get those nicely shot videos ranked locally in Google.  To make it easier to follow I will once again us the wine store example from the earlier post.

First thing is to give your video a title that will carry some weight for local search. In the wine store example a great title would be – MT. Pleasant Wine Tasting with (Name Of Guest) or if they would like to rank for Charleston they could substitute Charleston in place of Mount Pleasant. If the guest is a local Chef or wine rep from a local distributor – putting the name of the wine distributor or restaurant where the Chef is from would be beneficial as well. When someone searches for the restaurant, chef, or wine distribution company it is highly likely that your video will appear in the search results.

So here is our final title – MT. Pleasant Wine Tasting with Chef  Langley of  The Green Vine.

You will then want to upload the video to YouTube and in the basic info area write the title, a good description with proper keywords and in the tags section put your keywords.

In this example the description for this video would be -

At Acme wine shop in MT. Pleasant, SC on Friday May 18th will be tasting Acme Pinot Noir, Acme Chardonnay, and Acme Zinfindal with Chef Langley from The Green Vine. Chef Langley will discuss food pairings and (insert wine store owner) will cover the winery and details about the wine.

In the tags section would be the following keywords. You should shoot for ten really good keywords.

Wine tasting Mt Pleasant, Acme Wine Store, Mt Pleasant,  Charleston, The Green Vine, Chef Langley, Chef Bill Langley, Charleston Wine Tasting, MT Pleasant Wine Store, Wine Tasting Video.

In the advanced section of YouTube you can put the location where the video was recorded. Make Sure you do this.

Now that your video is online – Let’s get it on other places. The next place your video should go is on your Google Places page followed by any high-ranking local directories that allow videos. That is a good start.

Next using a tool such as Oneload or Traffic Geyser – you can distribute your video to many video hosting destinations at once.

Now you are well on your way.

Below is How to Further Optimize Your Video Marketing Efforts.

Don’t stop – Continue making videos. They are often easier than writing blog posts once you get the hang of it. Try creating a series that you can do on a monthly or even weekly basis, maybe even daily. The more videos you do the more likely that they are to show up in search results and they will be seen on the video hosting sites and could build a following of potential customers.

Test and Research – Research your competition. If any are producing videos, what types of videos are they doing? What types seem to be successful based on where they show in search results and the number of views?  Test different content styles in your videos and see what gets the best result.

Keyword Research – Use tools like Wordtracker and Google AdWords Keyword tool to research keyword. In a short time you will be able to tag your videos with the best possible keywords.  Try to add longer keyword phrases with a moderate search volume. You will be able to rank for these terms easier than going after more general terms.

Calls to action – Include annotations and links in your videos to send people to your landing pages or where they can find more information. Also tell the viewer what they should do next in the video – such as someone in the video saying – “Don’t forget to like us on Facebook” as the Facebook page url appears. Even if not directly selling from your video you can build your audience in other places and put them in your marketing/sales funnel.

Share and encourage to share – Publish the video to your companies Facebook page and put a link in your twitter feed.  Do not put copy in the twitter or Facebook post that is comes off like spam or a pushy salesperson. In an annotation, text overlay, or using someones voice in the video encourage others to share the video if they liked it.

Point back to YouTube – In blog posts, newsletters , social media, your website, or wherever seems appropriate link to your video on YouTube. If you are producing multiple videos ( you should be ) ask people to subscribe.

Well that covers that.  We have one last thing to cover regarding videos – how to produce high quality videos on a tight budget. That we will cover in the next blog post.

Did you know that  a local business has a better chance of ranking for relevant search terms using YouTube hosted, highly optimized videos than any other approach? – Blog post coming soon on Local SEO for videos.
Video production for the web has gotten very affordable. I will create another blog post about picking the best equipment at the best value in another blog post and add the link here once I do.

Below are the steps to create a great video for your website.

Let’s use the fictional company – Acme Wine Shop.

The first step is to come up with the concept for the video –  If you would like to look back on our post on content ideas for your videos you can find it here. They have decided to do a short sneak peak video in which they show a wine or two that will be tasted and mention their featured guest – usually a wine maker or distributor for their  weekly wine tasting.

The second step is to come up with a script or just wing it. Really whatever is most comfortable for you or your team. The trick is if you are using a script you do not want to appear as if you are.  It is also best not to have a bland monotone deliverance in your video. It should seem as though you are talking to your audience. The worst thing you can do is let fear of the camera keep you from making videos. You should realize that the first ones will not be the best and that they will get better as you go along.

The third step is to make sure the environment in which you are shooting the video is ready. Does it look cluttered or unorganized? Think of the visual messages you will be presenting to your audience. How is the lighting? You may need to take a quick take just to see how the lighting appears in the video. Be creative – Is there a way – without being obnoxious or distracting – to get your product or someone using your service in the shot? Speaking of distracting, make sure any noise that is present will be okay in the video. Ambient music in a store is probably okay as long as it is at an acceptable volume level.  Although wardrobe and overall appearance are not part of the environment you need to make sure your attire is appropriate for your audience.

The fourth step is to make sure the camera is set up correctly and everything that needs to be in the frame is.

Now you are ready to shoot your video and start attracting more customers. In the next blog post we will discuss low cost equipment and software to get you shooting videos like a pro. Of course you could always hire the heroes to shoot and produce a great video for you.

Storytelling – You can tell the story of your brand’s history or a customer experience.  This gets your audience more in touch with your brand. If the story is good your customers may share it with their friends. Below is an example of the story of how Coloft – a coworking space in Santa Monica California got started.

Testimonials – Video testimonials are 10x more powerful than text testimonials. Your prospect will have more trust in your product/service because they can actually see a real person singing your praises. Video can capture things such as tone and facial expressions which you just don’t get with text.  Below is a great example for AdvoCare products.

Product Demos – With a video you can go further in-depth about your product and/or demonstrate how it can help your customer. Check out the product demo below for the Marshmallow Shooter. Doesn’t it make you want to get one for your office? Wouldn’t you love to just do a sneaky Ninja style attack on a coworker? Hey – That could be a great Funny Stuff or Behind the Scenes video.

Calls To Action – Yes you can sell from your video. Some of the most succesful websites walk their prospects through the buying process. A video can be easily incorporated into your sales process. These type of videos work best on landing pages in which the prospect has come to specifically inquiring about a certain product or service. Below is a video for Dropbox which tells you why you should use Dropbox. On the DropBox home page underneath the video is the download Dropbox button.

Behind the Scenes – People love to feel like insiders especially with certain industries. People also do business with people/companies they know, like, and trust. A behind the scenes video can pull back the curtain on your operations. It will allow your prospect to see real people working hard to deliver your service/product. This will go a long way in helping your customers identify with and trust your company.

Behind the scenes at Ladybug Organic Coffee Company

Funny Stuff – Do you have a fun company? Show that side a little more with comical videos. A good example of this are the Zappos videos like the one below. Example Below.

There are many other things you can do with video such as tips and strategies related to your product/service or how your company is involved in the community or with a charity. The NBA does a great job with the NBA Cares campaign. In the comments below add a link to your company’s video or any video you think does a great job on using these ideas.

The first one I will cover is Aweber.

Aweber

Aweber is commonly used by internet marketers and has a great reputation in the industry. It is fairly simple to use. One of the best features of the platform is the scheduling of your  mailing campaigns.  Unlike other platforms which enforce a delay on your first autoresponder emails being sent – Aweber lets you send the email immediately.  For my issues with forcing a delay on the first autoresponder read my review of Mail Chimp below.  Overall I really like Aweber and have used it for years.

Ease of Use - A
Aweber is very easy to use. You can be up and running with a campaign in minutes.

Personalization of emails - B
Aweber allows you to implement many types of personalization. Most commonly used of those is the  ability to put the name field in the subject line or body of the email.  Email open rates increase when emails appear more personalized. An example of this would be  - Jeff did you hear about this? – as the subject line. Without adding the name your email open rate would be substantially less.

Tracking  - B
Aweber provides  a good assortment of tracking reports.

Templates - B
Overall I am not of fan of using templates for your email campaigns. They should either be cohesive with the rest of your marketing ( often hard to do with templates) or plain text which is more personal.  With that being said Aweber provides a good assortment of templates. The best of those would be the ones tailored to include coupons, pdf or audio downloads.

Web Forms - A+
Aweber probably has the easiest web forms to implement into a website. I do not recommend the templates they provide for there forms however. Use the blank form code and just add the fields you need. If you do want to have some style for your forms – Hire a Designer – preferably the one who created your website as they will do the best job at matching it to your website.

Email Campaign Setup and Scheduling - A
It is very  easy to set up a campaign in Aweber. The first email can also be sent immediately when someone signs up. That is important if you are offering something to them in exchange for their email address such as a coupon or free download etc.. You also have the ability to set the time and day of when your emails will be delivered. ( Super Tip: Sending on certain days and times will increase your open rate % – Will do a blog post in the near future with advanced email marketing tips).

Split Testing  - B
You can divide your list into percentages to test copy, subject lines, offers etc.. They also offer subscriber segmentation – see other features below.

Pricing  - B
You can test out Aweber for  a month for $1. The price then goes up to $19 an hour for 500 subscribers or less. As your list size increases so does the monthly fee. They do not charge for the # of emails sent. $19 is not a lot to pay and when your list grows so should your revenue so the increased fee should not be an issue.

Integration with other software - B
The Aweber API is integrated into many other platforms. There are plugins for WordPress and integration with other platforms like facebook and Unbounce.

Other Features - C
Aweber offers as an added feature subscriber segmentation.  It allows you to group your subscribers in order to deliver more targeted and relevant emails. We love this feature. The reason for the C is because it is the only notable extra feature they offer. They also offer facebook and twitter integration and the ability to broadcast your blog posts via email. Most of the email platforms do this so we give no extra brownie points for it.

Overall Grade: B
We use this platform and recommend it to many of our clients. It strongest points are ease of use and how easily it can be integrated into your websites.

Constant Contact

Ease of Use - A+
Constant Contact is possibly the most easy to use of all the email marketing platforms.

Personalization of emails - B
The Personalization of the email messages is extremely limited. They offer only  3 choices all related to the name field and can only be added to top of email and not throughout the body or in the subject line.

Tracking  - C
Nothing outstanding in this department only the essential data – opens, bounces, and clicks.

Templates - C
Once again – I am not a fan of templated emails unless it is your own custom template that is tailored to your brand. The “off the rack” templates for Constant Contact look really generic. If you use one you are actually in danger of your business looking less professional.

Web Forms - C
You can customize the forms with different fields.  The design choice customizations are next to non existent. What I really do not like is the default way it is set up is to have a link or “button” or your website that needs to be clicked and then taken to a form. This gives your website visitor one more step to take and effects the conversion %.

Email Campaign Setup and Scheduling – A
It is super easy to set up, schedule and manage campaigns in Constant Contact. Also there is not a delay in sending the first welcome message.

Split Testing - F
Constant Contact does not currently offer split testing. Major Fail!

Pricing - C
Free for a 60 day trial after that it is $15 a month for 500 subscribers or less. The price then goes up incrementally based on the number of subscribers. I  graded this lower based on the the low grades in other categories. Although it is inexpensive it lacks a lot of features of similarly priced platforms.

Integration with other software - A
Constant Contact is integrated with over 150 other apps and services. So they deserve an A in this department.

Other Features - B+
Constant Contact offers added services such as Event Marketing, Services, Local deals, Surveys, and Social Campaigns . These services really can help a business have more than one avenue of online marketing. Similar services can be found ala cart via other companies however it is nice to have them “all under one roof “.

Overall Grade : C
The best feature of Constant Contact is it’s overall ease of use. It is inadequate in too many other areas. Especially lacking split testing which is essential to maximizing your campaigns especially as your list sizes grow. So sign up for it if ease of use is your main concern. If you are serious about tracking and maximizing your email campaigns however this is not the platform you want.

Mail Chimp

Ease of Use - B
When you first log in to Mail Chimp’s dashboard it can seem overwhelming. Luckily, the chimp is there to hold your hand to get you started. In a short time navigating the dashboard becomes easy. They also offer training courses to walk you through everything.

Personalization of emails - B
You can add various merge tags for personalization throughout your  email messages in Mail Chimp including the ever so important subject line.

Tracking - B
In addition to the standard reports opens, bounces, and clicks. Mail Chimp also offers an industry average comparison and campaign reach which incorporates social media to determine potential reach.

Templates - A
I still hold to my stance on templates mentioned earlier however , Mail Chimp has the best “not so cheesy” selection of pre designed templates. They also offer basic templates with only the layout determined and not the graphics. The basic templates let you have a layout without sacrificing brand integrity.

Web Forms - B
The form designer seemed a little cumbersome to me when I tried to move fields around and to delete a field you have to actually type the word DELETE into a box.  The design interface outside of the fore mentioned complaints is easy to use and offers many color themes and it will import the colors from your website which is pretty cool. As a web designer I also find it easy to customize the design of the forms after getting the initial embed code.

Email Campaign Setup and Scheduling –  B -
Mail Chimp’s campaign setup and scheduling process is easy. The one knock (and it’s a big one) is the one day delay  on the first email that goes out when someone signs up to your list. Which really makes it hard to offer sign up incentives such as downloads or coupons.

Split Testing - B - 
Mail Chimp does a good job with split testing you can test subject lines, from names, and date & time of delivery.  I wish they would give you complete control and let you test the body of the email as well. That would enable you to test different offers and calls to action.

Pricing  - A
Mail Chimp is free for the first 2000 subscribers and 12,000 emails a month. That is the best deal out of any of the email marketing platforms. It lets you basically start building your list for free. After 2000 subscribers the price goes up based on number of subscribers.

Integration with other software - A
Mail Chimp has a vast amount of integrations included  in those are most of the popular cms, ecommerce,  and crm platforms.

Other Features - A
Mail Chimp also offers many added features. One of my favorites is Social Pro. Social Pro which incorporates your mailing list with social data, so you can learn more about your subscribers. Find out who’s most connected, then send targeted campaigns to those subscribers with a single click. There is also Delivery Doctor, Geo-Location, and many others. Mail Chimp has the best “extra features” of any of the email marketing platforms.

Overall Grade :  B+
Mail Chimp gets a slight edge over Aweber due to the quality and amount of features, layout templates, and the unbeatable price. If it wasn’t for the limits on the split testing and one day hold on the first welcome message email I would have given them an A.

I give the edge to Mail Chimp when it comes to picking an email marketing platform. At SuperHero Marketing we use Aweber due to there not being a delay on the first email when someone signs up as we provide downloadable pdfs. We do not want our subscribers to have to wait to receive the information once they have subscribed. With that being said we also are using Mail Chimp to send our newsletter because we love all the features of Mail Chimp. If they would get rid of the delay on the initial email we would move everything to them. Aweber is an excellent platform and a great choice as an email marketing platform.  As for Constant Contact, we are not a fan despite the ease of use and  cool extra services they provide, they swing and miss on to many of the core features.

What business goals do I want my website to help me accomplish?

That is where the Heroes of SuperHero marketing come in.  We can help align your web strategy with your business goals. We want to get to know you and your business so that we can create a proper blueprint for launching , relaunching or redirecting your businesses web presence.  Let me take you through a scenario to better explain what we do.

Let’s say John owns a ACME plumbing company and is  looking to get a website. He thinks he needs one because most of his competitors have one and he  looks for businesses via Google. He assumes that if he gets a website than he  will be listed on Google and his business will increase. His plumbing company’s profits have declined over the last few years and he knows he needs to do something. John starts his search for a solution where else but online.

This is what he finds

• 1. Acme templates-  He can get a  template that can get “close” to his company’s branding. He can list his services, slap his logo and maybe a picture on it and be off and running. John thinks to himself  that this does not really seem like a solution.His concerns:

He takes pride in his business and brand and close enough has never been good enough in the past.

He does not want to appear as a business that would just “slap something up”. After all he has been in business for fifteen years with a great reputation and he does not just slap things up for his customers.

He wants a professional appearance that better represents his company.

• 2.  Acme web design- They have a lot of “pretty” websites on their portfolio page. They can build a “custom website” for his business but they mention nothing about actually helping him understand what the web site should do or what to do once the website is launched.His Concerns:

He wants more than a website. He wants a tool for his business not just a big AD thrown up online.

He wants to know how his website can help him grow his business.

This company seems to know a lot about design but little about marketing or helping his business succeed.

• 3.  SuperHero Marketing – Eureka! SuperHero Marketing’s  primary mission is helping his business succeed.

What he likes:

Superhero Marketing is concerned about my business objectives not just selling me a website.

Not one size fits all.

Provide more than just a website – they help devise a plan to make his business successful online.

They will explain and consult with him on a multitude of things such as video, social media, email marketing, search engine optimization, search engine marketing, blogging, sales copy, etc..

They provide measurements so that he knows how well his online campaigns are doing.

John decides he needs more than a website he needs a team of  Heroes.

If you are interested in web solutions for your business give us a call at 843-606-0336.