Matt Cutts, Principal Engineer and head of Google’s web spam team recently spoke at a conference about this vary issue and said that Google is stepping up its efforts to index and show video content.

What does this mean for the average business?  Since the world is going online, and people would much rather watch a video than read text, you should probably have video on your website.  Also, you should talk to your web designer to see if you have a video sitemap on your website.  If your site is static or if you don’t have a blog attached to  your website, then you aren’t harassing the power of what Google like (fresh and relevant content).  Exit Row Productions can make a website for your business so you can post relevant content whenever you want, add your own audio or videos, embed videos (like we do here) and get noticed by Google, the world and your potential clients.  Go to the “Contact Us” page and drop us a line….we’d love to help!

1)  Customer Testimonials
We’ve all heard for years that it’s important to get customer testimonials for our website and literature.  But have you thought about getting those same happy customers on video?  Many people overlook this key way for other people to brag about you and your company.  No one likes to hear you go on and on about your company, but it will do wonders if someone that has used your product or services can say those great things on a short video.  You can put this on your website, Youtube, business card DVDs, and more.  Make it once and reuse it throughout your marketing campaigns.

A)  Here is a television commercial we shot that highlighted happy customers of the Dayton YMCA.  Your video could be 2 minutes per person so they can each tell their story…or it could look something like this.

B)  This is more traditional customer testimonial:

2)  Presentations
We have found great success in giving presentations at various networking and industry meetings.  It’s a great way to inform others on the trends in media (let us know if you need someone to speak at your meeting). Over the last few presentations we’ve recorded and combined it with our Powerpoint slides.  Now we can put it on our website, Youtube and countless other websites.  Go ahead, go to our website and see what we’ve done.  It has been a great way to send people back to our site. I’ve told people who were interested in video, Twitter, web SEO, etc to, “go to our website and watch the presentations we’ve done to learn more”.  Another great reason to put your presentations into video format is to help with your SEO (Search Engine Optimization. aka getting ranked higher in Google).  Since Google loves fresh, new, relevant content and puts a huge priority on video, then having your presentations put to video will greatly help others find your company website…which means they now know who you are, what you provide and how you can help them.  This has been incredibly valuable for us.
See some examples here:  Click here to see some presentations we’ve recently done.

3)  Video Case Studies
I’m sure that you have success stories about how you and your company saved the day with your product, service or customer service.  Why not create a video case study that walks someone through your processes?  We’ve all seen this done on paper and it is an effective way to help a potential customer see what you provide, but having it on video will only enhance who you are and what you do.  It will allow you to shine through and stand out from your competition.
This is a GREAT video that not only shows you a simple case study but it also shows the power of the combination of video and YouTube. 

You may haven’t thought of using video in these 3 ways.  There are countless other ways you can use video in your business.  Exit Row Productions strives to be creative by staying on the forefront of video and how you can utilize it in your business.  Let us know how we can help.

Website of the month: Zoho.com

Zoho is all you need as a small business owner. It is email, hosting, reports, invoicing, planning, sharing all done on a cloud. So it is all hosted online, and can be streamlined for your business. You can use many of the services for free with less than 3 people.

Here are the details
Where:
We continue in our NEW LOCATION– Champps Restaurant
7880 Washington Village Drive
Centerville, OH, 45459
When:
Thursday, May 20, 2010
7:30AM to 8:30AM

I hope you can attend this seminar. The information you’ll hear is both free and practical. Come and join us as we learn how to laugh at this recession, and explore how to operate our businesses more effectively and profitably.

Please note our NEW LOCATION— Champps Restaurant, 7880 Washington Village Drive in Centerville.

It’s a question we should all think about. It used to be that you would get your business up and running and one of the first things that you would get is some business cards printed. Now, it is an important thing to have your contact information available to those who need it. However, maybe we should think through what they are contacting us for. What is it about our business that will “wow” them once they get a hold of us.
With all of the technologies available to us now it is important to stay focused. Just as common as a business card these days is a website. The same rules apply for your website as a business card. You see, we spend a lot of time chasing the things that, “we are supposed to do.” There is one thing in common behind all successful marketing campaigns…..something worth marketing.
We think because we lay down a business card, build a website, make a video, launch a campaign, or start a twitter account that we will get business. A good idea for every business would be to make sure that once people come to them, there is something to keep them there. A website is only as good as the company, product, or service behind it. The same is true for a business card.
At Exit Row Productions we feel that video is a powerful tool. It can be used in all of the aforementioned forms of marketing, yes, even in business cards. So the answer to the question is ….no. Business cards are not dead. No matter what form of media we use, whether it be print, video, or web, they all adhere to the same principle of only being as good as what’s behind it. So, we can get people to come check out your business, service, or product. Once they are there it is up to you to convince them to stay!

Video of the Month:

Click Here

Web Pick of the Month:

Click Here

We’ve all seen people stranded on the side of the road. I’ve stopped to help a few but there are always time where I’d like to do more. What if a company made it their mission to help these people that are in trouble. Imagine, a company with vehicles that had their name plastered on the side of the van, that helped people on a regular basis? Wouldn’t that put a huge positive impression on both the person that was helped and all the passers by? Now, I know that this company couldn’t help everyone and maybe they started off just helping one person per week. Perhaps the owner would even get involved and pay the employee that stopped to help someone in need. I’m not talking a lot of money but enough to make it worth the employees time.

So, you have a boss who wants to help people and you have someone stranded that needs help. And even more, you have hundreds of passers by that notice the company van helping people.  By helping that person change a tire or take them to get gas, you will instill in people’s mind that you are there to help. And who do you think people will call when they need your service?  Would it be the company that helps people in their most vulnerable time, or a company that is selected at random from the phone book or online?

What a great way to help people while softly marketing to the masses.  It’s crazy but it just might work.

We’ve been telling people for a while now that they need to have a website that has: rss feeds, social media integration, blogs, video content and visitor participation.  Having a “Web 2.0″ website is all about interacting with the visitors to your site.  This helps by getting people involved on your site and it also helps with your Google rankings.
We are proud to announce our new website that offers all of the features that we advise people to have on their site.  So why are these aspects necessary?
RSS
By having rss (Really Simple Syndcation), people can “subscribe” to your website and be alerted every time something new is posted.  This means that people don’t have to magically know when you have new content on your site.  No longer can a business survive by pasting their outdated brochure onto their website.  People don’t want to have to go to your site every day and rss lets them stay in touch with you as needed.
Social Media
Social Media is booming and isn’t going away.  Without getting into all the facts and details, we can just let you know that it’s important to have this integrated into your website.  Your website, blog and social media should be seamless and all be directed back to your site…so you can make money…which is why all of this is important.
Blogs
Many people think of 17 year old girls writing out their latest drama on their blog.  This thinking has changed drastically as most large corporations have blogs directly from their CEO.  Since people want to be involved with you by writing comments to your blog posts.  The most transparent and real you can be, the more people can trust you as a person.  As you know, people do business with people they know and trust.
Video
Video content is important to you for several reasons.  First, people like to watch a video about the services and products you offer rather than reading about it.  Whether you like it or not, people’s attention span is only getting shorter.  Secondly, having videos on your site helps your Google rankings.  Google loves video…which is why they bought YouTube a few years ago.  By having videos on YouTube AND your website will help tremendously in people finding your company.
Interaction
Making sure your website is “web 2.0″ compatible means that people can interact with you on your site.  People expect interaction and want to communicate with you through leaving comments, seeing your posts on social media outlets or reading your newsletter.  It’s the best way to build a community around your business.  Remember, people don’t want to be sold to every time you communicate with them.  Feel free to let them know you’re a normal person that loves what they do and that has a life outside work (you do have a life outside of your job, right?).

Having our new website let’s us easily integrate all of the aspects above, which lets us move on to other important things like: doing our jobs, creating incredible videos for our clients, and enjoying the life we each have outside of our fun, little video production company called, Exit Row Productions.  If you would like to learn more about getting a new website that has all of the features above, or if you want to create a video to put on your website and YouTube, then give us a call.  We’d love to help.

Video pick of the month:

click here for the commercials.

When asked why they watch the Super Bowl, most viewers would likely respond by saying, “the commercials”. And who can blame them? Advertisers are spending big bucks on high concept, high energy and high profile spots. The commercials are an event to themselves; certain to live on as water-cooler conversation topics for weeks after the big game.

But 2010’s ad lineup is missing one of its key starters; Pepsi. The soda giant has pulled the plug on all Super Bowl advertising in lieu of a different approach, one that has more of a lasting impact than that big screen TV that crushed Justin Timberlake in one of last year’s spots. Pepsi is banking on a secret formula of online, social-media charity-something Pepsi hopes will be a refreshing change for its fans.

The interesting side effect of this marketing strategy is that numerous articles have been written and there is a buzz about Pepsi’s decision to take all of its Super Bowl spend and invest in an online, philanthropic  endeavor. Giving money away is great, but it’s not unique enough to merit an Exit Row newsletter. The big story here is that Pepsi is shifting the millions of dollars it would spend on a Super Bowl ad and putting it all in online efforts.

Pepsi has been doing Super Bowl commercials for the past twenty years, so this shift is a sign that the soda juggernaut is waking up and smelling the gigabits. With an overall $20 million dollar budget, there will likely be television spots to promote this initiative however these spots will certainly drive traffic to the www.refresheverything.com site.

Take a look at how your marketing and advertising budget is spent currently and throw out “the way we’ve always done it” mentality. In particular, investigate ways to harness the power that is the internet. Pepsi now has huge advantage here in that online media can be tagged and tracked, giving them measurable, key data to make informed choices about their products.

Make it your 2010 resolution to reinvent the way you reach your customers and let Exit Row guide you through the process.

Video of the Month:

We will be speaking on, “5 free resources to help you get more done…faster”.

To RSVP, e-mail: rpatel@fiveseasonssportsclub.com or call 937-848-9200

Our clients include the following organizations above and our videos have been seen on nationally broadcast television and internet channels.  We have done videos locally and nationally and can handle projects of any size.

In December 2009, ComScore Search Rankings Report found that YouTube’s searches had grown 35% year over year.  ReelSEO.com stated, “YouTube not only had 50% more searches than Yahoo web search and 180% more searches than Bing, but the number of searches at the online video giant made up almost 28% of the total searches on Google sites for Dec. 2009.”  By these stats, you can see the importance that YouTube has gained in the marketplace.  It’s no longer the place where only teenagers put videos of themselves goofing off.  It’s now become a place that your business has to have a presence.  Once on YouTube, we can see who is watching your video, where in the world they are watching and even how old the viewer is.  This is why we stress having a website with analytics along with videos that can be tracked.

Does your company take advantage of the fact that people are searching video both on Google and YouTube?  Have you put a video on your website and YouTube?  If not, you might be missing about 30% of the market that is searching for you.

*Give us a call to see how we can put your current corporate video on YouTube and your website…or, if you don’t any updated videos, then we’d love to help you create one.  Remember, videos online can be tracked and come with stats…can your brochures do that?

Merry Christmas!

Script and Editing by: David Hansen.

-11 BILLION videos were watched online in September 2009 alone.
-A small fraction of businesses have videos online.
-Those companies that do have videos online (both on your website along with other video sharing sites) have a distinct advance above those that do not.
-Customers find more value and importance with companies that have videos on their websites than those that don’t.

Exit Row Productions can produce high quality videos and host them, put them on your website, post them on other video sharing sites, create iPhone/iPod versions, make it into a podcast, as well as create a dedicated website for your videos. What if you could have your own Hulu.com or YoTtube site for your videos? We can do that. Click HERE is an example of a site we could create that would house all your corporate videos. It’s clean and professional and it will make your company stand out from the rest, and you will be saving money over companies that charge you $99/month to put your videos on a dedicated site.

Give us a call if you would like to learn more about how we can do this for you: 937.673.8450

To see what happens, watch the video below.

Is there a competitor that your customers are going to because it’s easier or cheaper? Maybe your competitor is the easy choice for people but your product is better in the long run (isn’t exercise on the stairs better in the long run, then a short term convenience of an escalator?). What can you do to make people aware of your products or services? Can you make the process interesting, fun, or memorable? Yes, this will take some thought, but isn’t it worth it? Imagine getting more customers just because you provide something different (think of what they did to the stairs in the video).

In an interview Siskel & Ebert said that since they watched about 5-10 movies per week, they could always tell when a good movie came around. But, in order for that to happen, it had to really stand out. All the bad and average movies mushed together in an unmemorable glump (is that a word?). But, when a really good movie came out, it was different than all the average movies. Seth Godin, calls this a Purple Cow. Wouldn’t you tell everyone you know if you saw a purple cow? It stands out and is very different from all the other cows you’ve ever seen. Is your business, product or service a purple cow? Aren’t you impressed when a company shows some personality, or they make things fun and interesting instead of being mushed together in an unmemorable glump. Which is your company, product or service?

So what are you doing that’s superior to the status quo? What stands out? What are you doing to make your product or service fun, interesting or a “purple cow”? Perhaps spicing up your website that separates it from your competitors will make you stand out. Would new creative business cards that look different and stand out from everyone else? Or maybe creating a video that isn’t a typical boring sleeper, but something people will be sharing with everyone on YouTube? I bet we know a company that can help you out!

PicsMatch is a facial recognition software that wanted to market itself in a new way. In stead of putting their money into print and television, they decided to let people make videos promoting the product. One of the guidelines was to make the videos in a low tech way without lighting, multiple cameras and paid actors. This project let us use our creativity without having to spend a lot of money. The contest was held on Youtube for 2 months. The top 10 videos with the most views were determined the winners. Our videos were the top 3 videos with the most views in the entire contest. Exit Row Productions was honored at the Film Dayton event on May, 15th. This was a lot of fun and we are excited to use the software to help tag, edit and publish our pictures.