piksie!

You can think of my blog post today as a segue way to tomorrow's post in which I will talk about the thought processes we went through in picking the winning video in the Best Video Contest.

The first point I want to make is one that I've made a few times already but I want to underline it once again because it's very important.

:piksie.com is an online shopping site for consumer products and it's managed by people just like you.

This implies a few things and probably the most important one is that :piksie.com is NOT a video sharing site. Let me try to present this a little differently.

I'd like you to go through an exercise for me -- especially if you're a producer. I think you'll find this exercise very useful in improving the appeal of your videos.

Please go to your favorite video sharing site and watch a few product videos and pretent as if you're a consumer who is interested in making a purchase in that product category. Also pretend as if you do NOT know a lot about the product featured in the video or the product category in general. Then ask yourself, whether or not, the video you watched was helpful to you, specifically in the following areas:

• Did the video convince you to purchase the product featured in the video?
• Did you learn something from the video about the product or the product category that you did not already know about?
• Did you find the video biased or unbiased?

I often go through this exercise myself and unfortunately, I find the videos on video sharing sites somewhat "purposeless". Maybe I should further qualify my point and say, purposeless from consumers' stand point.

This is the key differentiating factor between videos featured on :piksie.com vs. other video sharing sites. They have GOT TO be useful to consumers. And for them to be useful to consumers, they have to:

1. Help educate consumers about a product/products
2. Give consumers unbiased information
3. Here's a very important one: The video must appeal to the type of consumers who would watch that video

Let me give you a specific example about this last point:

Let's say you want to make a video about an entry level point and shoot digital camera. Here are a few safe assumptions you can make when planning your video:

• Those who might be interested in this camera probably don't know much about photography. So concepts like aperture, ISO, depth of field are probably foreign concepts to those who will purchase this camera.
• This camera will probably appeal to those who will take vacation pictures, parties, graduation ceremonies, etc. In other words, it's highly unlikely that people will buy that camera and use it for fine art photography.
• Chances are people who may purchase this camera will make small 4 x 5 prints of the pictures they take

So, if you make a video and simply go through the specs -- ISO, shutter speed, file type, etc. -- in your video, you really are NOT providing much help to consumers. They can just as easily read the specs on the showcase channel page for the product. Actually, that would be faster to do.

If you want people to find your videos appealing, you need to "speak" their language. Don't mention the ISO settings. Tell people what the particular ISO settings of the camera mean to them. Tell them how the ISO settings of the camera will help them and under what circumstances.

Here's what I mean:

BAD:
This camera has a ISO setting of 100 - 1600

GOOD:
This camera allows you to take pictures under low light conditions. That's the meaning of ISO 1600. 

In other words, if you're making a video for a point and shoot camera, don't talk a lot about technical specs. Talk about what they mean to a user who will probably never use 80% of the camera's features. Chances are he/she just wants to be able to take simple pictures and is looking for an inexpensive and easy-to-carry camera.

On the other hand, if you're making a video about a pro/prosumer DSLR, then you need to go deeper and talk about the features that will make serious amateurs or professionals want to watch your video.

Unfortunately -- actually fortunately for :piksie.com -- you won't see a lot of videos on video sharing sites that satisfy these points.

The moral of the story is this: Identify the audience, then go backwards. Meaning, plan your video so that everything you include in your video will speak to them.