Mixing video and animation for powerful messaging

One of the emails in my inbox this afternoon was a blast message from Jim Messina, campaign manager for President Obama’s 2012 re-election bid. Because I was thinking about streaming video when the email came through, the message interested me from a professional point of view as much as for its intended purpose.

Two things struck me about this message. The first was that it featured video—perhaps a routine occurrence these days for HTML email campaigns, but incredibly effective nonetheless. And by video, I mean embedded video with a thumbnail image clickable directly from the email, not just a blue text link.

Here is how the email looked in my inbox. Notice the play button arrow clearly visible in the center of the image. We know we can click on it. There’s no guesswork.

I have to say, it’s tempting to click when you’re presented with a colorful thumbnail of someone who looks like he’s ready to give you the answer you stopped by his desk to find out. Which is of course, the whole idea. 
The second thing I noticed was the engaging nature of the video itself. Particularly considering it was produced in a hurry to deliver a message that would have a very short shelf life.

Let’s step back a moment, in my profession, I watch a great deal of corporate video. As a working producer and writer, I know firsthand how tricky it can be to use video as a medium for relaying abstract ideas. So I tip my hat to Mr. Messina for recognizing that he could only hold his viewers’ attention for short periods by talking directly to camera. And sure enough, he allows himself all of 10 seconds on camera before switching to graphics to tell us what he wants to share.

During the data-heavy portion of his message, he employs animated charts, graphs, and numbers to show various dollar amounts, quantities, and percentages. For abstractions such as organizations, activities, and relationships, he uses graphic builds, arrows, maps, and plenty of motion to underscore points. Finally, he chooses snappy transitions to keep things moving, coming back to his onscreen presence only a few times during the presentation and again at the end for a warm goodbye.

In other words, it is a graceful mix of live shots and animation produced on what would seem to be a very low budget. We’re not talking about commercial CGI like Avatar here, but something simple and appropriate for corporate messaging. What I like best about this approach is its nimble affordability for getting key messages out to a brand audience and achieving better click-through results than text-based or static-image emails typically deliver. 
What does it take to produce a campaign video like this? It’s less about dollars than about having the right concept, supporting information, and understanding to get it done.

Before doing anything, consider your audience. Who are they, what do they want to know, and how do you reach them? How best can you convey the information they’ll find relevant? How will you measure success? Once you have those answers, you can move on to writing, producing, distribution, and analytics.

For the live shoot such as this one, you’ll need your completed script, the subject-matter expert ready to talk, a quiet location, a teleprompter, and some basic equipment: camera, lighting, sound, and computer support. Depending on your location, you might not even have to light the set, but the picture generally will be prettier if you do. The most critical component of the shoot is actually the sound. Viewers will forgive almost anything about the picture if they’re interested enough in the message, but will absolutely turn off if they can’t hear what's being said. Notice in the image above that Mr. Messina is wearing a lavalier (lav) microphone clipped to his shirt for better sound quality than a camera microphone would deliver.

For this video, lighting has been used, although it probably isn’t elaborate. You can see a nice amount of light on his face, hair and shoulders, which brightens the image and prevents that greenish cast we encounter all too often from webcam video.

After recording and downloading the digital files from the shoot, you’ll need some form of video editing capability to finish the job—plus motion graphics capability to make a video comparable to this OFA piece. Motion graphics can be done in-house if you have the right skills, tools, and patience. Or, you can find an experienced post-production house to take care of it for you. In truth, the graphics in this campaign video look very polished—I would expect to find a trained designer’s hand at work here. But many graphic animations are easily done in consumer-grade applications like Keynote and PowerPoint, and these can be exported as QuickTime files for use in easy-to-use video editing software like Final Cut Express or iMovie. You might be surprised at the quality achievable with inexpensive tools. And today’s audiences don’t always demand sky-high production values. (Well, okay, they’ll love it if you give it to them. After all, who wasn’t slack-jawed at the Old Spice Guy ads?) But for corporate news and points of view, audiences are likely to be satisfied with a sharply focused, audible and timely message.

To complete the delivery portion of the job, you’ll have to encode your video correctly for export. You’ll also want to determine key words for your search campaigns and analytics.

Finally, you’ll upload the work to your handy YouTube account or perhaps to your own enterprise streaming video platform that supports video embedding and social media sharing. If an email blast is to be sent, you might turn to a vendor that embeds video— Constant Contact, for example, if you’re a small business—or to an in-house HTML email marketing solution if you’re a large enterprise marketer.

And, voila! You’re in full campaign mode and ready to keep your audience entertained, informed, and sold on your brand. Will your campaign bring in $86 million in three months as the OFA reported here? Who knows? But we do know that all the famous brands of our day started somewhere. Even the President’s.

To see the OFA video for yourself, go here.