(left to right: Jason Paul, Jonatha, Jill, Wayne)
Speakers:
Jill Hanner (@JillHanner) of Youtube fame
Paul McClay (@paulmcclay) of Definition 6, creators of the Happiness Machine
Wayne Sutton (@waynesutton) of Our Hashtag
Jonathan Kay (@GrasshopperBuzz) of Grasshopper, creators of New Dork
Session is about to begin, with Jason Keath moderating.
Introducing speakers (bios on Socialfresh ) and showing cool videos they’ve done. See New Dork’s own promotional video on YouTube then their Coca-Cola Happiness Machine also on YouTube.
Showing Jill’s YouTubeFame’s Sexy Beach Day Ruined on YouTube and leading into questions.
Moderator: Jill, you get edgy in your videos. How do you do this for Ford?
Jill: I push the line but I always think about my parents, if it’s OK for them. Ford is OK with it.
Moderator: What is one misconception brands have for doing video?
Paul: Brand perceive web distribution as free, as cheap, and they think production quality is relative to that. Not true. Quality of content needs to be better when your budget is lower to ensure people will want to share it.
Moderator: Explain what you mean by quality?
Paul: Quality of creative, of the story telling. Capture the opportunity this way.
Moderator: Jonathan, can you talk to this from the perspective of a smaller shop?
Jonathan: One example, we put people in our videos to make it about the people. It goes viral that way.
Moderator: Wayne, what about you?
Wayne: For me, work flow is important. Quality is important, but you need to know what adds value to video — short intro, transitions here there, simple cut, getting them the information they want and need.
Jill: I have over 20 million collective views on YouTube and it’s based on tag words, catchy photos in the middle.
Audience QT: Should you consider for internal purposes?
Paul: Cinnabon is a good example. They generated staff consensus.
Jonathan: We’ve used it a couple times, but you still have to be entrepreneurial. We started recording people internally who were passionate about their job and used it in hiring. Very successful.
Audience QT: How can companies use or not use hoaxes?
Wayne: It’s OK to create a persona if you are transparent but not to use the persona to trick people. When media outlets hear it and don’t know it’s a hoax, it’s waste of time. I don’t recommend it. A hoax vs. a fake persona are different. While some people say if no one is talking about you you’re not doing anything, but that’ s not true.
Jill: Example of Tequila company that was “stealing” Times Square ball to put in club making video to make it viral. It didn’t go anywhere because people didn’t get it. It needs to make sense.
Paul: It has to match up to your brand. Think about what the hoax is, how it conforms to your brand value, how will it evoke a response. It should start with your goals.
Audience QT: Can you talk about overproduction and how it gets too like a commercial? Coke Happiness Machine as example.
Paul (who made Coke video): We debate this a lot. What remains true in all our experience in video is that storytelling has to be at the foundation and production quality comes after that. For Coke, the production quality and investment didn’t impact it; as long as the story is good and conveyed, you have a point of variance.
Audience QT: What is your distribution strategy?
Paul: Seeding is phenomenally important. If you don’t have paid media budget, you need this. TubeMogul is example. You want to invest your own assets. Integrate people into the strategy to get outreach. Axe deodorant is an example of someone who pays to get to the top of the list and it becomes systemic.
Jonathan: An unpaid approach is this — I spend two weeks just investigating and contacting people one at a time. Wrote personal notes, “Hey Joe, saw that on Sundays you. . .” and I reached out to 500 people one-on-one and heard back from 80 percent. It sparked the start and was guerrilla.
Wayne: Agree with TubeMogul. Can’t understand why cites would prevent others from embedding video – don’t limit your video, don’t close it out. Reach out to your social crowd.
Moderator: Great point from Jonathan is finding the right audience.
Audience QT: There are budget constraints; what were these in your videos and how did you handle it?
Paul: There were no seeding dollars allocated to Coke Happiness Machine. It was tweeted by Coke, posted on FB — great case for the value of social assets in an organization. The outreach is very important and at an agency is can be expensive, and we were able to leverage Coke. They are a large organization, so we could use their networks. Think about the low hanging fruit and then go in to paid outreach such as PR. Also, if you have quality creative and good value, it will work. There was value in the sentiment. Coke later aired on TV during American Idol because the power of creative had been proven.
Jonathan: If I can comment on the agency side.. . . Two years ago, I wasn’t a smart kid. But I had passion. I believed in the brand and in the video. And that comes through to your contacts in the outreach.
Wayne: Don’t say “I can guarantee.” If someone says that, run. It’s different when you have channel or subscription base, then you can estimate. Make estimations realistic so you don’t go under or don’t overbid yourself.
Moderator: We’ve been building toward the goal of the video. Coke goal was sentiment, for example. What were they and did you reach goals?
Jonathan: People will hate me for saying this, but the goal of our video was not sales. It was 100 percent brand awareness. 1st was re-branding with our name – who is Grasshopper.com? Our second video was being the entrepreneurs, the New Dork.
Moderator: How did you judge it?
Jonathan: Word of mouth – so many people say, “Oh you’re the new dork!”
Wayne: The goal of our video was relationships. Use links from video back to you site, use content , to later drive sales and measure results. Set expectations.
Moderator: It’s not a clear equation to measure a video back to sales.
Paul: Again, it’s important to understand your objectives. I would argue that it is possible to drive sales. We worked on campaign for boutique brewery in NYC; what they did was made short 9 minute documentary on brewing process. It was insightful, it was how it was made in authentic fashion. They distributed it across Manhattan and only had 50,000 views but ALL were by people who lived in Manhattan and people who loved beer and were enthusiasts. And, video seeded PR. As long as your goal and creative match video is a way to do that.
Moderator: Jill, what about you and working with Ford?
Jill: I have a good relationship with Ford Motor Companies and I work a lot with them…I think the whole Fiesta movement was great, they measured it, it was to people who loved the car. So we took that social media success story to the dealerships.
Moderator: So the whole goal of Fiesta moving forward was to make people test it and want to buy it?
Jill: Yes, it’s great, and I really like the car, too, so everything I say is honest. That’s why I’ve grown a community that believes what I say — most of the time (laugh).
Moderator: Take a look at some of these YouTube videos and subscribers. Jill has 33,000.
Audience QT: How do you break through barriers with client when discussing all video’s challenges?
Wayne: A lot of times a client has an idea that they’d like to do it, and you’re just pushing them a long, which is my experience.
Paul: It starts with a business case. If you can come up with a creative concept that connects your business objective with your ad concept you’re half-way there. That’ s the nature of pitching.
Audience QT: I want to ask about Old Spice. Did it actually sell product?
Moderator: There are stories in AdAge, Wall Street Journal.
Wayne: I want to say something. Why does everyone ask about sales so soon? Give it some time. Give a social media ad campaign some time.
Moderator: Don’t get Wayne started on this! (laugh)
Moderator: That’s it, lunch time!
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