The uncertainties of a brand story video is beautiful
A tech company launched their new products recently and engaged me to shoot a video for them. Since they are fairly new in the market, I proposed a brand story video idea that will help them reach their audience. Unfortunately, my idea flatlined and my team and I acted according to our client’s brief. We made a product-focused video instead — showcasing the unique selling points of the products that placed them high up the throne. In short, a fancy video with flashy effects.
Generally speaking, there is no right or wrong when it comes to creating marketing content for your brand. I find that having the drive and consistency to put up quality content every day is the key to reaching your target audience in today’s over-saturated market, content is king.
However, I find that people tend to remember and resonate with emotions and stories more than numbers or statistics.
For example — A collar that helps your dog to poop at the right places.
Product Focus Video:
Shows how effective the product is and zooms in on the details of the collar and the technology that comes with it.
Beautiful product shots with proper lighting, and flashy after-effects to entice the customers
Cute golden retriever puppy popping at the right places
Call-outs of numbers and statistics, showing off the success rates
Cinematic camera movements with aerial shots and super slow motions
Brand Story Focus Video:
The founder talked about her product stories of how the idea came about.
Matching her stories with B-rolls.
”I love my dog but sometimes, she poops all over the place and It pisses me off!”
Pairing it with hilarious B-rolls (Action shots):
The founder screaming at her dog for pooping on the carpet.
Cleaning up the poop while the dog jumps on her.
Her kids laughing and chasing the dog away.
Showing her audience all the poop-stained carpet spots.
Conclusion
The advantage that a brand story video has over a product-focused video is the uncertainty.
A product-focused video is straightforward — crafting a strong vision, focusing on the unique selling points and target audience.
However, when it comes to a brand story video, it becomes uncertain because a majority of it deals with the storyteller’s emotions and no script or storyboard can complement that. This will open up more ideas and angles to flavour the video — angles that we have not thought of.
Let me give you an example:
The founder talks about his brand’s story of growing pink apples and we have come up with a storyboard and script together.
The founder talks about the procedure of growing a pink apple and what it tastes like.
However, somewhere down the line he might have touched a nerve or two and talked about what the colour pink reminds him of.
Sometimes, out-of-script situations like these will resonate with the customers because they can only come from the storyteller — not from my professional experience, topics that I would never have thought of.
Through my experiences, I find that having conversation interviews with my clients is far more effective than using fine-tuned scripts because it gives us the freedom of expression.
Picture this, we create a box and fill it up with ideas.
Creating a box and filling it up with ideas will create limitations.
Creating ideas first and then boxing it up will give us more freedom.
One thing that helped us was to create bullet points of topics that we wanted to cover.
This will prevent us from steering too far away from our path.
The uncertainties of a brand story video are what make it special.
Thanks for reading!
- Alfred Twj
