Is there a secret recipe for an engaging marketing video? How much preparation do you need to do to come across as authentic and not sound like you are hard selling?
The secret is there is no rule of thumb; you will usually hear stuff such as have enough sleep before the shoot and always smile in front of the camera. But these are a mere fabrication of the true state of your personality. And when it comes to video, as much as you want to, you cannot fake authenticity.
If you think you have done an unsatisfactory work, then by all means do it all over again until you get it right.
But how do you build confidence so you need not sound like you are making up things as you talk while being interviewed on the camera?
Only talk about the things you are knowledgeable about
The only way you will come across as a trusted resource person is if you talk about the things that you are knowledgeable about. Your tone of voice will make or break your message. And as in any field of discipline, you cannot sound better than who you are.
Pay attention to the interviewer
As much as you can, pay less attention to the camera, it is an inanimate object that is as harmless as the mountain dew. Be on the same page as your interviewer, pay attention to his body language and hand gestures, you will learn to react naturally as you respond to how the interviewer talks to you.
Converse and don’t recite your line
When you are asked a question, and you realised you need to be politically correct in your statement, this poses a great challenge. You will sound like you are reciting something you read from a book, always do it in a conversational way. Never recite any line from your brain, it’s as simple as a coffee talk. You listen, you respond, you talk, you nod, you smile. Put this all into the mix and you would be done in no time at all.
Ask questions if you need to
One way to make the process conversational is when you ask a question once in a while. It’s natural that the interviewer will sometimes sound confusing if you need him to repeat and explain something, feel free to ask. Anyway, he has been asking you on the whole duration of the interview; it is probably just fair if you can ask your questions as well.
Start to appreciate the person in front of you.
It also helps to build confidence when complementing the person in front of you, or even the video crew, that is basically what human beings do, we appreciate the goodness around us. And believe me, there are a lot of things worth enjoying in a marketing video shoot so try to be generous enough and give appreciation when needed.
Life everything in your business strategy, once you embarked on creating video content, it takes patience and hard work, ask a few of your friends to give you honest feedback and compare it to the video crew’s feedback, you will then the big picture impact of your marketing video shoot.
And if you think you have done an unsatisfactory work, then by all means do it all over again until you get it right.
I hope you will learn to be more confident in your marketing video shoots as you go through the process over and over again, your level of confidence is part of your holistic strategy in building content that converts.
