5 Tips for Creating a Quick Client Video

Creating video for your clients doesn't have to be labor intensive, expensive, or highly produced. More than likely, the main ingredients are already at your fingertips.

Think of the points here as a checklist to evaluate how you can seize the opportunities that are right in front of you. As brand communications professionals we must be opportunistic to provide the best service to our clients. Fortunately, many of the tools you need should already be in your kit:

• A trend-identifying news sense
• Connections or access to influencers
• Access to permit-free "sets"

Here are my five keys to quickly creating video content for your clients. 

Be a connector

You're probably in the field of PR, marketing, and brand communications because you fit Malcolm Gladwell's definition of a Connector -- you're the kind of person who knows everyone. There is more than likely someone in your network - an expert or thought leader - who can become the talent for your client video. Maybe they can speak to the client's product or mission with authenticity (like a sponsored athlete) or they have a loyal audience that will embrace and help the content become instantly successful.

Seek out and utilize your connections, call in favors, and enable your friends to build their brand. 

Crowdsource on social

Script writing can be a huge barrier to producing video quickly. Not only does it require a copywriter but it means practice and memorization for the talent in your video. An easy workaround that also makes your video more social media-relevant is to crowdsource questions or feedback from your client's owned media channels. Fans and customers get to be a "part" of the video, only increasing your opportunity to incentivize views and shares while creating a more freewheeling "script" for your talent to follow. 

Understand client needs

Knowing your client's strengths and weaknesses will help you create opportunities that the client - because of limited resources or time - has not been able to execute on their own. Creating video for these opportunities that enhance your client's service or product, especially when tied to a sales season or product campaign, provides another resource for better brand awareness and share of voice. If your client is having trouble establishing a footing in a product category, for instance, showing their service and commitment with video is one of the best, most immediate ways for customers to learn. 

Enhance with PR

Publishers are leaning on brands all the time to get content that can be served to its readership, whether it is product or people-related. Not only are you providing your client with a valuable piece of marketing, you're also giving media something different than the expected press release or written pitch. And if it's a good enough piece of content, you've created the opportunity for an earned placement.

When you pitch client videos to editors, know that earning a story online is not the only measure of success. Social video (especially if the publisher has an active audience) can exceed the visibility and number of impressions even more than a traditional online placement.

Find relevance

If your client sponsors an event, creating video that involves one of the influencers or thought leaders who might attend is a simple solution. Go there and use the always-growing number of social video or live video streaming services like Meerkat, Hangouts on Air, Blab or Periscope. If you have the resources to create produced, edited content at (or prior to) an event, position your client contact to host. No one knows the brand better than him or her and enabling them to speak fluently to the public shows authority and credibility that can't be reproduced by outside talent.

Craig Randall is Integrated Services Director at Verde Brand Communications. Follow Craig at @craigrandall. Follow Verde: @verdebrandcomm