Effective Product Videos

A couple weeks ago I threw my hands up in despair over the number of companies out there whose websites, product videos, and white papers failed to answer the very basic question of “What do you do?”.  As best practices and marketing strategies go, this is a pretty poor one – especially if you’re looking to attract customers or looking for investors. (Hint: If I don’t know what you’re selling – I’m not buying.)

Then, I came across GNIP. I could tell you what they do but, really, they do a pretty good job of that themselves in their product introduction video (in 24 seconds no less):

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQN4k5-eW20]

Now, you’ll notice that this video is actually 1 minute and 22 seconds long- but if YouTube were to crash at the 24 second mark, someone watching could tell you what this company does and what pain point they address. The watcher wouldn’t have any details but they’d have a basic answer to the question “so what do you do?“.  Notice that they achieve this using nothing more complicated than a few slides and a clear, concise narration.

So, if you’re considering adding an introductory video to your site, consider this: If I only watch the first 30 seconds, will I know what you do?