If you’re considering a video production as part of your marketing strategy, it’s helpful for you to know how I’ll approach the project. In our initial meeting I’ll focus on fact-finding. I’ll gather basic information about your video. I don’t want to know anything about the content you have in mind at this point. Instead, I’ll ask questions about the circumstances surrounding its production and distribution.

Four important questions

My most important question is “What’s your deadline?” All our future decisions will hinge on the lead-time. A couple of months versus a couple of days makes a huge difference in the scope, preparation, and cost of the finished program.

The next question is, “How do you plan to display and/or distribute this video?” Our approach for a video designed for CD-ROM distribution is considerably different from the way we handle a video that you’ll display on the scoreboard at the local arena.

I’ll also want to identify the one person with absolute final approval. This factor is critical to whether or not your project will be successful. If you love what I produce but your CEO hates it—and your CEO is the final decision maker—your video may never see the light of day. So, to ensure its success, I’ll want to meet with your CEO as well to gain insight into his or her goals, objectives, and style preferences.

Finally, I’ll want to determine your primary and secondary audiences. Your primary audience will dictate the look, feel, tone, and complexity of the piece. This group is the main target for everything we’ll be doing. However, we don’t want to overlook the fact that other audiences often may view a video designed for one specific audience. If we know in advance who the secondary audiences(s) might be, we can adjust the content for broader appeal.

Influencing your audiences

With those four basic foundation questions answered, we can now talk about your video’s content. My job is to look beyond any preconceived ideas and determine your project’s main goal and supporting objectives. Of course, I’ll listen to your ideas, too. During our conversation, I’ll glean a lot of information I’ll use to clarify the goal and subsequent objectives.

One main goal may become obvious early in our conversation. If not, I’ll need answers to three very important audience-centered questions:

1. What do we want the audience to think?
2. What do we want the audience to feel?
3. What do we want the audience to do?

Answering these questions enables us to establish definable planned outcomes for your project. Otherwise, a video may go on for hours with little effect on the audience. Will it bore them? Entertain them?  Motivate them? 

Achieving a successful outcome

To ensure your project meets its goals, I’ll work with you to design the video with a particular audience response in mind. When we know who the target audience is and how we want them to respond, we can translate those responses into definable and achievable goals.

It’s not necessary for you to have a specific number of objectives to support your goal. But no matter how many you come up with, always remember that these objectives should serve one purpose and one purpose only—to assist in accomplishing the main goal. If they don’t, then it’s time to rethink the goal, the objectives, or both.

In the days and weeks that follow, we’ll build the script and production specs around your main goal and its supporting objectives. By doing this correctly, we’ll increase the likelihood of a successful outcome. In addition, you’ll have a clearly defined price, and you’ll see the value your project will bring to your marketing efforts.