According to Wyzowl, 78% of video marketers say video has directly helped increase their sales. So, it’s no wonder so many businesses are choosing to invest in video marketing.
Of course, if you want to do video marketing right, it’s vital you know how to put together a good marketing video brief for your business.
Your video brief is an important document because it helps to ensure that you and your videographer are on the same page about the outcomes you’re hoping to achieve for your business and any limiting factors that need to be considered.
Without a video brief, you risk ending up in a situation where you and your videographer have very different ideas about everything. At best, this will waste your time and money. At worst, it could result in a video that damages your brand, rather than enhancing it.
As you can see, it’s important to ensure you know exactly what to include in your marketing video brief. That’s why we’ve put this blog post together – to share the five key things you should cover in your business’s marketing video brief.
1 – Define your objectives & target audience
Your video brief should explain the purpose behind your marketing video. In particular, you should describe the motivation behind your video and the outcomes you want it to achieve. For example, are you making a video to build brand awareness, or to generate sales? This is important, because a brand awareness marketing campaign looks very different to a sales-driven one.
In order to properly define and explain your objectives, you’ll also need to identify your target audience. To do this, you may want to answer some or all of the following questions: Are you targeting new customers or existing customers? Do they know your brand? What are their average demographic characteristics? What do they all have in common?
By covering your objectives and target audience in your brief, you’ll give your videographer a good idea about why you’re filming this content and who it’s for.
2 – Describe your style & voice
Every business and brand has a unique style and “voice”. Your marketing videos should reflect your business’s style and voice, so it’s important to describe these to your videographer.
To do this, consider sharing some basic information about your brand or business, then describe the style of communication you want reflected in your video. Is your business cheeky and daring? Is it responsible and reassuring? Perhaps it’s expert but approachable. Whatever it is, be sure to tell your videographer!
Understanding your business’s style and voice will help your videographer make the right artistic decisions when filming and editing your content. For example, if you want a fun and bubbly marketing video, your videographer may use more handheld footage to give the content movement and “life”. On the other hand, if you want a corporate and formal style of video, your videographer may choose to use fixed and static shots interspersed with smooth pans to create an appropriate feel and voice.
3 – Identify locations, participants & other key details for planning
Even if you’re just making a 30-second ad, your videographer will need to plan a shooting timeline and schedule for your marketing video. To do this, they need to know details about the people, resources, and locations you want to include. So, make sure you cover this in your brief!
When your videographer knows where you’ll be shooting, who you’ll be shooting, when they’re available, and anything else you want to include in your video, they can set up a shooting timeline and schedule with confidence. This plan should include shooting times that meet everyone’s availability, and allow for any necessary travel between sites for same-day shoots.
Of course, a shooting schedule isn’t just important for your videographer – it’s also important for you. And once you have a shooting schedule, you can ask for a timeline that covers editing and post-production as well, so you can be confident your marketing video will be delivered on time.
4 – Describe your desired visual mood & look
We already talked about your business’s “voice”, but it’s also important to get the look and feel for your marketing video just right. That’s why you need to describe your desired visual mood and look to your videographer in your marketing video brief.
The easiest way to communication the visual mood and look you want to create is to provide visual examples such as photos or links to other videos.
Understanding your desired visual mood and look will allow your videographer to plan the ideal time of day for filming, the ideal lighting conditions for indoor shoots, and the right colour grading and effects to use during post-production to create a marketing video for your business that matches your visual goals.
5 – Include your deadlines & budget
One of the biggest mistakes business owners make when they first begin producing marketing videos is to forget to outline deadlines and budget from the get-go. Don’t make the same mistake.
If you don’t discuss your deadlines with your videographer, they may take on the job when they don’t have the time to finish it by your due date. No videographer wants to inconvenience you in this way, and many would prefer to recommend other videographers who may be able to adhere to your schedule. But your videographer can only help you meet your deadlines if you discuss them first.
Similarly, your videographer needs to know your budget so they can advise you on how best to stick within it. For example, when your videographer knows your budget, they can make sure your marketing video is a job they can take on (or recommend you look elsewhere), they can leave out any extra “bells and whistles” that would blow the bank, and they can recommend any necessary changes to your brief that will allow you to stay in budget.
Get supported to create your video brief
At Starlight Media, we do everything we can to support you to create a video brief that will ensure we’re all on the same page for your marketing videos.
If you want that kind of support for your next video project, we need to talk!
Contact us today to discuss your plans for video marketing for your business.